Exploring Resource-Based Actor Engagement in Microfinance Institutions: The Service-Dominant Logic Perspective

Actor engagement is an emerging area of research in service-dominant logic yet equated with the traditional view of customer engagement. The narrow explanation of cognitive and emotional perspectives obstructs the theory building to further understand the resource-based perspective of actor engagement, thus warranting an inductive inquiry. The interrelated categorization is also a missing link in the literature, and this study fills this gap.  This qualitative study explores antecedents of actor engagement with a resource-based perspective at pre, core, and post-service encounters. While adopting the qualitative Gioia methodology, twenty-five customers of microfinance institutions were interviewed to explore the phenomenon. Our study reveals that in the pre-resource integration phase, the value fit and actors' dexterity are the antecedents that bring actor engagement. The alignment of integrated resources and service interaction disposition ensures engagement at the resource-integration phase, whereas, in the post-integration phase, actor engagement is affected by the service outcome. Furthermore, the actors' association with networks influences the engagement, and information gateways interconnect all three phases. This study offers four unique propositions to explain interrelated resource-based actor engagement. Microfinance institutions moving towards digital banking can adopt the study findings to redesign engaging strategies at an actor-to-actor level to ensure brand loyalty and commitment. Researchers can quantitatively test the proposed propositions for further conceptual advancement.