A Comprehensive Approach to Job Performance in the Service Sector: A Systematic Literature Review

Abstract

The service sector currently employs the largest portion of workers in the world and stands out due to the nature of labor in this context. This study aimed to produce a systematic multicriteria review on job performance in the service sector. We selected 50 articles in accordance with relevance criteria comprising recentness, citations, and journal’s impact following the Methodi Ordinatio protocol. The articles were analyzed based on the components described in Campbell’s theoretical model. All studies adopted survey as data collection technique — most of them collecting from more than one source — and 11 studies combined survey with other techniques. Only a fifth of the studies included three out of eight of Campbell’s performance dimensions, the larger proportion, though the majority was restricted to only one dimension. The performance determinants often outnumbered the performance measures adopted. The review showed considerable fragmentation as well as neglect of some of the phenomenon dimensions foreseen in the theoretical model. We outline theoretical and methodological guidelines such as longitudinal studies and the need for instruments that cover the phenomenon in its entirety in order to advance the research on the subject.