Abstract
Various studies examined the effects of employee behaviour in specific service contexts. However, research fails to provide comprehensive results in different types of service situations, which is addressed in this research. Assuming that employees represent leaders guiding customers through a service situation, this research supposes that the results of Fiedler’s leadership contingency theory, stating that a leader’s success depends on leadership style and leadership situation, also apply to a service context. Analogous to Fiedler, the effectiveness of employees task- and relationship-oriented behaviour in different types of service situations is tested (n = 315). Situations varied between their employee-customer relationship, the interaction’s inherent performance structure and the employee’s personal power. Results confirm that the advantageousness of employee behaviour for employee’s overall success depends on the type of situation. However, contrary to Fiedler, irrespective of the type of service situation, relationship-oriented behaviour is more effective for employee’s overall success than task-oriented behaviour.
