Boundary spanner consumption of organizationally provided support services: A communication/socialization perspective

The effectiveness of organizations is determined by the performance of boundary spanning (sales and service) employees, who are responsible for delivering value to customers and generating revenue. Boundary spanners' capacity to satisfy customers is critically dependent on organizational support. The provision of successful, value-delivering organizational support services poses effectiveness/efficiency tradeoffs. The literature underscores the importance of investing in high quality support-service provision. However, organization's resources are wasted if employees do not obtain value from effective support-service consumption (e.g., if employees are not satisfied and do not use the services). The flexibility and capacity of support services to completely satisfy employees is limited by cost and operational efficiency constraints. Employees may not appreciate and use support services unless they are educated to understand and accept the organization's support-service system.; Drawing from organizational communication and socialization theory, this dissertation addresses the following objectives: (1) to explore the concept of boundary spanner consumption of organizationally provided support-services, (2) to conceptualize and empirically investigate the impact of a support-service communication/socialization mechanism for enhancing the effectiveness of boundary-spanner support-service consumption, and (3) to study the influence of the boundary spanning job-related role context on employee socialization to and consumption of the organizational support services. The empirical study consists of a mailed survey of the nation-wide salesforce of a large Midwestern financial investments services firm. The investigated support service consists of the facility support that this firm is completely outsourcing from a commercial real estate partner. A sample of 989 boundary spanners reported on their experience with the facility support services during their new office opening process.; The results indicate that boundary spanner support-service consumption is impacted by: (1) effective socialization to support services (acceptance of support service goals and role behaviors and appreciation of service provider's customer orientation); (2) high communication quality during the service delivery process; (3) employees' perception of the organization's supportiveness of the boundary-spanning role; and (4) employees' level of psychological empowerment. This research provides a better understanding of the internal service exchanges in organizations and the factors that contribute to boundary spanner effectiveness. The dissertation provides specific theoretical and managerial implications.