Despite these disagreements on certain aspects of service-quality determinants,
there is agreement regarding the importance of service employees. Service employees
are frequently referred to as the “face” of a service organisation, and they have been the
subject of much research – particularly with respect to their role in achieving customer
satisfaction. Customer satisfaction can be defined as the “customer’s response to the
evaluation of the perceived discrepancy between prior expectation and the actual
performance of the product as perceived after its consumption” (Tse and Wilton, 1998,
p. 204). Research has shown that motivated employees are more likely to have a clear
understanding of the importance of service quality and are therefore likely to provide
superior service which, in turn, positively influences customer satisfaction