The buffering effect of polychronicity on negative impacts of customer incivility in sports stadiums.

Introduction: This study applied action regulation theory and polychronicity theory to investigate the adverse impacts of customer incivility on employees' job performance within sports stadiums. The study also explored the mediating role of work interruptions and the moderating effect of employees' polychronicity on the proposed mediation model. Methods: Data were collected using paper questionnaires from junior managers and their subordinates in public-to-private sports centers in Taiwan, which had been operational for over one year by November 2020. Out of the 43 centers meeting this criterion, 31 were included in the study. A total of 219 valid dyads consisting of direct supervisors and subordinates were collected, resulting in a response rate of 94.8 %. We employed reliability tests, confirmatory factor analysis, Pearson correlation analysis, and hierarchical regression analysis to assess hypotheses and the research framework. We examined the mediating effect and conditional indirect effects using Model 4 and Model 58 of the SPSS PROCESS macro. Results: The majority of our results supported the research hypothesis that customer incivility significantly negatively affected work interruptions and job performance, as evaluated by supervisors. However, the hypothesis regarding the mediating effect of work interruptions was not supported. Integrated model analysis revealed that employees' polychronicity significantly moderated the proposed mediating effect of work interruptions. While customer incivility significantly decreased the supervisor-evaluated job performance of employees with relatively lower polychronicity levels through the mediating effect of work interruptions, the mediating effect was not significant for employees with relatively higher or moderate levels of polychronicity. Conclusion: Our results elucidated how customer incivility negatively impacted employees in the sports service or sports venue industry. Consequently, it is recommended that organizations provide pre-employment and customer service training for employees. This study also emphasizes the employees' agency and temporal cognitive flexibility, confirming that employees' polychronicity can alleviate the adverse consequences of uncivil customer treatment. This finding deserves consideration by both government and private entities within the sports industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]