Creating Reciprocal Value Through Operational Transparency
通过实地和实验室实验，研究在餐饮服务中引入运营透明度（让顾客看到操作过程、让员工看到顾客）如何提升顾客感知的服务质量和员工效率，并带来22.2%的质量提升和19.2%的耗时减少。
We investigate whether organizations can create value by introducing visual transparency between consumers and producers. Although operational transparency has been shown to improve consumer perceptions of service value, existing theory posits that increased contact between consumers and producers may diminish work performance. Two field and two laboratory experiments in food service settings suggest that transparency that (1) allows customers to observe operational processes (process transparency) and (2) allows employees to observe customers (customer transparency) not only improves customer perceptions but also increases service quality and efficiency. The introduction of this transparency contributed to a 22.2% increase in customer-reported quality and reduced throughput times by 19.2%. Laboratory studies revealed that customers who observed process transparency perceived greater employee effort and thus were more appreciative of the employees and valued the service more. Employees who observed customer transparency felt that their work was more appreciated and more impactful and thus were more satisfied with their work and more willing to exert effort. We find that transparency, by visually revealing operating processes to consumers and beneficiaries to producers, generates a positive feedback loop through which value is created for both parties. Data, as supplemental material, are available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2015.2411 . This paper was accepted by Serguei Netessine, operations management.