Customer Orientation of Service Employees: A Case Study of Iranian Islamic Banking (Based on COSE Model)

Abstract

With the performance of service personnel often constituting a major element of a service per se, the customer orientation of service employees (COSE) is often regarded as a main determinant of service firm's success. The purpose of this study is Understands how customer orientation (CO) of service employees (SE) affects customer satisfaction (CS), customer commitment (CC), customer retention (CR) and increasing service quality (SQ) in Iranian Islamic banking sector. This is based on 300 responses collected from customers using Iranian Islamic bank service in three provinces (Khorasan-e Razavi, Khorasan-e Shomali & Khorasan-e Jonobi), in private and governmental sectors. The results show that customer orientation of service employees (COSE) has no impact in customer retention in Iranian Islamic banking. Therefore, other hypotheses accepted. There are important variables in the service sectors that affect customer quality perception. This paper draws on the conceptualization suggested by Henning-Thurau and Thurau and tests model of COSE dimensions (Technical and Social Skills, Motivation and Decision Making Authority) and customer–sided consequence in Islamic banking in Iran.