MSI REPORT SUMMARY Ten Lessons for Impro' ig Service Quality Report No. 93-104 Leonard L. Berry holds the JCPenney Chair of Retailing Swidies, is Professor of Marketing, and is director, Center for Retailing Studies, at Texas A&M — University's College of Business Administration, A. Parasuraman is Federated Professor of Marketing at Texas A&M's College of Business Administration. Valarie A. Zeithaml is a partner of Schmalensee, Zeithaml, BACKGROUND Quality service helps a company to maximize benefits “and minimize burdens. for customers, the essence of delivering value. Quality service is a key to a company’s competitiveness. Yet ‘many companies are struggling w improve setvice, ‘wasting money on ill-conceived service programs and undermining credibility with management shetoric that is not backed up with action. Since 1983 we have been studying service quality in America under the sponsorship of the ‘Marketing Science Institute. ~ We “have now ‘completed five research phases.. In this commentary, we reflect on our research joumey and our immersion in the service quality subject to present ‘guidance for managers on improving service, We present our guidance in the form of service quality “lessons.” FINDINGS To prepare this paper, we asked ourselves if there are certain lessons of service quality that apply across service industries and are essential 19 service improvement. We came up with ten lessons that met these two tests: * Lesson of Listening * Lesson of Reliability * Lesson of Basic Service * Lesson of Service Design > * Lesson of Recovery, * Lesion of Surprising Customers * Lesson of Fair Play * Lesson of Teamwork * Lesson of Employee Research * Lesson of Servant Leadership ‘These ten lessons represent in our view the foundation for service improvement. The potential for service improvement is diminished iF even one of these ten essentials is missing. a