Call for papers for a Special Issue of Service Business journal.
“Implementing Industry 4.0 Technologies in Services: Challenges and Reinventions in Service Business”
Guest editors: Belanche D., Belk R., & Flavián C.
Submission deadline: 31 December 2021.
Background and motivation
The emerging Industry 4.0 technologies (also known as Technologies 4.0) represent a great opportunity to increase customer value in the service sector (Lee and Lee, 2020). These advanced technologies are surpassing the advantages of previous digital tools by incorporating disruptive analytical systems and hardware such as: Artificial Intelligence (AI), autonomous robots, virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR), Big Data analytics, cloud computing or the Internet of Things (IoT).
However, previous research on the advent of the Fourth Industrial Revolution has been focused on the impact of Technologies 4.0 on manufacturing and supply chain operations (Alcácer and Cruz-Machado 2019), ignoring their tremendous potential to shape current and future service interactions with customers. Indeed, these technologies have enhanced the dynamic capabilities of organizations to rapidly respond to the evolving customer needs and preferences (Lee and Lee, 2020).
Thus, Technologies 4.0 are challenging traditional front-line service encounters, especially in a post-Covid-19 era where “contactless” services make it easy to avoid face-to-face contact between employees and consumers (Lee and Lee 2020) by ensuring that social distance is maintained. The gradual development of AI skills required for service tasks (mechanical, analytical, intuitive, empathetic) foresees that customer-machine interactions could increasingly replace customer-employee encounters (Huang and Rust 2018).
Many services are already benefiting from the advantages of AI capabilities and efficiency. For instance, in the financial sector, robo-advisors manage increasing sums of investments in exchange for a very low fee, according to customer risk profile. In social media, AI improves the efficiency of the news and audiovisual contents shown to users. Alternatively, many companies are employing chatbots as sales agents or in customer services (Luo et al. 2019). Consumers are increasingly interacting with voice-controlled smart devices (Schweitzer, et al. 2019). Furthermore, AI systems monitoring users’ physical activity or learning activities provide customers with emotional support (by means of warmth and empathetic messages) to fulfill with their goals (Gelbrich et al. 2020).
Focusing on service robots, the opportunities and risks derived from the raise of robots has only just begun to be researched. Their introduction as social agents in frontline services and their subsequent acceptance by employees and customers deserve further scholars’ attention (Mende et al. 2019). In the tourism and hospitality industries, recent studies show that customers value service robot quality in terms of assurance and reliability (Chiang and Trimi 2020) as well as based on their capacity to enhance service provision at a lower cost (Belanche et al., 2020b). From the broader concept of consumer robotics, controversial areas such as sex robots (Devlin 2018) and military robotics (Jentsch 2016) are beginning to show up.
As might be expected in such sensitive and divisive areas, ethical discussions and debated have emerged (e.g., Lin, Jenkins, and Abney 2017; Danaher & McArthur 2017). Research and analysis in these areas is urgent as these are two of the fastest growing areas of robotics. Virtual reality and augmented reality (VR/AR) are highly immersive technologies that generate unique sensory, affective, cognitive and behavioral customer experiences that can significantly affect decision-making. VR/AR is being successfully implemented in many service sectors such as education and healthcare and presents particular advantages to be developed in the tourism and entertaining industries (Flavián et al. 2019). AR and VR allow for immersive experiences by moving the user to a new setting with various virtual components and great realism, achieving increasingly complete sensory experiences, which may enhance previous or later experiences with some traditional services and may even replace them.
Concepts such as the customers’ social presence or their need for assurance or empathy in the touchpoints should be further explored in this kind of virtual environments (Hung et al. 2019). Other Technologies 4.0 have also emerged in relation to the advancements of AI in the digital era. This is the case of Big Data devoted to the processing and understanding of evolving and immeasurable data sets with the aim of predicting behavior and guiding the customer journey, among other purposes (Kim and Hong 2020). In turn, cloud computing focuses on the storage of these data with important implications from both managers and customer in terms of the security and privacy for such infrastructure.
Linking the physical to the digital worlds, the IoT is an emerging and evolving phenomenon in the 5G digital era. Like smart sensors employed to improve customers’ health (Gelrich et al 2020), all kind of devices connected to the internet (e.g., household appliances) entail a great opportunity to increase customer value by expanding current services with a technological focus. Blockchain technologies also promise or threaten to replace service intermediaries like banks with direct online technologies as has been done in many retail contexts (Humayun and Belk 2017), advancing from current platforms of the gig economy (Belanche et al. 2021).
However, despite the clear advantages of Technologies 4.0 in services, their implementation may also raise important concerns among customers (Belanche et al. 2020a), employees and managers of services industries which is likely to lead to controversial issues in society and public policy. These problems will affect various ethical issues (Belk, 2020) and privacy issues arising from the possible misuse of data through controversial practices with these new technologies (Lee and Lee 2020), the rejection of new technologies due to the threat of replacing some people, or because of dehumanizing impacts on relationships between people through the increasing intermediation of these technologies.
The growing incorporation of all these technologies requires a deep reflection on the role that technology should play in personal relationships (Belk, 2013) and how far we are willing to go. This special issue aims to fill existing gaps in the literature to deepen the current understanding of the Technologies 4.0 impact on customer value and customer experiences in services. Research should examine relevant customers’ perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors derived from the implementation of these technologies in various service sectors. Studies about the challenges and concerns related to this Fourth Industrial Revolution in the service domain are welcomed. We are open to a wide range of methods, including both qualitative and quantitative empirical research. Theoretical, conceptual and critical papers are also welcomed if they contribute to establishing the fundaments for a better understanding of the consequences of such innovative technologies. We also invite interdisciplinary research that broadens the scope of current knowledge and cultural and cross-cultural studies analyzing the global diversity of these phenomena.
A non-exhaustive list of some sample topics that merit exploration includes:
• Technologies 4.0 introduction in services: managerial, employee, and customer approaches
• Differential features of Technologies 4.0 and their contributions to generate customer value
• Opportunities for Technologies 4.0 to shape new customer experiences in services
• Technologies 4.0 for a better management of the customer journey
• The influence of Technologies 4.0 on services branding
• Distributed Autonomous Organizations (DAOs)
• The role of touch versus tech in technology-driven or -facilitated services
• Impact of AI implementation on efficiency in different service industries
• Use of smart robots in the transformation of frontline and other service processes
• Robots and other technologies as consumers’ social companions
• Potential benefits of employing VR/AR technologies to enhance customer experience in services
• Challenges related to the use of Big Data analytics and cloud computing in service businesses
• Strategies to develop new services based on IoT technology
• The dark side of Technologies 4.0
• Users’ concerns about the disruptive changes caused by Technologies 4.0
• Ethics in the Fourth Industrial revolution: privacy, security. and other threats arising from a greater dependence on technology
Instructions
Submitted manuscripts must be original and must not be under consideration for publication elsewhere. All submissions should be made online to Service Business. Manuscripts typically will be reviewed by at least two independent referees per the journal’s standard evaluation process. The editors will base their final decisions on the relevance to the special issue, technical quality, innovative content, and originality of research approaches and results. All submitted manuscripts must be fully compliant with the Service Business author guidelines.
Submissions should be uploaded via Editorial Manager. To ensure your paper is considered for this special issue, reply “yes” when asked during submission whether it is intended for a special issue, and select the relevant title from the drop-down menu. You may also wish to mention the special issue in your cover letter.
Submission deadline: 31 December 2021
Guest Editors
Daniel Belanche, University of Zaragoza, Spain
Russell Belk, York University, Canada
Carlos Flavián, University of Zaragoza, Spain
More info here.
