Quality-focused management of tourism and hospitality industry services is vital, in order to ensure such services meet customer requirements and achieve the organisational goals of the business offering them. The Chinese-language stream of IFTM’s Tourism Retail and Marketing Management Bachelor’s Degree Programme dedicates a full course to this subject, via experience-based study that blends in-class teaching of academic theories with hands-on assignments.
The course on Service Quality Management is led by IFTM adjunct faculty member Mr. Geraldo Tou, and is offered to Year 4 students. It aims to stimulate teamwork and promote critical thinking, making use of field trips and on-site observation to give undergraduates opportunities to apply in practice what they have learnt in the classroom.
The Chinese-language stream of IFTM’s Tourism Retail and Marketing Management Bachelor’s Degree Programme is presented via evening classes. That means that many students are working adults, some with professional experience in retailing. This helps enrich group discussion in relation to the Service Quality Management course.
In academic year 2021/2022, students enrolled on the course were invited to take on a debate project, followed by a stint as ‘mystery shoppers’ via what is known as a ‘retail walk-through audit’. The overall goal of the 2 exercises was for undergraduates to get an insight into service quality management and concepts including customer satisfaction and loyalty.
The question selected by Mr. Tou for the debate project was: ‘Should retail shops offer service guarantees?’. The class was divided into 6 groups, with 3 arguing ‘yes’ and the other 3 arguing ‘no’. Each group had to collect and analyse data – with a view to supporting their position – regarding how retail firms link up with customers, and how retailers can have an influence on customers’ purchasing behaviour.
IFTM undergraduate Xiao Lili was part of one of the groups arguing in favour of shops offering service guarantees. She says it was her first time participating in a student debate. “I had no idea about how a debate works, but Mr. Tou guided us, step by step,” she says. “I learnt that the most important thing in a debate is to be clear about your own argument, and be determined in defending your position.”
Students Sofy Su Yahong and Melody Chen Chen were on one of the teams opposing the idea of a service guarantee. Both say it was initially challenging for them to find arguments to support this position, since they personally were in favour of such guarantees. “But when we started to search for examples, we found that actually some brands are not providing service guarantees to customers; nonetheless, they still attract buyers,” says Sofy. “In the long run, service guarantees might not be the most essential element for a company’s success,” she adds.
Melody says being in a team arguing ‘against’ made her see things from a new perspective. “If we are talking about ‘service quality management’, it seems a bit contradictory to stand for the negative,” she says. “But we can see that a successful brand does not only rely on service guarantees: it is important, but there are other important elements.”
The 3 students agree that taking part in a debate was quite different from other projects they had completed at IFTM. “We could control the content of other projects. A debate requires interaction and immediate response to challenges from our counterparts regarding our arguments or examples. There are a lot of things in a debate that we cannot control, making preparation demanding,” says Melody.
The students add that, regardless of whether debating in favour or against, all teams came up with interesting arguments that led the class collectively to broaden its views on service quality management.
Auditing service quality
In the retail walk-through audit with mystery shopper element, undergraduates had to visit a selection of businesses and complete a service quality survey on them. They also had to offer comment on the overall service experience, and propose suggestions to improve the service quality of each visited outlet.
Student Lili says her mystery shopper role made her aware of a number of important details that can affect a customer’s experience of service quality in a shop. Lili, who combines her studies with a job in retailing, adds that the project led her to review her own work performance, and helped improve it. She says that the practical project made it easy for students to understand several concepts related to service quality management, and how to apply them directly to real-life situations.
Sofy and Melody visited a restaurant for their walk-through audit. “We made records of every detail, from entering the car park up to finishing our meal and leaving the shopping mall,” Sofy says. The project – once completed – gave her “a detailed picture of all aspects related to service quality”. Sofy adds: “There are a lot of small issues in a business that customers might not notice, but that might still need improvement.”
Melody praises the overall hands-on approach of IFTM’s course on Service Quality Management. “For completing the debate and the mystery shopper audit projects, we needed to collect data and go on field trips,” she says. “Equipped with the systematic knowledge gained in the classroom, we could evaluate objectively the overall service process” of different businesses, she adds.
