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G. Ronald Gilbert: G. Ronald Gilbert is at the Department of Management and International Business, Florida International University, Florida, USA.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT: With regard to "Measuring internal customer satisfaction" for publication in Managing Service Quality, although copyright for the article is assigned to MCB University Press, MCB University Press agrees not to limit in any way the author's use of the descriptors of factors used in the study.
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the effectiveness of the perceived performance of work units based on the perceptions of those they serve in the organization - their internal customers. The paper will identify measures to assess internal customer service and test the degree to which employees who comprise the internal teams can accurately predict how effective they are from the perception of their internal customers.
Background
To survive in highly competitive markets, organizations need to provide goods and services that yield highly satisfied and loyal customers. When customers are satisfied, they are more likely to return to those who helped them, while dissatisfied customers are more likely to go elsewhere. The retention of very loyal customers is key to organizational survival (Jones and Sasser, 1995). Thus, organizations are challenged to create demand for their products and services through outstanding customer support. To attain sustained excellent external customer support requires internal systems that are aligned to serve the external customer, with each internal subsystem adding value to others within the organization who are dependent on it; as though the other subsystems were its customers (Deming, 1986).
Extensive research has been conducted on the characteristics and quality of organizational effectiveness from the perspective of those who are the organization's external customers (Parasuraman, et al., 1988; Zeithaml, et al., 1996; Fisk, et al., 1993; Bojanic, 1996; Nicholls, et al, 1993, 1998; Taylor, 1994). Much less has been reported about organizational effectiveness from the perspective of internal customer satisfaction. Yet, effective internal supplier-to-customer relations are essential prerequisites to the level of quality service that yields sustained external customer satisfaction, loyalty, retention and long-term financial success.
As depicted in Figure 1, the service-profit chain focuses attention on the causal relationships between the quality of the organization's internal systems that lead to satisfied and loyal employees who, therefore, provide better...