Improvisation in service performances: lessons from jazz

Purpose The purpose of this article is to establish the efficacy of jazz improvisation as a useful metaphor to understand and implement features that contribute to excellent service performances. Design/methodology/approach The paper begins by presenting services as performances that often require flexibility and adaptability in their enactment. It then offers the metaphor of jazz improvisation as a means to comprehend and communicate the dynamics of such flexibility and adaptability. Jazz elements are used to illustrate their application to service delivery issues. Practical implications Similar to jazz, services deal with complex and real time delivery circumstances; this makes services prone to uncertainty at the service encounter. Lessons from jazz offer service managers guidelines for improvisation by each player in their ensemble that can enable them to adapt to customers and produce a coherent and cohesive performance. Originality/value The jazz improvisation metaphor offers a template and guidelines to comprehend and enact principles pertaining to adaptability in services contexts that may be useful for managers in designing service delivery and training frontline service employees.