Cumulative operational capabilities in customized services: an exploratory study from the performance perspective

Abstract

The relationship between the competitive criteria has been an issue for recurrent debate in the operations management literature. Recently many studies have shown that, based on cumulative capabilities model, the competitive criteria may be interrelated. However, results and conclusions from these studies are based on empirical data from operations and production managers’ opinions in companies producing goods, characterizing an internal organizational perspective. Differently from those previous studies, this study aims at exploring the relationship between the competitive criteria of companies producing services from an external perspective using empirical data from customers’ opinion. The main argument is that the development and improvement of competitive criteria have consequences for customer satisfaction. Data from customer satisfaction survey conducted with 243 customers of customized services were used to test the relationship between the competitive criteria. Structural equation modeling was used to test the relationship among the variables. Results show that the competitive criterion quality and the customer service affect the delivery and maintenance of services as well as their delivery time.

Keywords: capabilities, competitive criteria, services, customization, performance.