Value co-creation process of integrated product-services: Effect of role ambiguities and relational coping strategies

• Co-creating value is central to providing product–service solutions.
• Value co-creation requires major role shifts in provider-customer relationships.
• Role ambiguities represent key challenges in the value-co creation process.
• Relational response strategies are vital to handle ambiguity in value co-creation.
• Role ambiguities and relational coping strategies vary across co-creation phases.

Co-creating value is central to providing product–service solutions. The present study contributes to a better understanding of the transition process from traditional transaction-oriented roles to future co-creation roles within provider–customer relationships. Our inductive analysis of cross-comparative case studies, including eight provider–customer relationships, identifies significant role ambiguities among actors involved in this transition. In addition to identifying challenges, we explain how relational coping strategies help the partners manage the presence of role ambiguities during the value co-creation process. Notably, three types of role ambiguities (vague role expectations, unclear role descriptions and uncertain role scripts) often serve as barriers to co-creating value across different phases of the value co-creation process and require different relational response strategies (role clarification, role redefinition and role adaption) to cope with unclear expectations, responsibilities and demands. The present study contributes to the emerging literature on value co-creation by underlining the role dynamics in provider and customer relationships during the co-creation process of product–service solutions.