My observation of service encounter was conducted at Starbucks; a giant coffee cafeteria having several branches all over the world. The giant coffee shop is renowned for its success in the cafeteria retail industry, and I sought to know the facts behind its success, especially with regards to the service encounter interactions between the shop attendants and the customers. My decision to settle on this business is due to perceived manifestation of ethics that has been attributed to success.
In order to get the best result, I decided to take my observation during the off-peak hours. I am well informed that the cafeteria hosts several customers, and as such having the right information on application of service encounter would not give a fair view of what it actually undertakes. I therefore, made an effort to conduct my observation and recording of the events from 9 a.m. to 12 noon, on a typical weekday. Besides, these periods’ witnesses lower number of customers, compared to evening hours. The timeframe also gives an ample opportunity for positive interaction between the attendants and their esteemed clients.
b) Describe three or four service encounters, following the format of the examples
Attendant: Will that be it?
Customer: Yeah. Where did you buy your shoes?
Attendant: This is a rare species in town, it was imported from Italy.
Customer: It is great, I love it a lot
Attendant: would you like to have one?
Customer: Yes, I’ll let you know as soon as I get ready.
Attendant: Thanks for visiting Starbucks; come back again!
Attendant: Will that be it?
Customer: Yeah. How was your weekend?
Attendant: It was fantastic; I went out with peers for a glamorous party.
Customer: I suppose it was so enjoyable, you must have had it to the fullest.
Attendant: sure, we had fan and enjoyed a lot?
Customer: I am glad to hear that.
Attendant: Let’s meet again next time, bye
Attendant: Will that be it?
Customer: Yeah. Did you watch the yesterday’s English Premier League derby?
Attendant: Sure, I was fully in for the game
Customer: I must say that I was disappointed as I had projected a win for my team
Attendant: Would you like to have snacks alongside coffee?
Customer: Nope.
Attendant: Thanks for visiting Starbucks!
The service encounters in the three examples take place between the Starbucks attendants and their perceived regular customers. The conversations take place on friendly tone, and it exhibits the usual social conversation that could emanate between friends and acquaintances. The first conversation is perhaps between two ladies who are fashion enthusiasts and thy must in their youthful stages of life. They can be from any race, but their age bracket is most specially youths. The second example is an encounter between youths who can belong to either gender, and they share a few incidences that transpired over the weekend. Finally, the last conversation can fit to any age strata since the love for football does not consider age or race.
Uptake Analysis
In the three examples above, there are varying changes in communication, and the introduction of uptake in the conversations. Thus, the three conversations are coupled with presence and absence of uptakes respectively. In the first conversation, line two introduces an uptake invocative question by the client, “Where did you buy your shoes?”. The attendant goes ahead and gives in to this uptake inquiry, and employs comics in answering the customer. Therefore, line 3 entails an uptake conversation by the attendant, which acts as a response to the customer’s initial inquiry. In line 5, an uptake conversation resurfaces, and the attendant invokes another collaborative question, “would you like to have one?”, but finally, the attendant assumes an absence to uptake when he adopts a business language to thank the customer for using the coffee cafeteria.
The second conversation is mined with uptake and no uptake conversation. The client formalizes the conversation with the attendant and inquires about his weekend. On this note, the client introduced an uptake conversation, and gives a breakdown of details of how he spent his weekend. This uptake conversation ensues to the fourth, fifth and sixth lines of the conversation, before dropping uptake conversation in the seventh line.
In the third conversation, the second line posted by the attendant invokes an uptake inquiry, “Did you watch the yesterday’s English Premier League derby?”, and the response in the third line, “Sure, I was fully in for the game” gives in to an uptake conversation by the attendant to the client’s inquiry. However, the fifth question posted by the attendant rescinds the uptake comment posted by the customer’s fourth statement. Thus, line 5 of the conversation signifies a no uptake conversation, and it continues to the last line.
There are some reasons why uptake conversation would miss in a professional setup. In the first case, most conversations that are stipulated under professional codes of conduct are supposed to be positive. Therefore, the attendants are expected to adhere by the [professional standards in discharging their duties. This will obviously eliminate the presence of uptake in any conversation. In addition, uptake may miss due to the nature of duties which calls on one to communicate in a prescribed pattern.
