Why is Empowerment Important in Big Data Analytics?

Big data analytics with its intricate insights is enabling service providers to better gauge customer needs. It is equally delivering information about the competitive landscape of services to customers. The frontline employees (FLEs) responsible for managing the diversified needs of these 'informed customers' face multiple challenges. The FLEs need not only information about their products/ services but also about markets and customers. A systematic review of the extant literature of big data and FLEs has helped to understand that FLEs need empowerment to adapt their services in high contact big data driven services. Empowerment as a concept is well known in management and psychology literature. The empowerment construct has predominantly remained to consisting of a single, and in a few cases, of multiple items. To facilitate effective service delivery in high contact big data driven services, FLEs need empowerment on multiple levels and there exists a significant gap in the literature about these constituent dimensions. This paper, synthesizing the relevant scholarly work, proposes a conceptual model for the empowerment construct. In doing so, this paper makes an important theoretical and managerial contribution towards the understanding of FLEs' empowerment and its relevance in high contact data driven services.