The Bright Side of Stressed Frontline Employees in Service Recovery: The Combination Causes of Organizational Empowerment and Self-Regulation Processes

PURPOSE: This study aims to extend the previous research on the structural relationships between organisational empowerment and frontline employees’ behaviours by exploring the role of the self-regulating processes and its impact on service recovery performance (SRP). METHODS: This study adopts fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). Following the procedure of applying fsQCA, including data calibration, truth table construction and fsQCA analysis, the 287 dyadic data from the express mail industry was collected and analysed. RESULTS: The findings show that organisational empowerment is a sufficient antecedent for high SRP, especially in cases involving frontline employees with strong service recovery awareness and positive work engagement. Moreover, in the context of organisational empowerment, a reasonable level of emotional exhaustion represents a positive impact on performance in service recovery. CONCLUSION: This study offers some comprehensive insights for practitioners to empower stressed frontline employees and monitor their emotions and behaviours using appropriate approaches.