Customer-facing service work as a moment of truth?

The proportion of people working in jobs where dealing with a client/customer is essential has grown considerably (e.g. MacDonald & Merrill, 2009). Although this could encourage the investigation of differences and singularities of service work, managerialist approaches rather tend to assume universal management models, based on a prescriptive set of human resources practices and a harmonious vision of the relationships between management, customers and employees. Writing within this tradition, Norman (1984) labeled the point at which client/customer and service worker interact as the 'moment of truth' for the service firm. This sub-theme asks scholars to critically reflect on what kind of truth claims are put forward, enacted and experienced within service interactions, and on how we, as scholars, mediate these truth claims. A different set of answers to these questions are suggested, for instance, within sociological approaches that analyse service settings as based on potentially antagonistic relationships leading to contradictions and tensions between the parties involved (e.g. Korczynski, 2002; Lopez, 2010)