A Systematic Literature Review on Service Robot Attributes and Organizational Climate’s Role

Service robots are gaining increasing attention due to their potential productivity and efficiency gains. However, implementing service robots within an organization faces challenges because service robots possess characteristics that can affect employees in a negative or positive direction. It is therefore important to examine which characteristics matter most. Additionally, organizational characteristics, in particular the prevailing organizational climate, are important to provide a conducive work atmosphere in robot adoption. However, the latter has been less emphasized in service robot studies so far. Therefore, this study sets out to investigate the importance of both service robot characteristics and organizational climate for robot implementation in the workplace. Drawing on two respective systematic literature reviews, we have uncovered four groups of service robot attributes (i.e., social attributes, physical attributes, operating modes, and degrees of intelligence) and four groups of organizational climate attributes (i.e., resources, communication, leadership, and job autonomy), including their effects on particular service robot outcomes within an organization. Theoretically, this study adds insight through identifying key service robot characteristics and considering organizational climate as a novel angle for future research. For practice, this paper offers adoption advice to managers on service robot implementation while considering the organizational climate at work.