Assessing the moderating roles of brand equity, intellectual capital and social capital in Chinese luxury hotels

Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management 43 (2020) 139–148

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Assessing the moderating roles of brand equity, intellectual capital and social capital in Chinese luxury hotels

T

Chih-Hsing Liua, Jing-Feng Jiangb,∗ a b

National Kaohsiung University of Science and Technology, Department of Tourism Management, No. 415, Chien Kung Road, Kaohsiung, 807, Taiwan Fuzhou Melbourne Polytechnic, Hospitality Management Department, 9 Lian Rong Road, Shangjie District, Minhou County, Fuzhou, Fujian Province, China

A R T I C LE I N FO

A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Brand equity Intellectual capital Managerial ties Social capital

To highlight the importance of intellectual property, the authors first introduce an integrated moderated mediation model to explore the relationships between intellectual capital (relational, organizational and human capital), brand equity (perceived quality, brand awareness, brand loyalty, and brand image) and social capital, in turn providing valuable guidance on hospitality industry management and empirical evidence for China's hospitality sector. As expected, interrelationships of intellectual capital exist, and relational capital may influence human capital through organizational capital. Additionally, the authors continue to expand on the concept of managerial ties and find a moderating effect of business and government ties. We in turn contribute to the theoretical development of intellectual capital, brand equity and social networks. The authors also discuss how this intriguing pattern of the moderated mediation model can be explained by brand equity and intellectual capital theory and can serve as inspiration for hotel managers.

1. Introduction Given the growing dynamism of the hospitality industry, hospitality firms must continually absorb internal and external knowledge and information to improve their capacities to satisfy customers and capitalize on market opportunities (Dabrowski, Brzozowska-Woś, GołąbAndrzejak, & Firgolska, 2019; Rienda, Claver, & Andreu, 2020; Romero & Tejada, 2019). Through the development of China's hospitality industry, hotels have gradually formed unified standards according to construction equipment, hotel scales, service quality and management levels. Liu (2017) also used intellectual capital (IC) to predict customer needs and to create value to sustain hotels' long-term profits as an effective management tool for creating a competitive advantage. IC is an important mechanism in that it has enabled hotels to serve as learning organizations that not only generate internal and external connections in the midst of a changing environment but have also gradually formed unified standards of customer service (Kim, Kim, Park, Lee, & Jee, 2012; Rudež & Mihalič, 2007). Additionally, the hotel industry serves shows great potential for national and regional development (Walheer & Zhang, 2018). Further, in securing a competitive advantage, intellectual capital (IC) is a critical attribute of hotel financial performance (Sardo, Serrasqueiro, & Alves, 2018). IC, which is based in relational, human and organization capital, not only contributes to a need for a dynamic hospitality industry with changing customer requirements but also ∗

responds to hotels' capacities to co-create value and explore market opportunities (Liu, 2017; Sardo et al., 2018). The application of intellectual capital in the hotel industry has the following functions. First, intellectual capital manages the complex external relations of hotels and improves their abilities to resist risks while helping them respond to environmental change (Engström, Westnes, & Westnes, 2003). Second, intellectual capital helps enhance the competitiveness and profitability of the hotel industry (Bontis, Janošević, & Dženopoljac, 2015). Third, intellectual capital can meet the needs of mature customers and provide customized products by improving employee skills and knowledge, system processes and customer relationships (Zeglat & Zigan, 2014). Although research on IC's effects on the hotel industry has drawn academic and industry attention, the influence of IC and how it directly and indirectly affects intangible asset development (e.g., brand equity and social capital) remains to be verified (Rico, Cabrer-Borrás, & del Mar Benavides-Espinosa, 2019). The research objectives of the study to examine the IC effects in the hospitality industry are as follows. First, the number of Chinese star hotels is increasing rapidly. With the increase in hotels from 203 in 1980 to 10,667 in 2018, the estimated value of China's tourism and hospitality industry will be 6.06 billion domestic tourists and 5.6 trillion yuan in tourism revenue in 2019, up 9.5 percent and 10 percent, respectively, over the previous year (China Tourism Academy, 2018). The tourism and hospitality market extension brings the benefit of

Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected] (J.-F. Jiang).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhtm.2020.03.003 Received 22 June 2019; Received in revised form 22 February 2020; Accepted 14 March 2020 1447-6770/ © 2020 Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of CAUTHE - COUNCIL FOR AUSTRALASIAN TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY EDUCATION

Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management 43 (2020) 139–148

C.-H. Liu and J.-F. Jiang

2017; McDowell, Peake, Coder, & Harris, 2018). In the knowledge economy, an organization's competitive advantage often comes from its IC; in other words, IC not only helps the organization benefit and grow but also creates economic growth for that furthers a country's development (Popkova, Yurev, Stepicheva, & Denisov, 2015). In the Chinese hospitality industry, with the advent of an era of rapid change toward a knowledge economy and given the dynamics of information technology, IC has gradually replaced traditional factors such as capital, labour and land to become a more critical capital factor in hotel development (Li & Liu, 2018) and has continuously expanded its influence in the hotel industry (Bontis et al., 2015). As the means of creating core value and enhancing competitive advantage in the hotel industry, intellectual capital reflects the innovation, foresight and predictive ability of enterprises, which benefits organizational and industrial development (Davey, Alsemgeest, O’Reilly-Schwass, Davey, & FitzPatrick, 2017). In terms of the main dimensions of IC identification, human capital (i.e., experience, level of education, intrinsic and extrinsic motivation), organizational capital (i.e., a firm's capacity to deploy and develop rare resources in the market and quickly adapt to environmental changes, usually reflected in efficiency in integrating existing resources into organizational processes and the ability to implement successful strategies), and relational capital (i.e., the development of business networks, which includes the values and access of stakeholders, customers, and suppliers) are important intangible assets for firms and are positively related to firm performance (Hsu & Fang, 2009; Saxena, 2015). According to the above studies, we conclude that the importance of IC in tourism and hospitality is undeniable and has received increasing attention (Bontis et al., 2015; Kim et al., 2012). Previous studies examining the role of IC mainly focus on the information technology sector and the pharmaceutical industry, where firms need to develop innovation capabilities to maintain their competitive advantage (Bontis et al., 2015). Recently, Battisti et al. (2015) concluded that IC plays a more significant role in the service industry than in manufacturing industries in terms of value creation and satisfying customers' needs. In other words, examining the interrelationships among aspects of IC enables the efficient measurement and identification of IC and provides an important step for IC improvement and management (Li & Liu, 2018). Following the increasing importance of IC in service industries, we use a sample from China's hospitality industry and examine the impact of the effective usage of IC and social capital development through brand equity. Some studies have also asserted that discussing the interrelationships between the critical variables provides more meaningful theoretical and managerial contributions to the hospitality industry (Tsai, Horng, Liu, & Hu, 2015). Therefore, we focus on the interrelationships between IC and brand equity to show how IC may affect an end service or product, thereby enhancing value for present and future customers. According to the above studies, we conclude that the importance of IC in recent studies is undeniable. Previous studies examining the role of IC mainly focus on the information technology sector and the pharmaceutical industry, which need to develop innovation capabilities to maintain their competitive advantage (Bontis et al., 2015). However, recently, Battisti et al. (2015) concluded that IC plays a more significant role in the service industry than in manufacturing industries in terms of value creation and satisfying customers' needs. The critical attribute is human capital because it is a core organizational competency in developing inimitable and unique capabilities. The study also found that relational capital significantly affects structural capital, which consequently influences firm performance. In other words, examining the interrelationships among IC enables the efficient measurement and identification of IC and provides an important step for IC improvement and management. Following the increase in the importance of IC in the service industries, we use a sample of China's hospitality industry and examine the impact of effective usage of IC, social capital development, through brand equity. We then focus on the interrelationships among IC

market opportunity exploration but also high competition. Therefore, hotels need to highly rely on intangible resources or assets to attract customers and maintain their own competitive advantages (Assaf & Cvelbar, 2011). Thus, there is an increasing need to examine the relationship with intangible resources or assets, such as intellectual capital, brand equity and social capital (Liu, 2017), identify the critical attributes of these intangible resources or assets, and examine how organizations can significantly enhance their stocks to further improve their own capabilities (Meek, Ogilvie, Lambert, & Ryan, 2019). Second, in general, most Chinese hotels belong to the SME scale, are scarce with abundant financial resources, human capital, intellectual capital or social capital, and thus need to adjust and input large amounts of resources to catch up with international and local industrial competition (Kim & Shim, 2018). Further, until now, the Eastern standards of hotel operations have led the Chinese hotel industry brand equity development for a long time (Zhang, Guillet, & Gao, 2012). As such, it is understood that more research is necessary to understand the brand equity connection among Chinese hotels given the current layout (GonzálezMansilla, Berenguer-Contrí, & Serra-Cantallops, 2019; Wang, Yang, & Yang, 2019). Third, hotel managers have stronger hotel management professionalism, sensitivity and a better understanding of the hotel ecological environment than consumers (Jaykumar, Fukey, & Balasubramanian, 2014). Most previous research topics discussed the impact of hotel smart capital and hotel brand equity on social capital from the perspective of consumers (Lin, Yang, Ma, & Huang, 2018). Few studies have looked at the relationships with social capital and brand development from the perspective of managers (Liu, 2017). As such, we adopted the perspective of managers to evaluate how the relationships among intellectual capital, brand equity and social capital provide more meaning in the tourism and hospitality literature. Fourth, this study identifies a potential attribute of managerial ties for hotels in securing rare resources and institutional support. Because managerial ties are seen as critical features to business success in China, Hsu et al. (2015) indicate that in order to receive support and access the resources from the local government, the firms' managers need to build managerial ties with local government to get approval for public resources. However, until now, fewer hospitality studies have discovered how managerial ties may help hotels to identify opportunities and gaining legitimacy in Chinese business practices (Hsu, Liu, & Huang, 2012). Therefore, this study advances the tourism and hospitality literature by identifying managerial ties as an important management-affective characteristic in acquiring intangible resources and may attenuate the relationship between brand equity and social capital in China's hotel industry. The structure of this study is as follows. We first review the literature by addressing the main constructs of the research, service quality, brand equity and innovation performance. Base on the literature, we elaborate a model of how service quality influences innovation performance through brand equity and examine the structure of service quality and brand equity (Fig. 1). This elaboration is followed by a discussion of the proposed hypotheses, applied method and measurement scales. The findings from an empirical setting, a sample of 622 hotel managerial staff, are then discussed. The final section addresses the theoretical and empirical implications of the findings for researchers and hotel practitioners (Fig. 2). 2. Literature development and hypothesis development 2.1. Intellectual capital Owing to the increasing competition of a dynamic environment and changing customer needs, Intellectual assets not only bring additional value for new service and product development but also help service organizations maintain competitive advantages (Bader, 2006; Battisti, Gallego, Rubalcaba, & Windrum, 2015). Intellectual capital (IC) refers to the economic value of an organization's intangible assets, such as rational capital, organizational capital and human capital (Bejinaru, 140

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Fig. 1. Research framework: Hypothesized model.

tourist, such as brand loyalty, brand image, perceived quality and brand awareness. Liu (2015) examined the interrelationships among brand equity and proposed that brand image mediates the relationship between brand awareness and utilitarian value. More recently, Šeric, GilSaura, and Mollá-Descals (2016) examined the impact of perceived information and communication technology on the creation of hotel brand equity. These qualitative and quantitative studies either focus on or extend different aspects of Aaker's (1991, 1996) concepts. They commonly recognize basic and foundational attributes of brand equity, namely, brand loyalty, brand awareness, perceived quality, and brand images. Therefore, we integrated these four critical attribute of brand equity in China's hospitality industry.

and brand equity to show how it may be transformed into the end of service or a product, thereby enhancing value for present and future customers.

2.2. Brand equity The concept of brand equity was developed by Mudambi, Doyle, and Wong (1997), who defined it as “the total value added by the brand to the core product”. Keller (1993) concluded that brand equity is “the differential effect of brand knowledge on the consumer's response to the marketing of the brand.” Following the increased importance of brand equity, the application fields range from marketing strategies to tourism and hospitality destinations and strategies of visit decision-making (Kim & Kim, 2005; Nam, Ekinci, & Whyatt, 2011; Wong & Wickham, 2015). Voorhees, White, McCall, and Randhawa (2015) asserted that brands add to the intangible and emotional values of a product or service, which influence consumers' perception of brand information, which in turn influences their decision-making heuristics. In other words, brand equity is a signal and, not only influences customers' value perception but also affects consumer behavior in response to their expectations by signaling value, perceived risk and familiarity with the brand image (Gertner, Berger, & Gertner, 2007; Murphy, Benckendorff, & Moscardo, 2007; Šerić, Gil-Saura, & Ruiz-Molina, 2014). Most relevant here, it is likely that brand equity is a critical core of IC for hotels because, facing insufficiency and limitations in market resources and shortages in skills and expertise, they need brand equity (brand awareness, brand association, perceived quality, brand loyalty) to strengthen their market reputation and provide benefits to the firm (Asamoah, 2014). Aaker (1991) asserted that brand equity is “the set of brand assets and liabilities” that are linked to customers' perceptions of a brand name, symbol or value provided by a product or service. The term “the set of brand assets and liabilities,” which means brand equity, includes multiple dimensions and attributes. Oh and Hsu (2014) used upscale (four- and five-star or equivalent) high-end foreign hotels as samples and proposed that brand equity includes multiple dimensions, including brand awareness, brand loyalty, brand image, perceived quality, utilitarian value, management trust, brand choice intention and brand reliability. Huang and Cai (2015) explored the values of multinational hotel brands, whereas Horng, Liu, Chou, and Tsai (2012) examined relationships among selected brand equity sub-dimensions for foreign

2.3. Hypotheses One reason brand equity promotes social capital accumulation is because it creates value and connections to resources from customers, visitors, shareholders, and employees embedded in a network (Bruhn, Schoenmueller, & Schäfer, 2012). Further, we assert that brand equity is a mediating attribute that connects the relationships between intellectual capital and social capital for several reasons. First, brand equity encourages hotel customers to reflect on their potential or actual perception of service or product images for which they feel confident in their own consumption experiences (Oh & Hsu, 2014). In other words, brand equity delivers a reliable message about the availability, competencies, and mutual trustworthiness of brand information for potential partners, which may help firm develop social capital (Davis & Mentzer, 2008). Second, increased intellectual capital development and a focus on actively improving brand equity are likely to translate into higher organization social capital accumulation. Petty and Guthrie (2000) argued that IC serves as “new” intangible assets for organizations. Such assets are associated with employee capability, staff competencies, customer relationships, and administrative systems. These intangible assets are of increased importance in a knowledge-based economy and can improve the speed of traditional intangible asset accumulation, such as brand equity, patents, and reputation. Third, in the hospitality industry, when facing a highly competitive and dynamic environment, IC is associated with the return of market-oriented IP, not only contributing to shareholder value but also increasing brand equity (Dzinkowski, 2000), which consequently influences a firm's social capital accumulation (Nahapiet & Ghoshal, 1998). We state this more 141

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(2005) argue that relational capital provides organizations needed resources from external connections, which influences the firm's development capabilities. Central to this argument is the fact that relational capital influences human capital through adding value and developing an organization's external and internal capabilities and will make hotels act with integrity in transferring information and knowledge in an open platform (Bontis et al., 2015). Therefore, relational capital plays an important role between organizational capital and human capital in hotel management and IC development, leading to the following hypothesis:

formally: Hypothesis 1. Brand equity mediates the positive relationship between intellectual capital and social capital. Managerial ties refer to top managers' personal networks' boundaryspanning and extension of interpersonal connections in business and political institutions, which help firms gain necessary resources, occupy critical network positions, and access valuable resources to achieve superior performance in China (Li, Poppo, & Zhou, 2008). Peng and Luo (2000) identify two categories of managerial ties: The first category is ties with business partners or executives at other firms, such as buyers, suppliers, and competitors, and the second category is ties with government officials, who have power in providing special resources or protections in transition economies such as China (Stuart & Wang, 2016). From the social capital theory perspective, there is a micro–macro link from managerial ties to creating intangible resources of social capital and enhancing a firm's performance (Wu & Leung, 2005). Gao, Xu, and Yang (2008) asserted that in rural Chinese SMEs, a manager's value of reciprocity can help the firm develop intangible resources, intra- and inter-organizational trust, network ties, competitiveness and overall firm performance. In other words, if hotels want to efficiently create brand equity and attract customers in China, a manager's personal value of reciprocity can greatly influence the speed of brand equity development, which in turn enhances a firm's social capital accumulation.

Hypothesis 5. Organizational capital mediates the positive relationship between relational capital and human capital.

3. Methods In this study, a sampling survey was conducted among the supervisory and management staff of star hotels in the eastern coastal area of China. Prior to the survey, managers and directors of human resources in the desired star hotels were requested by phone or e-mail to confirm their consent for participation in the sampling survey and questionnaire. A total of 1270 survey forms were distributed, with 650 returned; 28 copies were incomplete, meaning 622 copies were valid. After analyzing the forms through a series of checks and eliminating invalid copies with SPSS 18.0 software in a pattern of framework establishment, AMOS 18.0 software was used to measure and estimate the structural model.

Hypothesis 2. Managerial ties moderate the positive relationship between brand equity and social capital. The concept of brand equity reflects the customers' feeling and experience for brand value and addresses all of the tangible and intangible factors for which the business provides (Ambler, 1997; Wood, 2000). Specifically, this research argues that perceived quality provides the basis of customers' evaluations of a provider regarding the overall excellence or superiority of a product or service and is an important foundation; thus, it is more likely to influence antecedent behavior (Chen & Chang, 2012). Wu, Liao, Hung, and Ho (2012) suggested that when the quality of a hotel meets customer expectations, the image and awareness will rise, which will influence costumers’ revisit or repurchase decisions based on specifications in the service guarantee. Kim and Kim (2005), Kim, Jin-Sun, and Kim (2008), and Bailey and Ball (2006) also find a positive interrelationship between customer-based brand equity (perceived quality, brand awareness, brand image, and brand loyalty) in the hotel industry. In other words, brand image and brand awareness play an important role between perceived quality and brand loyalty. Thus, the following hypotheses are proposed:

3.1. Measures The scales were patterned after relevant surveys obtained in the literature review. The surveys were translated from English to Chinese. Then, semantic assessments and back-translations were conducted by scholars and experts in the hospitality industry to ensure that the Chinese translations did not deviate from the original English surveys. The questionnaires use a seven-point Likert scale, ranging from one (least likely to agree) to seven (most likely to agree). There are three sub-scales, intellectual capital, brand equity and social capital, as well as background information. Intellectual capital. Intellectual capital is measured by 19 items based on Chen, Shih, and Yang (2009), which contains three dimensions: human capital, organizational capital and relationship capital. For the each set of measurement items, managerial staff were asked to assess the degree to which they agreed from 1 = least likely to agree to 7 = most likely to agree. Examples for each dimension include “Employees have suitable education to fulfill their jobs” (human capital), “Employees realize the relationships among authority, responsibility, and benefit” (organizational capital), and “Employees have close interaction with the partners” (Relational capital). Brand equity. Brand equity is measured by 22 items based on Kayaman and Arasli (2007), Boo, Busser, and Baloglu (2009), Konecnik (2006), Konecnik and Gartner (2007), containing four dimensions: brand loyalty, brand awareness, brand image and perceived quality. For each set of measurement items, managerial staff were asked to assess the degree to which they agreed from 1 = least likely to agree to 7 = most likely to agree. Examples for each dimension include “When the hotel promised to do something by a certain time, it did it” (perceived quality), “I usually use this hotel as my first choice compared to other hotel brands” (brand loyalty), “It is a suitable place for the upper class” (brand image), “The hotel enjoys a good reputation” (brand awareness). Social capital. Social capital is measured by 5 items based on Hughes, Ireland, and Morgan (2007). One sample item is “Our employees are skilled at collaborating with each other to diagnose and solve problems”.

Hypothesis 3. Brand awareness mediates the positive relationship between perceived quality and brand loyalty. Hypothesis 4. Brand image mediates the positive relationship between perceived quality and brand loyalty. Intellectual capital (IC) as a critical intangible resources in today's business operations, particularly in the current knowledge-intensive economy, which also relies heavily on the need for innovation and creative ideas, creating high levels of competition in the hospitality industry (Kim et al., 2012; Zeglat & Zigan, 2014). IC has been frequently recognized as an IP that is managed and can be categorized into organizational capital, relational capital and human capital (Khalique, Bontis, Abdul Nassir bin Shaari, Hassan, & Isa, 2015). Bontis et al. (2015) asserted that relational capital in the hotel industry entails relationships with customers, suppliers and cooperation partners, which provides important resources and significantly influences organizational capital, which in turn affects hotel performance. In particular, relational capital has assumed a strategic role in IC development because it extends the networks and maintains both the internal and external relationships of hotels (Henry, 2013). Do Rosário Cabrita and Vaz 142

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4.2. Hypotheses testing

3.1.1. Data collection and analysis Three hotel managers and lecturers in Fujian Normal University performed the pre-test of this research before data collection. One hundred questionnaires were distributed between May 1, 2015 and June 2, 2015. After eliminating incomplete questionnaires, there were a total of 90 valid responses, for a response rate of 90%. To prepare the final version of the survey, some wording to the questionnaire was changed. This study uses convenience sampling. Researchers chose the managerial staff in star rated hotels in China as research subjects. The target respondents were hotel managerial staff working in 11 of China's luxury star rated hotels in most main tourist cities, such as Shanghai, Shaoxing, Xiamen, Fuzhou, and Quanzhou. To identify participant hotels, we telephoned and visited the general managers or human resource managers in different hotels. Then, the questionnaires were distributed through human resource managers and were collected by the researchers by hand from Sep 1, 2015 to Nov 1, 2015.

This study used a structural equation model (SEM) to test hypotheses for the causal relationships between variables. Hair et al. (2009) noted that “SEM combines aspects of multiple regression and factor analysis to estimate a series of interrelated relationships among variables simultaneously”. The measurement model fits the data satisfactorily which shows in Fig. 2, with all indexes greater than the standards (x2/df = 2.93, p = 0 0.000; AGFI = 0.803; GFI = 0.821; CFI = 0.918; NFI = 0 0.881; TLI = 0.914; IFI = 0.911; RMSEA = 0.056), and all factor loadings are highly significant (p < 0.001). Only the GFI and AGFI are slightly lower than 0.9. Bagozzi and Yi (1988, p. 79) suggested that values equal to or greater than 0.9 provide meaningful models for further statistical analysis. Further, Fornell and Larcker (1981, p. 47) discovered values of composite reliability (CR) above 0.58, almost 60%, and average variances extracted (AVE) above 0.5 may be considered acceptable and satisfy discriminant validity. We also assessed that the values of Cornbrash's alpha for all the constructs were higher than the 0.70 benchmark. Overall, the model adaptability was satisfactory and in accordance with the study's theoretical framework.

3.2. Respondents’ profiles A total of 1270 questionnaires were formally distributed to 11 starrated hotels in China from September to November in 2015. A total of 622 questionnaires were effectively completely, for an effective return rate of 48.9%. The sample collected was analyzed using Stata 12.0. The demographic data are shown in Table 1. Most respondents were female (54.2%). The majority of respondents had a university level of education (54.5%). Some 383 participants (61.6%) were 21–30 years old, and another 163 (26.2%) were 31–40 years old. The respondents were mainly in three departments: the food & beverage department, the front office, and the housekeeping department, and 196 employees (31.5%) were from the food and beverage department. The average hotel working experience for managers was 4.1 years (Table 2).

4.3. Mediation effects analysis Hypothesis 1 proposed that brand equity mediates the relationships between intellectual capital and social capital. The 95 percent bootstrap confidence intervals for the indirect effect, including bias-corrected confidence intervals for all parameters in the model, was applied for the mediation test for hypothesis 1. The total effect of intellectual capital on social capital through brand equity is significant (β = 0.850, p < 0.001). The indirect effect is positive and statistically significant, as evidenced by the 95% bias-corrected bootstrap confidence interval (CI) (β = 0.850; CI [0.816; 0.880]). Therefore, Hypothesis 1 was supported. Hypothesis 3 and Hypothesis 4 proposed that for the relationship inside brand equity, there are two indirect effects: brand awareness mediates the positive relationship between perceived quality and brand loyalty, and brand image mediates the positive relationship between perceived quality and brand loyalty. To integrate the mediation effect, we used same method to test hypotheses 3 and 4 using the bootstrap method. The total effect of perceived quality on brand loyalty through brand awareness is significant (β = 0.669, p < 0.001). The indirect effect of Hypothesis 3 is not statistically significant, as evidenced by the 95% bias-corrected bootstrap confidence interval (CI) (β = 0.669; CI [0.603; 0.720]). Therefore, Hypothesis 3 was not supported. The total effect of perceived quality on brand loyalty through brand image is significant (β = 0.813, p < 0.001). The indirect effect of Hypothesis 4 is positive and statistically significant, as evidenced by the 95% biascorrected bootstrap confidence interval (CI) (β = 0.813; CI [0.760;

4. Results 4.1. Scale validity and reliability Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was used to estimate all measurement items, which were loaded on the expected constructs, and each factor had discriminate validity between the others (Anderson & Gerbing, 1988). Table 3 and Table 4 show the means, standard deviations (SD), composite reliability (CR), average variance extract (AVE) and correlations between the research variables. The results show that the composite reliability (CR) ranged from 0.853 to 0.935, which is higher than the standard of 0.6. The Average Variance Extracted (AVE) for each factor was between 0.538 and 0.728, which is higher than 0.5. Therefore, it could be concluded that the convergent validity of the study measurement scale was acceptable (Karatepe, 2006). Table 1 Samples and questionnaire distribution. NO

Hotel name

Questionnaire Distribution

Usable/effective Questionnaire

Percentage

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

Kempinski Hotel Xiamen Wanda Vista Quanzhou Luhuitou State Guesthouse Westin Xiamen Hotel Fuzhou Guian Hot Spring Conference Center Crowne Plaza Pudong Shanghai InterContinental Fuzhou Hotel Dayu Kaiyuan Jumeirah Himalayas Hotel Shanghai Sheraton Fuzhou Hotel Shangri-La Hotel Fuzhou

120 120 120 120 120 50 120 120 120 120 120

90 89 85 77 73 19 60 38 38 23 22

75% 74% 70% 64% 60% 38% 50% 31% 31% 19% 18%

1270

622

49%

Total

143

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Table 2 Demographic information about hotel managers. Variables Gender Male Female Age Less than 20 Between 20 and 30 Between 31 and 40 Between 41 and 50 Between 51 and 60 Above 61 Education Junior high school Senior high school University Graduate school Working Experience

Samples

%

Variables

285 337

45.80% 54.20%

24 383 163 34 11 7

3.90% 61.60% 26.20% 5.50% 1.80% 1.10%

58 216 339 9 Average 4.11 years

9.30% 34.70% 54.50% 1.40%

Department Housekeeping Department F&B Department Front Office Department Human Resource Division Sales & Marketing Division Entertainment Department Security Department Administration Office Other Position Captain Supervisor Manager Department Director General manager

Samples

%

87 196 95 50 44 8 50 11 81

14.00% 31.50% 15.30% 8.00% 7.10% 1.30% 8.00% 1.80% 13.00%

200 295 114 11 2

32.18% 47.40% 18.32% 1.77% 0.33%

this study discovered the inter-relationship among intellectual capital, brand equity, managerial ties and social capital. We find that hotel brand equity from the managerial view plays a mediating role between intellectual capital and social capital. These findings imply that hotels need to build internal and external branding by connecting the internal intellectual capital development and the external social capital identification (Wang et al., 2019). Further, we have followed the previous tourism and hospitality studies and examined the mutual relationship of the sub-dimensions of IC (Liu, 2017) and brand equity (Liu & Fang, 2018; Pike, 2007). An SEM analysis showed that relational capital influences human capital through organizational capital; another analysis discovered the mediating roles of brand awareness and brand image that link the relationships between perceived quality and brand loyalty. Finally, with the increase in the importance of managerial ties (Ying & Norman, 2017), this study demonstrates the moderating role of managerial ties that strengthen the effects of brand equity on social capital development. This may explain why managerial ties contributed to the strength of the boundary-spanning hotels’ brand equity in a highly competitive hotel environment in China.

0.856]). Therefore, Hypothesis 4 was supported. Hypothesis 5 tests the relationship inside intellectual capital. Organizational capital mediates the positive relationship between relational capital and human capital. The total effect of relational capital on human capital through organizational capital is significant (β = 0.804, p < 0.001). The indirect effect is positive and statistically significant, as evidenced by the 95% bias-corrected bootstrap confidence interval (CI) (β = 0.804; CI [0.766; 0.840]). Therefore, Hypothesis 5 was supported. 4.4. Moderating effect analysis The moderating effects of brand equity-social capital associations with managerial ties are shown in Fig. 1. The moderating effect was examined using regression analyses and bootstrapping (Edwards & Lambert, 2007). All of the interaction variables were mean centered to reduce multicollinearity (Aiken & West, 1991). As the result shows in Table 3, the interaction between brand equity and managerial ties was significantly related to social capital (β = 0.071, p > 0.05). To understand the nature of the moderating relationship, the interaction was plotted by adopting Aiken and West's (1991) procedure for computing slopes one standard deviation above and below the boundary strength's mean at home. Fig. 3presents the interaction patterns. The results show that consistent with H2, brand equity has a stronger positive relationship with social capital.

5.1. Theoretical implications This study contributes to the existing tourism and hospitality literature in the following ways. First, few studies have been conducted on intellectual capital, brand equity and social capital in relation to hotels in Fujian Province and China's eastern coastal area. Li and Liu (2018) recently illustrated the relationships between intellectual capital and a hotel's competitive advantage (Liu, 2017), and several other hospitality studies have focused on ways to build a hotel's brand equity

5. Discussion By integrating the perspective of Chinese star-rated hotel managers, Table 3 Means, standard deviations, reliabilities and correlations. Variables

Mean

SD

VIF

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

1. Human capital 2. Organization capital 3. Relationship capital 4.Brand loyalty 5.Brand image 6.Brand awareness 7. Perceived quality 8. Tie with other firms 9. Tie with government 10. Social Capital

5.69 5.68 5.68 5.54 5.84 5.68 5.80 5.74 5.64 5.71

0.79 0.81 0.83 0.92 0.85 0.92 0.76 5.74 5.64 5.71

4.68 4.23 3.5 3.46 3.44 2.72 2.59 2.39 2.13

(0.91) 0.83 0.82 0.65 0.64 0.71 0.73 0.7 0.62 0.75

0.53 (0.93) 0.76 0.65 0.67 0.73 0.73 0.71 0.64 0.79

0.54 0.51 (0.91) 0.61 0.59 0.68 0.68 0.7 0.6 0.72

0.47 0.48 0.47 (0.90) 0.63 0.59 0.72 0.66 0.53 0.59

0.43 0.46 0.42 0.49 (0.91) 0.64 0.73 0.68 0.55 0.63

0.51 0.54 0.52 0.5 0.5 (0.85) 0.65 0.71 0.55 0.77

0.44 0.44 0.43 0.5 0.47 0.45 (0.93) 0.71 0.56 0.65

0.43 0.44 0.45 0.47 0.45 0.5 0.42 (0.86) 0.69 0.66

0.44 0.47 0.45 0.44 0.42 0.46 0.38 0.49 (0.84) 0.6

0.52 0.55 0.52 0.47 0.46 0.62 0.43 0.44 0.48 (0.92)

Note: 1. N = 622. 2. () Cronbach alpha. 3. Values in the lower diagonal are the correlation matrix. 4. Values in the upper diagonal are the covariance matrix. *p < 0.05. **p < 0.01. 144

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Table 4 Summary of construct and item indexes. Measurement items Human Capital Employees have suitable education to fulfill their jobs. Employees are well trained. Employees hold suitable work experience for accomplishing their job successfully. Employees are well-skilled professionally to accomplish their job successfully. Employees understand that doing this job well is a reward in itself. Considering the time spent on the job, employees feel thoroughly familiar with their tasks. Mastering their jobs means a lot to our employees. Organizational Capital Employees realize the relationships among authority, responsibility, and benefit. Employees effectively construct an information system. Employees effectively utilize their information system. Employees know well about the contents of a company's culture. Employees clearly recognize the company's perspective. Employees can operate an efficient business process. Employees can effectively share their knowledge with each other. Employees can conveniently access enterprise information. Relational Capital Employees have a close interaction with their partners. Employees have mutual respect with the partners. Employees have mutual trust with the partners. Employees have personal friendships with the partners Brand Image Our hotel is comfortable Our hotel has a very clean image Our hotel is luxurious Our hotel is a suitable place for the upper class Brand Loyalty Our customers usually use this hotel as their first choice compared to other hotel brands Our customers are satisfied with their visits of this hotel Our customer would recommend this hotel to others Our customer would not switch to another hotel the next time Brand Awareness Hotel enjoys a good reputation Customer can easily name famous services in our hotel This hotel comes to mind immediately when customers think about hotel services. Perceived Quality When the hotel promises to do something by a certain time, it does it The hotel performs the service right the first time The hotel provides its services at the time it promises to do so The hotel insists on error free service Staff at the hotel are able to tell patrons exactly when services will be performed When patrons have problems, the hotels shows a genuine interest in solving them Staff at the hotel give prompt service to the patrons Staff at the hotel are never too busy to respond to patrons The behavior of staff instills confidence in patrons Staff of the hotel are consistently courteous with patrons Staff of the hotel have the knowledge to answer patrons Social Capital Our employees are skilled at collaborating with each other to diagnose and solve problems. Our employees share information and learn from one another. Our employees interact and exchange ideas with people from different areas of the company. Our employees partner with customers, suppliers, alliance partners, etc., to develop solutions. Our employees apply knowledge from one area of the company to problems and opportunities that arise in another

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Factor loading

AVE

CR

.813 .831 .803 .812 .719 .819 .627

.605

.914

.795 .813 .809 .795 .776 .700 .794 .767

.538

.935

.806 .856 .863 .736

.667

.889

.841 .845 .874 .852

.728

.914

.767 .849 .867 .853

.697

.902

.825 .811 .799

.659

.853

.743 .788 .776 .748 .754 .760 .780 .705 .724 .769 .716

.565

.935

.832 .856 .839 .813 .802

.687

.916

extends this perspective and demonstrates that managerial ties may strengthen the relationships between hotel brand equity and social capital accumulation. Third, past research has generally focused on consumers' or employees’ attitudes towards hotel brand value (Xiong & King, 2019). We contribute to this line of research by presented several significant predictors of hotel brand equity development in consideration of antecedent attributes of intellectual capital and consequent results of social capital development. Namely, managers recognize hotel brand equity as well as a connection orientation, which directly and indirectly influences other critical attributes. This study in turn informs professionals and the hospitality literature on ways to advance effective the operational management of hotel brand equity and identify psychological strengths in managers that enhance hotel brand identification based on empirical results.

(Sarker, Mohd-Any, & Kamarulzaman, 2019; Sürücü, Öztürk, Okumus, & Bilgihan, 2019; Xiong & King, 2019). However, fewer studies have integrated various theoretical viewpoints and perspectives in empirical examinations. This study in turn presents novel findings. Second, rather than studying the relationships between factors, past studies have focused on individual factors while disregarding their connections (King, So, & Grace, 2013; Saleem & Raja, 2014). This study shows that different attributes of intellectual capital (i.e., relational, organizational, and human capital) can serve as a catalyst in developing a hotel's brand equity and have subsequent positive effects social capital accumulation. Further, Hsu et al. (2012) asserted that hotels may benefit from network connections through difference types of managerial ties in the process of identifying market opportunities, accessing rare resources, and gaining competitive advantages in a relationshipdependent sector such as China's hospitality industry. This study

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Fig. 2. Research framework- results.

accommodation facilities to provide more comprehensive protection (Engström et al., 2003). The hotel should also give full consideration to the unique needs of the individual to build its own brand equity. If a hotel is not capable of providing standard configured facilities to all customers, it should at least be able to meet the needs of individual customers when necessary, such as oversized slippers. The study also found that services in the form of lobby decorations, room size, room comfort, room decoration design, bed size, bed comfort, television quality, restroom quality, etc, i.e., tangible products, are the most important according to the index, but still have relatively low index scores. Therefore, hotel managers should pay extra attention to the development of intangible assets, such as intellectual capital, brand equity, and social capital. Second, the results of this study suggest that continuously accumulated intellectual capital and the creation of unique advantages play an important role in enhancing customers' brand value and loyalty. The vitality of the brand should be reflected in its pursuit of intellectual capital to maintain vitality in consumers' perception. If a hotel simply follows market trends, accumulating IC as critical foundational mechanisms to increase product innovation will not create new consumption hot spots or widen the gap with other competitors. Successful IC should create new markets, increase customer loyalty, and develop new marketing trends by addressing customers’ intangible and unmet needs. It should also enable business innovation, seize opportunities and establish a superior competitive advantage. Thus, the products and services provided by a hotel need to continuously develop IC to maintain a unique competitive advantage and eliminate the homogenization of influence, allowing it to become the industry leader. A hotel may consider developing ideas and actively seeking and finding its own brand positioning and image, coinciding with physical attractions to enhance the brand value. Third, the hotel managerial staffs of hotels need to establish the correct values of brand equity. First, they need to realize that brand value covers three aspects: brand image, brand awareness and brand loyalty. Furthermore, the hotel needs to provide core value to customers continuously. In other worlds, the core values of hotel brand equity in the customer's perception must remain clear and stable. Hotels also need to pay attention to the fact that the customer's perception plays a critical role in inference regarding hotel brand equity. Creating superior customer value will increase hotels' competitive advantage.

Fig. 3. The interactive effect of brand equity, social capital and managerial ties.

Fourth, this study not only provides empirical results demonstrating that brand equity mediates the relationship between intellectual and social capital but also discusses the relationships of critical attributes of brand equity (i.e., brand awareness, perceived quality, brand loyalty and brand image) and intellectual capital (i.e., relational, organization, and human capital). Tsai et al. (2015) identification of relationships between critical attributes of an organization serves as meaningful contribution to the hospitality literature. Recently, tourism and hospitality studies have also provided empirical support for such relationships (Liu & Fang, 2018). Based on this perspective, the present study shows that organizational capital plays a mediating role between relational and human capital. Brand awareness mediates the positive relationship between perceived quality and brand loyalty. In addition, brand image mediates the positive relationship between perceived quality and brand loyalty. Our study is the first to examine these relationships.

5.1.1. Managerial implications The results of this study have important implications for star-rated hotels in China. First, to overcome challenges in the service industry, hotels need to develop IC to enhance brand equity and increase social capital accumulation. In addition, from the variety of hotel customers' needs, IC may need to consider customers’ demand for basic 146

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5.1.2. Limitations and future research directions There are several limitations in this study. First, this study's sample of employees in high positions (e.g., department directors and general manager) is relatively small. Most of the sample is middle to lower level managerial staff. However, according to the proportion of hotel management, top management is inherently smaller. Future research should focus on top management level staff to examine differences from this study. Second, the scales used to measure intellectual capital, brand equity and social capital are all from foreign scholars. Future research could consider more scholars from China because they better understand the hotel industry in China. Third, the hotels examined are based in Fujian Province in China. Due to the rapid growth and internationalization of China's hospitality industry, different cities may be facing different industry changes. Thus, further examinations of relationships between intellectual capital, brand equity, social capital and managerial ties are warranted. To generalize our findings, future tourism or hospitality research could expand our sample to other cities in China or study larger samples to draw more robust conclusions based on the results of this study. In this study, we also combine government ties and business ties as one variable to represent managerial ties. Future studies could separate and discuss the relationships of both variables.

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