Expectation Vs Experience Job Roles Management

This literature review explores the four dominant areas of the research, expectation vs experience, important dimension of choosing an airline, Leadership to have a clear vision to achieve set objectives and process management.

All airlines are making every attempt to deliver outstanding service levels to all its customers to have an edge over with other competitor airlines, the key is the company's total approach towards address the customers mind set and its need as customers are buying complete package of service and that all its components have to excel in every way.

Top management has to play a major role in the educating and motivating the front line staff and up (Bottom Up) to deliver service excellence in their respective areas. Perhaps management has to continuously work on the processes and review periodically to achieve expected performances.

3.2 Expectation Vs Experience:

Too often customer satisfaction is reduced to a simple equation that compares customer expectations to customer perceptions (E-P = Opportunity).

In fact, there are many contexts and points of view relevant to the discussion of customer satisfaction. For instance, other than E-P, other key facts that inform customer satisfaction are company vs. competitor comparisons, company vs. comparable company comparisons, service execution versus brand promises and service execution versus loyalty goals. Applying a variety of measurement methods to capture these other indicators may be just as important-if not more important-than E-P.

3.4 Definition of Dimension - Scope, size, extent a problem of enormous dimensions, in this context it refers to the scope that consumers have choosing the services of an airline.

3.5 Definition of Leadership - has been described as the "process of social influence in which one person can enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task". Definitions more inclusive of followers have also emerged. Alan Keith of Genentech states that, "Leadership is ultimately about creating a way for people to contribute to making something extraordinary happen." According to Ken "SKC" Ogbonnia, "effective leadership is the ability to successfully integrate and maximize available resources within the internal and external environment for the attainment of organizational or societal goals."

3.6 Definition of process management - is a holistic management approach [1] focused on aligning all aspects of an organization with the wants and needs of clients. It promotes business effectiveness and efficiency while striving for innovation, flexibility, and integration with technology. BPM attempts to improve processes continuously. It can therefore be described as a "process optimization process." It is argued that BPM enables organizations to be more efficient, more effective and more capable of change than a functionally focused, traditional hierarchical management approach. An empirical study by Kohlbacher (2009) indicates that BPM helps organizations to gain higher customer satisfaction, product quality, delivery speed and time-to-market speed.

3.7 Definition of Asses

In this context to establish service value for something, for example, a user of the service compares the service level between two airlines.

3.8 Definition of Cargo - Cargo refers to anything other than passengers carried for hire, including both mail and freight.

3.9 Definition of service levels - A measurement of the performance of a system or service. The service level is usually expressed as a percentage of a goal; for example, the percentage of time a network or system is operative or the percentage of successful transactions processed.

3.10 Air Cargo Industry in Sri Lanka

With time-definite international transactions, production flexibility and speed

characterizing much of the new economy, it is nearly certain that air cargo will play an

increasingly vital role in the global economy. No other means of transportation is better

equipped to meet the economic realities of the new era where global sourcing and

selling, and just-in-time logistics, require that producers receive and ship smaller

quantities more frequently, quickly and reliably over long distances.

Global exports (by volume and value) have outpaced production (by volume) which has,

in turn, outpaced economic growth indicating a substantial restructuring of production

and distribution.

With McKinsey estimating that the 20 percent of manufactured goods that are traded

Internationally today will rise to 80 percent by 2020, the air cargo industry is poised for

continuing rapid growth at an expected rate of 5.9 percent annually for the next 20 years

( according to recent estimates by Airbus) and at 6.2 percent (according to analyses by

Boeing).

Our focus here is how operational reforms in the air transport industry, combined with

air rights liberalization and continued improvements in supply and distribution practices,

will allow air cargo to expand its geographic spread - primarily to the southern

hemisphere - and deepen its product mix, thereby further accelerating economic

development and the diffusion of prosperity.

The evolving organizational form of the air transport industry

The air transport industry is already quite large. Korean Air, Lufthansa, Singapore

Airlines, Cathay Pacific, and China Airlines are the largest combination passenger

cargo carriers, measured by tons of capacity. American Airlines and United Airlines

provide substantial cargo service without the use of dedicated freighters. Several,

particularly European, airlines such as, Lufthansa, Air France, and KLM, have

particularly broad geographic coverage, offering service to more than 50 countries each.

That level of service has been valued by a significant segment of the air cargo market to

the point that integrated express now accounts for an estimated 11 percent of the

international air cargo market. In the United States, air express actually accounts for

over 70 percent of all air cargo shipments, despite its premium cost, and the average

weight of each shipment has now risen to approach six pounds. FedEx, UPS, and DHL

are the largest integrated air express companies with operations in over 200 countries

each and 952,000 employees, collectively. They own or operate 677, 577, and 420

aircraft, respectively, placing each among the largest airlines in the world and they

serve over 300 airports internationally.

Transparency and time-definite services are increasingly becoming expected by

shippers and consignees. In a 2003 study, The International Logistics Quality Institute

found that 70 percent of the 800 companies surveyed would incur significant supply

chain problems if their intercontinental air freight shipments were even one or two days

late. Fully, 73 percent of respondents expected time-definite service to be common in

the future. The backbone task of the air cargo industry will increasingly be in providing

high-quality service for routine shipments.

In an attempt to fill this demand and to answer the innovations of the integrated express

carriers, the airline-forwarder-handler coalitions are now increasingly offering timedefinite services. Airlines have attempted to streamline cargo services by introducing

three major air cargo portals (booking platforms): Europe-focused GF-X (Global Freight

Exchange), North American-oriented CPS (Cargo Portal Services), and Asian-allied

Ezycargo.

3.11 Understanding a Service:

Definition of service - A service or an act or performance that one party can offer another that is essentially intangible and does not result in the ownership of anything. (Kottler)

3.12 Features of a service:

Intangibility - The inability to touch and feel the production of the service.

Inseparability - Cannot separate the service provider from the consumer

Variability - Every time a service is performed, it will vary depending on the service provider or other factors.

Perishability - One cannot store service.

3.13 Definition of service quality

The following are some of the definitions given by some researches that have pioneered the service quality theory.

The perceive service quality will be the result of an evaluation process in which customers compare their perceptions of service delivery and its outcome against what they expect" (Christian Gronroos :1984)

The discrepancy between customer expectations and perceptions of service (Parasuraman, Zeithamal and Berry 1988)

The above definitions clearly identify two components of service quality. They are

Expectations of the service

Perceived performance of that service encounter

Service quality is essentially the gap that consumers experience between the expectation of the service and the perceived performance of the service experience. Based on the above definitions and the two essential components of service quality, the gaps that a consumer could experience could be conceptually presented as follows

3.14 Types of Service Quality GapsService Quality

Perceived performance by the Customer (as a consequence of the service encounter)

Customer Expectations of the Service

GAP

3 Types of Gaps

Positive Gap

Expectations < Perceived

Of the service - Performance of the service

No Gap

Expectations = Perceived

of the Service - performance of the service

Negative Gap Expectations > Perceived

Of the service Performance of the service

As one may see, there could be three types of gaps in measuring service quality. A "negative gap" could be where the perceived performance of the service delivery falls short of the customer expectations. A "no gap" is a situation where the perceived performance of the service matches with the expectations. A "positive gap" is where the perceived performance of the service is higher than the expectations. A negative gap is one major factor that could lead to customer dissatisfaction. A no gap situation would influence customer satisfaction and a positive gap may influence customer delight.

It would be interesting to further understand the two components of service quality in brief.

3.15 Customer Expectations:

Customer expectations refers to a situation of outcome that is expected in the minds of the customer

These expectations are both intrinsic and extrinsic in nature

Intrinsic refers to self generated factors within an individual examples could be the desire to progress building savings, security, respect.

Extrinsic refers to explicit rewards. Examples could be such as higher interest rates, gifts, prizes for competitions etc.

Customer expectations are influenced by - Income, family background, educational levels, wealth, status in society, age, group, cultural, setting, heredity, many more.

3.16 Customer Perceptions/ Experiences:

Customer perceptions/experiences about the Airline is based on a concept called Moment of Truth (MOT)

MOT is a brief action or instant connection between a customer and the airline.

Sometimes it could even be seconds while at times it could be minutes/hours.

It creates an impression / perception about the airline in the mind of the customer.

At every contact point, it is important that the airline manage this MOT.

Perceptions that are created over time will be reinforced in the minds of the customers.

These perceptions would then become stereo types

Once stereo types are formed it is difficult to change them, as the human mentality would block any new thoughts being perceived.

3.17 Customer Satisfaction:

Customer satisfaction will be an outcome of the interaction between customer expectations vs customer experience.

Pillars of Customer SatisfactionCustomer Expectations Customer Perceptions / ExperienceGapsNegative Gaps

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