Impacts of customer incivility and abusive supervision on employee performance: a comparative study of the pre- and post-COVID-19 periods

Abstract

The purpose of our study was to assess the effects of customer incivility and abusive supervision on employee performance during the pre- and post-COVID-19 periods. Our two-wave panel data collected from South Korean frontline service employees revealed that the indirect effect of customer incivility on job performance through emotional exhaustion became more pronounced after the onset of the pandemic. Furthermore, during the pandemic, customer incivility exerted a greater indirect effect on job performance through emotional exhaustion than abusive supervision. These findings offer insights for effectively managing frontline service employees’ stress in times of crisis, including pandemics.