Customer Orientation of Bank Employees and Culture

The competitive nature of the financial services market has placed increased importance on the satisfaction of customer needs. This study considers the customer orientation of the customer contact personnel in four banks. Specifically, the relationships between employee motivation, satisfaction, and role clarity, and customer orientation are assessed. Findings indicate that motivation, satisfaction, and role clarity are all directly related to customer orientation. However, when these variables are considered together, motivation and role clarity appear to have the greatest impact on the customer orientation of employees. In addition, tellers were found to be less satisfied and motivated than other customer contact personnel. Managerial implications based on these findings are also discussed.