Empowering or overloading? How intelligent machine usage influences hotel employees’ proactive customer service behaviour

Purpose This study aims to examine when and how intelligent machine usage facilitates or inhibits employees’ proactive customer service behaviour (PCSB). Design/methodology/approach This study used a scenario-based experiment and two-wave survey to collect data from hotel employees in China. Findings The findings indicate that for employees with a growth mindset, intelligent machine usage enhances role efficacy, thereby promoting PCSB, whereas for employees with a fixed mindset, intelligent machine usage increases role overload, thereby inhibiting PCSB. Practical implications This study enhances hotel managers’ understanding of how intelligent machine usage affects employees and offers practical guidance for promoting employees’ PCSB in human–machine collaboration contexts. Originality/value Drawing on role theory and implicit theory, this study advances understanding of when and how intelligent machine usage shapes employees’ PCSB by identifying employees’ mindset as a key boundary condition and uncovering a dual-path mechanism of role efficacy versus role overload.