Tourist hotels in Taiwan are focusing their attention on improving customer service quality. In general, a firm's human resource management (HRM) practices can create an environment that encourages positive employee behavior, thereby enhancing service quality. This conceptualization is grounded in an extensive review of the literature, pooling together previously disparate research strands. The purpose of this study is to empirically explore the relationship among human resource management practices, service behavior and service quality in the tourist hotels. The results indicate HRM practices had partially a direct effect on customer perceptions of service quality and an indirect effect through employees' service behavior. This means that service behavior only partially mediates the relationship between human resource management practices and service quality. The implications for HRM and future research implications of this finding are discussed. (C) 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
