The Influence of Job Satisfaction and Job Engagement on Customer Orientation: The Moderating Role of Empowering Leadership – A Conceptual Paper

Purpose: This study aims to determine empowering leadership as the moderator in job satisfaction and job engagement factors on customer orientation of front-office employees in Hong Kong hotels. The Conservation of Resources (COR) theory is used to understand customer orientation of front-office employees to achieve a competitive advantage. Design/methodology/approach: This study suggests a cross-sectional quantitative research method using random sampling from the front-office hotel employees’ population in Hong Kong. Findings: This finding may contribute to hotel and service industries by providing prominent customer orientation strategies that is aligned with job satisfaction and job engagement to improve business performance and growth in Hong Kong. Research limitations/implications: This research is based on the hotel sector of front-office employees in Hong Kong. As a result, it was unable to represent other countries that may have differences in cultures, and policies. Practical implications: This paper enhances our understanding of empowering leadership in various hospitality and tourism settings. Moreover, there are growing interest in comprehending how leaders can effectively empower their subordinates leading to the improvement of customer orientation in service industries. Originality/value: The conceptual framework serves as a point of reference and offers guidance to scholars and practitioners in Hong Kong's service sectors to optimize job satisfaction and job engagement to achieve higher performance in customer orientation of front-office employees.