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IJBM
31,1
Does hope moderate the impact
of job burnout on frontline
bank employees’ in-role and
56 extra-role performances?
Received 3 September 2012
Accepted 21 September 2012
Ugur Yavas
Department of Management and Marketing, East Tennessee State University,
Johnson City, Tennessee, USA
Emin Babakus
Department of Marketing and Supply Chain Management,
The University of Memphis, Memphis, Tennessee, USA, and
Osman M. Karatepe
Faculty of Tourism, Eastern Mediterranean University, Gazimagusa,
TRNC, Turkey

Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine whether hope as a personal resource moderates
the relationships between job burnout and frontline bank employees’ in-role and extra-role
performances.
Design/methodology/approach – Frontline employees of several banks throughout the Turkish
Republic of Northern Cyprus serve as the study setting.
Findings – Results of the study reveal that burnout is significantly related to frontline employees’
in-role and extra-role performances and that hope moderates these relationships.
Research limitations/implications – Though common method bias does not appear to be
a potential threat to the magnitude of relationships, in future studies using multiple-informants
(e.g. performance data from supervisors or customers) would be useful. In addition, replication studies
among front employees in other countries would be beneficial for further generalizations.
Practical implications – Management of the banks should consider the personality traits of the
individuals during the selection process. This is important, since hope reduces the detrimental impact
of burnout on performance outcomes. Management should also retain employees high in hope, because
such employees can create a positive work environment and serve as role models to their colleagues
with low hope.
Originality/value – Empirical research in the banks services literature pertaining to the effect of
hope on extra-role performance and hope as a moderator of the impact of burnout on in-role and extra-
role performances is scarce. Therefore, this study adds to the literature in this research stream by
investigating the aforementioned relationships.
Keywords Banks, Employees behaviour, Employees attitudes, Stress, Individual psychology,
Frontline employees, Job burnout, Performance, Survey, Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus
Paper type Research paper

Introduction
International Journal of Bank
In today’s increasingly competitive banking environment, astute bank executives view
Marketing retention of motivated, satisfied, and committed frontline employees as important to
Vol. 31 No. 1, 2013
pp. 56-70
r Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0265-2323 This research was supported by a Non-Instructional Assignment awarded to Dr Ugur Yavas by
DOI 10.1108/02652321311292056 East Tennessee State University.
business success as customer satisfaction and retention (cf. Yavas and Babakus, 2010). Frontline bank
This is because frontline employees are perhaps the most critical link in the provision employees
of superior service to customers and their actions are also critical for service
recovery when a service failure occurs (cf. Yavas, 2007). However, caught in the middle
between discerning customers’ service excellence demands and management’s
productivity and performance requirements, and because they often participate
in unscripted and challenging interactions with customers contributing to their 57
stress (e.g. Zablah et al., 2012), frontline bank employees often suffer from burnout
(cf. Babakus et al., 2009).
Burnout is a psychological response to stressors on the job (Leiter and Maslach,
2005) and leads to such undesirable outcomes as diminished job performance, job
dissatisfaction, shifting of time spent on work-related activities to non-work activities,
lower organizational commitment, and increased absenteeism and turnover intentions
(cf. Bhanugopan and Fish, 2006; Lewin and Sager, 2007; Podsakoff et al., 2007; Shani
and Pizam, 2009; Shirom, 2003; Yagil, 2006). Importantly, burnout is contagious and
crosses over from one individual to another and spreads across the organization
(Bakker et al., 2007).
Some recent developments and trends further exacerbate employee job burnout and
make it inevitable (Luddington and Vonderheid, 2009). On one hand, in today’s
recessionary economy large scale layoffs leave employees who still hold jobs with a
sense of insecurity and additional job demands (Naiman, 2009). On the other hand,
rises in incivility and verbal aggression by customers (Karatepe et al., 2009; Kern and
Grandey, 2009) and co-workers (Andersson and Pearson, 1999) and the pressures of
achieving work-life balance (Deery, 2008; Yavas et al., 2008) inject additional doses of
daily stress to the already stressful work environments of frontline employees.
Compounding the stress levels of frontline employees in banks are emotional labor or
display requirements (e.g. smiling when dealing with unpleasant customers,
suppressing negative feelings such as anger) (Chan and Wan, 2012).
Given that frontline bank employees are prone to suffer from burnout and that,
because of their boundary-spanning roles, they play, arguably, the most critical role in
the delivery of quality services to customers and/or returning aggrieved customers to
a state of satisfaction after a service failure, it becomes of paramount importance
to manage employee burnout effectively. While a variety of techniques are available
to intervene with burnout (e.g. attempting to alter the sources of stress at work
and/or reduce the severity of stress symptoms before they lead to serious problems,
employee assistance/training programs) (Halbesleben and Buckley, 2004; Richardson
and Rothstein, 2008), ultimately individual’s own ability, personality, and inner
psychological resources can overcome burnout and its negative consequences
(cf. Janssen et al., 2010).

Purpose and study background

Grounded in this backdrop, this study examines the role of hope as a moderator
between burnout and frontline bank employee performance by using a sample of
frontline employees in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus as a case in point.
In our study we contend that hope as an inner psychological resource (Valle et al., 2006)
can serve as an antidote to the detrimental effects of burnout on employee
performance. We study the mitigating role of hope within the context of two types of
performance (in-role performance and extra-role performance). In-role performance
(e.g. job performance) refers to a behavior that is recognized by formal reward systems.
IJBM It is part of the requirements as described in job descriptions. Knowledge and skills are
31,1 important characteristics of in-role performance (cf. Goodman and Svyantek, 1999).
Extra-role performance (e.g. organizational citizenship behavior), on the other hand,
represents discretionary behavior that is not directly or explicitly recognized by the
formal reward systems (Piercy et al., 2006). Although, extra-role behaviors are beyond
the formally prescribed organizational roles, they directly promote the efficient and
58 effective functioning of an organization (cf. Netemeyer and Maxham, 2007; Rego
and Cunha, 2008).
Inclusion of both types of performance in the study scope is important and
relevant. This is because performance outcomes used in prior studies examining
burnout-performance relationships in general (Bakker and Heuven, 2006; Shirom,
2003) and hope-performance relationships in particular (Peterson and Byron, 2008) are
primarily based on in-role performance, and extra-role performance is largely ignored.
This is a shortcoming since extra-role performance towards customers as well as
fellow employees may have significant effects on customer evaluations of service
delivery in addition to the effects of in-role performance (Netemeyer and Maxham,
2007). Also both in-role and extra-role performance may be important in transmitting
the effects of an organization’s service climate into customer satisfaction and
consequently an organization’s performance (Yavas et al., 2010).
As can be inferred from a statement of its purpose, our study examines whether
hope as a personal resource moderates the relationships between job burnout and
frontline bank employees’ performance in terms of both types of performance. To the
best of our knowledge, our study is the first in the banking services literature that
examines extra-role performances with respect to this issue. The next section presents
an overview of the relevant literature. This is followed by presentations of the method
and results of the empirical study we undertook among frontline bank employees in
the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. We conclude with implications of the results
and suggestions for future research.

Relevant literature
Conceptualization and measurement of burnout
Traditionally associated with professionals mostly working in care-providing and
helping professions in the public sector (Shirom, 2003), burnout occurs in all kinds of
jobs ranging from health care (Cropanzano et al., 2003) to teaching (Bakker et al., 2007)
to firefighting (Halbesleben and Bowler, 2007) to frontline service jobs (Mulki et al.,
2006; Shani and Pizam, 2009; Yagil et al., 2008) including those in banking (Babakus
et al., 2009). Burnout develops as a result of daily job demands and hassles at work as
opposed to “extreme demands of major stressors, such as the death of a loved one,” and
the process takes place “under a slow boil, taking time to develop” (Hobfoll and Freedy,
1993, pp. 116-7). Burnout is not only a serious outcome in itself but also results in
depletion of individuals’ valuable physical, emotional, and cognitive energies/resources
(Halbesleben and Bowler, 2007). Undoubtedly owing to its importance for the well
beings of the employees and costs to the organizations, since the 1980s, burnout
has attracted interest from the researchers, and several conceptual models and
measurement instruments on burnout have emerged in the literature (Shirom, 2003,
2005).
Freudenberger (1980) is credited with the pioneering work on burnout. Despite its
criticisms (cf. Shirom, 2005), perhaps the burnout model most widely used by both
researchers and practitioners is the one developed by Maslach and her colleagues
(cf. Maslach and Jackson, 1981; Maslach and Leiter, 2008). According to this model, the Frontline bank
burnout syndrome is characterized by emotional exhaustion, a tendency to employees
depersonalize others and diminished perceptions of accomplishment on the job.
The emotional exhaustion component of burnout refers to the feelings of depleted energy
and sensation as a result of excessive demands. Depersonalization is the tendency to
dehumanize others through a callous and uncaring attitude. It typically manifests
itself in the treatment of others as if they were objects. Finally, the third component of 59
burnout (reduced personal accomplishment) entails low motivation, inefficiency, and
reduced self-esteem and is associated with the belief that future efforts are not
worthwhile as past efforts have repeatedly failed to produce desired results.
The Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) developed by Maslach and her colleagues
(cf. Maslach and Jackson, 1981; Maslach and Leiter, 2008) is widely accepted and
utilized in the study of burnout across occupations.
Pines (1993) viewed burnout as a state of physical, emotional, and mental
exhaustion caused by continuous exposure to emotionally stressful situations and
developed a burnout measurement tool which consists of the sole dimension of
emotional exhaustion. Inspired by the works of Maslach and her colleagues and Pines,
Shirom and a group of researchers defined burnout as an affective state characterized
by a sense of loss of physical, emotional, and cognitive energy (Shirom, 2003). They
conceptualized burnout on the basis of the tenets of conservation of resources theory
(cf. Hobfoll and Freedy, 1993). By focussing on the combination of physical fatigue,
emotional exhaustion, and cognitive weariness in the conceptualization of burnout,
they developed the Shirom-Melamed Burnout Measure (Shirom, 2003).
A relatively new burnout measure, the Oldenburg Burnout Inventory (OLBI)
(Demerouti et al., 2001, 2003) is based on a conceptual model similar to that of the MBI.
Exhaustion and disengagement constitute the two dimensions of burnout in the OLBI.
Exhaustion refers to “a consequence of intensive physical, affective, and cognitive
strain, for example as a long-term consequence of prolonged exposure to certain
demands” (Demerouti et al., 2001, p. 500). Disengagement, in turn, is defined as
“distancing oneself from one’s work, and experiencing negative attitudes toward the
work object, work content, or one’s work in general” (Demerouti et al., 2001, p. 500).
A distinctive feature of the OLBI relative to the MBI is that it includes both negatively
and positively framed items (Bakker et al., 2004). Furthermore, while the MBI focusses
only on affective components of emotional exhaustion, the OLBI features questions
designed to assess cognitive and physical components of exhaustion (Halbesleben and
Buckley, 2004). As discussed in review papers and empirical studies (cf. Bakker and
Heuven, 2006; Cropanzano et al., 2003; Halbesleben and Buckley, 2004; Shirom, 2003),
burnout decreases employees’ performance. The negative correlation between burnout
and performance is attributed to burned-out individuals’ impaired coping ability and
reduced levels of motivation to perform (Shirom, 2003).

Hope
Hope, in its everyday understanding, is an expectation of good in the future.
Because of its potential links to psychosocial well being, since the early 1990s,
hope as a trait has attracted increasing attention from researchers (cf. Brouwer et al.,
2008; Valle et al., 2006). One of the best elaborated and investigated theories of
hope was developed by Snyder et al. (1991) who conceptualized it as a trait-like
cognitive construct encompassing affirmative beliefs about one’s ability to accomplish
personal goals.
IJBM According to this conceptualization, hope is a cognitive set determined by the
31,1 reciprocal interplay of two components, pathways, and agency (Geraghty et al., 2010).
The pathways component refers to an individual’s perceived means or routes available
to achieve goals. People with high pathways beliefs have the ability to generate
possible means of attaining desired goals, can easily identify multiple viable routes
to reach their goals, and find alternative routes when their initial strategies fail.
60 Agency component refers to the belief in one’s ability to succeed in using pathways to
realize desired aims. High agency is characterized by determination, motivation, and
energy directed toward meeting one’s goals. While the hope construct shares
some features with other constructs (e.g. optimism and self-efficacy) it is different
(Luthans et al., 2007; Peterson et al., 2006).
For example, while hope and self-efficacy are both concerned with beliefs about
expected success, they differ in that self-efficacy does not explicitly include the
pathways component to the desired outcomes (Peterson and Byron, 2008). In addition,
while self-efficacy focusses on whether one can perform the actions in a specific
situation, hope emphasizes the belief that one will initiate and continue goal-directed
actions (Peterson et al., 2006). Similarly, while hope and optimism are associated with
positive expectations, the focus of the expectations differs. The positive expectations
associated with hope are specifically directed toward goal attainment whereas the
expectations associated with optimism are more general expectations of positive
events (Peterson et al., 2006).
There is a growing body of evidence supporting the notion that hopes drives
adaptive behavior. Like other traits, hope begins developing early in life. Pathways
thinking comes first as the infant learns the temporal relations between his/her actions
and outcomes. Then, as the understanding of self-emerges, the recognition of self as
an agent can develop. Hope beliefs are then strengthened by personal experience.
High hope people are better equipped to find means to overcome difficulties
(pathways), and the confidence to exercise coping strategies (agency). Research
demonstrates that hope is positively associated with behavioral outcomes such as
coping and problem solving, and performance in several domains (e.g. athletics,
academics) including job performance (Alexander and Onwuegbuzie, 2007; Ciarrochi
et al., 2007; Peterson and Byron, 2008; Snyder, 2000).
It should be underscored that while, as reviewed in a recent meta-analysis (Alarcon
et al., 2009), the relationships between personality traits and burnout have been
studied, the role of hope in the burnout process is mostly ignored. This is despite the
recognition that hopeful thinking can buffer against the adverse effects of stressful
life events (Valle et al., 2006). Examining hope in this context is significant and relevant
at a time when there is a shift from negative psychology to positive psychology in the
study of organizational behavior (Schaufeli and Bakker, 2004; Wright, 2003).
Positive psychology focusses on human strengths, optimal functioning, and positive
experiences at work rather than weaknesses and malfunctioning (Mauno et al., 2007;
Schaufeli et al., 2002; Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi, 2000). Likewise, positive
organizational behavior, which is an extension of positive psychology, encourages and
promotes the study and application of positively oriented human resource strengths
and psychological capacities to improve performance in today’s stressful work
environment (Luthans, 2002; Wright, 2003) and calls are made to incorporate positive
psychology into burnout research (Zellars et al., 2006). Our study responds to such calls
and seeks to determine if hope enables frontline employees to perform better despite
burnout. We surmise that hope can help employees cope with burnout and enable them
to preserve their physical and psychological energies. This, in turn, should improve Frontline bank
their performance. employees
Method
Sample and procedure
Data for the study were collected from full-time frontline employees (e.g. tellers,
customer service representatives) of several banks located throughout the Turkish 61
Republic of Northern Cyprus. Managements of 21 retail banks were contacted prior to
data collection. Permission was granted by 15 banks. Questionnaires were then
distributed to the frontline employees of these banks by the research team. Employees
were given assurance of confidentiality (that only the aggregate results would
be shared with management) and were requested to fill out the questionnaires in a
self-administered manner. By the cut-off date for data collection, a total of 164 usable
questionnaires were retrieved.
About 38 percent of the respondents were between the ages of 18 and 27, 38 percent
between the ages of 28 and 37 and the rest were older than 37. Close to two-thirds
(63 percent) of them were female. About 21 percent of the respondents had secondary/
high school education. Approximately 37 percent had graduated from two-year
colleges and about 42 percent from four-year colleges. The sample was predominantly
comprised of married individuals (69 percent) and more than half of the respondents
(54 percent) had one or two children. About 18 percent of the respondents had tenures
of less than one year, 43 percent tenures of one to five years, and the rest had been with
their bank for more than five years.

Measurement
The study constructs were operationalized via multi-item scales. Exhaustion (four
items) and disengagement (four items) were measured via items taken from Demerouti
et al. (2003). Responses to these items were elicited on four-point scales ranging from 4
(strongly agree) to 1 (strongly disagree). Hope was operationalized via eight items
taken from Snyder et al. (1991). Responses to these items were elicited on four-point
scales ranging from 4 (definitely true) to 1 (definitely false). Because there is very little
unique variance explained by pathways and agency items, items pertaining to both
components were aggregated (Brouwer et al., 2008). In-role performance (three items)
and extra-role performance (three items) were measured via items adopted from
Netemeyer and Maxham (2007). Responses to the performance items were elicited on
seven-point scales ranging from 7 (always) to 1 (never).
All the study items were valenced in such a way that higher scores consistently
indicated higher levels of each construct (e.g. exhaustion, hope, extra-role
performance). The survey instrument was initially prepared in English and then
translated into Turkish via the back-translation method (Behling and Law, 2000).
To ensure that the item contents were cross-linguistically comparable and generated
the same meaning, two academicians fluent in both languages further checked the
questionnaire. Prior to administering in the field, the questionnaire was pre-tested with
a pilot sample of bank employees and no changes were deemed necessary.

Results
Measurement results
The measures of the five study variables were subjected to an initial exploratory factor
analysis (principal components) with oblique rotation. Five factors emerged with
IJBM eigenvalues 41.0. The factors collectively accounted for 61.7 percent of the variance
31,1 in item scores. The first factor explained only 28.4 percent of the variance, which is
much less than the 50 percent benchmark used in Harman’s single-factor test to
determine if common method bias is present ( McFarlin and Sweeney, 1992). This result
suggests that common method bias may not be a problem. However, a number of items
did not load on their respective underlying factors and some of the factor loadings were
62 weak. Hence, we followed a partial aggregation approach to create composite
indicators in order to improve item reliabilities (Bagozzi and Edwards, 1998; Bagozzi
and Heatherton, 1994). The partial aggregation approach has been shown to improve
indicator and scale reliabilities ( Williams and O’Boyle, 2008).
We randomly divided items comprising hope, exhaustion, and disengagement
scales into two equal groups and then computed the average scores of each group to
create two composite indicators for each construct. Since the performance scales
contained only three items each, they were not subjected to partial aggregation.
We reran factor analysis using the partially aggregated measures. This resulted in a
five-factor solution explaining 86.4 percent of the variance. All items converged
on their respective underlying factors and loadings ranged from 0.534 to 0.945 and no
cross-loading was 40.175. The composite measures demonstrated improved levels
of internal consistency reliability where coefficient as were 0.84 (hope), 0.80
(disengagement), and 0.82 (exhaustion). These exploratory results suggest that our
measures are reliable and show convergent and discriminant validity.
The measures were also subjected to confirmatory factor analysis using LISREL
8.80 (Joreskog and Sorbom, 1996) for further psychometric evaluation. We tested the
five-factor measurement model using the partially aggregated measures. The results
showed that the model fits the data relatively well (w244 ¼ 138.18, RMSEA ¼ 0.099,
NFI ¼ 0.93, CFI ¼ 0.95, SRMR ¼ 0.063). The standardized loadings of the items ranged
from 0.76 to 0.98. The average variance extracted by the underlying factors ranged
from 0.68 (disengagement) to 0.81 (in-role performance). The squared correlations (F2)
among the underlying factors ranged from 0.03 (between disengagement and in-role
performance) and 0.44 (between in-role and extra-role performance). These results
collectively indicate that the measures exhibit convergent and discriminant validity
(Fornell and Larcker, 1981). Table I presents the descriptive statistics and the internal
consistency reliabilities (coefficient as) of the study measures.

Burnout-performance relationships
In examining the relationships between burnout and performance, two regression
models were run by using two components of burnout (exhaustion, disengagement)
as the independent, and in-role and extra-role performance measures as the
dependent variables. As can be seen from Table II, both models proved to be viable.
The independent variables collectively were more effective in explaining the variance

Variables No. of items Mean SD Range a

In-role performance 3 15.38 3.23 7-21 0.92

Table I. Extra-role performance 3 15.08 3.41 7-21 0.91
Descriptive statistics Hope 8 23.85 3.59 12-32 0.84
and scale Disengagement 4 12.04 2.04 6-16 0.80
reliabilities Exhaustion 4 11.67 2.25 4-15 0.82
in extra-role performance with an R2 value of 11 percent. An examination of the results Frontline bank
also showed that in both models, exhaustion was the best predictor. employees
Hope as a moderator
Moderation of the form or nature of a relationship is directed by examining for
interaction effects in analysis of variance or significant differences in regression
coefficients across sub-groups (Arnold, 1982). In this study, to examine the role of hope 63
as a moderator of the relationships between burnout and in-role and extra-role
performance, we used the sub-group analysis as it depicts the pattern of results more
clearly (cf. Kohli, 1989). Specifically, we repeated ordinary least squares regression
analysis in sub-groups reflecting low and high scores on the moderator variable, hope.
In forming a pair of sub-groups representing low and high sub-groups, the
respondents were arrayed according to their hope scores and the two sub-groups were
then formed by selecting approximately the top and bottom 25 percent of the cases.
The accepted procedure in sub-group analysis is to drop the middle cases from
subsequent analysis so as to increase the contrast between sub-groups (Arnold, 1982;
Kohli, 1989). The Chow test (Dougherty, 2007) was then performed to establish the
significance of the difference in the form (intercept and slope) of each regression model
across the two sub-groups. Chow’s test is defined as
½SSRN  ðSSR1 þ SSR2 Þ=k
F¼
ðSSR1 þ SSR2 Þ=N  2k
where SSRN is the residual sum of squares for the combined data set; SSR1 the residual
sum of squares for the high group; SSR2 the residual sum of squares for the low group;
N the number of observations in the combined data set; k the number of parameters in
the model (i.e. k1 slope coefficients and one intercept).
A statistically significant Chow test would suggest that the estimates of the
structural parameters corresponding to the two data sets (i.e. high and low hope
groups) are different and, therefore, hope is a moderator. The Chow tests of
the individual regression estimates for high and low hope groups were statistically
significant in the cases of both performance measures showing that hope (in-role
performance: F ¼ 179.75, p ¼ 0.0001; extra-role performance: F ¼ 128.96, p ¼ 0.0001) is
a significant moderating variable. Further, independent samples t-tests confirmed that
the in-role and extra-role performances of employees with high hope were significantly
higher than their low counterparts.

Discussion
By using frontline bank employees as our setting, in this study we investigated the role
of hope as a moderator between burnout and frontline employee performance. Our

Independent variables
Dependent variable Exhaustion Disengagement R2 F

In-role performance 0.17* 0.10 0.05 4.51 Table II.

Extra-role performance 0.28* 0.10 0.11 9.99 Regression analysis:
performance ¼
Notes: R2 values for both regression models are significant at 0.01 or better level of significance. F(exhaustion,
Reported under each independent variable are the estimated b coefficients. *po0.05 disengagement)
IJBM results show that hope can indeed serve as an antidote to the detrimental effects of
31,1 burnout (exhaustion and disengagement) on frontline bank employees’ in-role and
extra-role performances. It appears that hope plays a critical role in guiding one’s
cognitive processes and behaviors. Because of their general tendency to experience
frequent positive moods and positive goal-directed outlooks, employees high in hope,
on one hand, may not be as affected by burnout. On the other hand, because of their
64 inherent disposition to find means to overcome difficulties, they may perform better
despite burnout. As discussed by Fredrickson and Losada (2005) in a related context,
because the broaden-and-build effects of hope may accumulate and compound over
time, positivity, and higher levels of hope can transform individuals for the better,
making them more resilient and effective.
Also, relying on the basic tenets and reasoning of the perception mechanism (Oliver
et al., 2010; Spector et al., 2000), which was originally designed as a substantive
approach to explaining why negative affectivity relates to job stressors and strains and
adapting it to the hope context, it can only be speculated that employees in low hope
tend to perceive their jobs as having high levels of stressors, which lead to high levels
of burnout. This consumes their physical and psychological energies and interferes
with their performance. Alternatively, employees high in hope may perceive work
stressors as temporary conditions to improve soon, whereas those employees in low
hope may perceive them as more enduring conditions and, as Koslowsky (1998)
discusses, conditions perceived as permanent are more likely to result in burnout.
Also due to their motivation, energy, determination, and beliefs in their abilities
employees high in hope, compared with their counterparts, are more likely to engage in
behaviors aimed at actively reducing or eliminating work stressors and perform better.
Whatever the explanation(s) may be, a conclusion that readily emerges from our study
is that hope does moderate the detrimental effects of burnout not only on the in-role
but also the extra-role performances of the frontline bank employees surveyed here.
This conclusion conjures up some implications and provides hotel managers in the
study area with actionable information.

Managerial implications
Our results suggest that managers should consider the personality traits of the
candidates during employee screening, selection, and hiring. Since employees high in
hope can better cope with burnout, such candidates should be given priority. By using
objective and standard tests candidates high in hope should be identified. In this
context, managers, for instance, can draw upon the questionnaire items, such as
the ones used in our study, devise questions that elicit hope levels of the
candidates (cf. Farrell and Oczkowski, 2009) and use hope scores as a selection tool
(Peterson and Byron, 2008). Likewise, managers can utilize reactions to various
scenarios and/or employ role-playing to elicit to what extent candidates possess (or do
not possess) hope. In addition, the hope levels of employees can be considered in
periodic appraisals.
Management should also take deliberate steps to retain employees high in hope in
the organization. These employees can be instrumental in creating a positive work
environment, may serve as role models to their colleagues and generate a
demonstration effect among current employees with low hope. During the selection
and hiring process, candidates with low hope should be avoided as much as possible,
since such prospective employees are more susceptible to the detrimental effects of
burnout.
 While hope is an enduring disposition, frontline employees, as is the case with other Frontline bank
positive psychology traits, can be trained to “learn” to be hopeful (cf. Seligman, 1998) employees
and interventions can be devised to for employees with low hope. It should be
remembered that it will never be possible to shelter employees from all negative
circumstances in the job environment or from burnout. However, programs to develop
cognitive-motivational strengths, such as hopeful thinking, will allow employees to
more effectively cope with adverse circumstances when they occur. Such interventions 65
and programs, combined with a careful matching of frontline employees with high
hope as mentors to those with low hope, can pay dividends.
The mentoring role can booster high hope employees’ satisfaction and commitment,
while low hope employees can learn from their mentors and develop better coping
skills and subsequently perform at higher levels. People are “emotion conductors”
(Barsade and Gibson, 2007) and research in intergroup emotions theory (Smith et al.,
2007) shows that individuals may experience group-level emotions that arise from
strong identification with a group. Managerial initiatives to nurture the formation of a
cohesive group among frontline employees can be helpful in lifting employees with low
hope to perform better as part of a group. In culmination, our results clearly show that
hope, as a positive individual trait, can play a key role in moderating the detrimental
impact of burnout on performance and reinforces the adage “hire for attitude and train
for knowledge and skill.”

Limitations and future research directions

Although the results reported here are insightful, our findings must be tempered by
certain limitations. Our study was conducted among frontline bank employees
employed in a particular country. Therefore, generalizations beyond the specific
context of this research must be guarded. Replications among frontline employees
in other countries are in order to broaden the database for further generalizations.
Also inclusion of other employee outcomes (e.g. job satisfaction, turnover intentions)
into the research model would provide further insights into the role of hope as a
moderator between antecedent variables and outcomes.
The single-source nature of the data in this study makes the construct measures
vulnerable to common method bias. In particular, self-report measures of hope and
performance can potentially invoke “espoused” or “normative” responses from frontline
employees. Future studies could benefit from collecting information from alternate
sources (e.g. performance data from supervisors or customers). Finally, past writings
suggest that differences exist between males and females in their reactions to stress,
emotional exhaustion, and burnout (cf. Adam et al., 2008; Karatepe et al., 2006; Smith,
2010). Therefore, inclusion of gender as a control variable in future research would be
illuminating. Also enlightening would be to include branch size and bank type (e.g. public,
private). Because these variables may impact managerial styles and, hence, employee
burnout. Therefore, their inclusion will allow for better delineation of the relationships
examined in the study and provide a more rigorous test of the relationships.
Thus, we culminate with a call for additional research on these intriguing issues.
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About the authors

Ugur Yavas is Professor of Marketing and Advisory Board Faculty Fellow at East Tennessee
State University. Besides the International Journal of Bank Marketing, he has contributed to such
70 journals as the Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Retailing, Journal of the Academy of
Marketing Science, Journal of Service Research, The Service Industries Journal, Journal of
Business Research, International Journal of Research in Marketing, Journal of World Business,
Management Decision, Journal of Financial Services Marketing and Long Range Planning.
Among other journals, he serves on the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Bank
Marketing. Ugur Yavas is the corresponding author and can be contacted at: [email protected]
Emin Babakus is Palmer Professor of Marketing at the University of Memphis. Besides the
International Journal of Bank Marketing, he has contributed to such journals as the Journal
of Marketing Research, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, International Journal of
Research in Marketing, Journal of Service Research, Journal of Retailing, Decision Sciences,
Journal of Business Research, European Journal of Marketing, The Service Industries Journal,
International Journal of Service Industry Management, Decision Sciences and Journal of
Advertising Research. Among other journals, he serves on the Editorial Board of the Journal
of Service Research.
Osman M. Karatepe is Professor of Marketing in the Faculty of Tourism at Eastern
Mediterranean University (Gazimagusa, TRNC, via Mersin 10, Turkey). Besides the
International Journal of Bank Marketing, he has contributed to such journals as the Journal of
the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Business Research, International Journal of Service
Industry Management, The Service Industries Journal, Journal of Retailing and Consumer
Services, Managing Service Quality, Tourism Management, International Journal of Hospitality
Management and Cornell Hospitality Quarterly. Among other journals, he serves on the Editorial
Board of the International Journal of Hospitality Management.

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