Resources

RESOURCES


RESOURCES: PAPERS & PRESENTATIONS

Author : Conrad Lashley & Barry O'Mahony
School/Work Place : Nottingham Trent University, UK (Conrad Lashley) & Victoria University, Australia (Barry O'Mahony)
Contact : conrad.lashley@ntu.ac.uk
Year : 2007

Recent challenges within the hospitality industry highlight a critical need for research and innovation to inform management practice. Surprisingly, however, a comprehensive review of literature has found that innovation research within the industry is scant and that innovative practice lags behind many other industries. In a study into innovation activity across 14 industries in the UK, for example, Robson and Ortmans (2006) found hotels and restaurants to be the second least innovative. This lack of innovation activity is most pronounced in the food and beverage sector with Enz (2004, p.5) noting that the food service sector in the US is reactive making few advances in current practice ‘ … until a period of crisis arises’ and Ottenbacher and Gnoth advising that hospitality ‘managers often rely on gut feeling, speculation, and their own limited experience about the keys to innovation success’ (2005, p. 206).

An emerging crisis is currently evident in the food and beverage departments of international chain hotels. Indeed, a continual decline in customer demand within this sector has prompted Riley (2000, p.112) to pose the question ‘can hotel restaurants ever be profitable?’ Riley’s question is based on his observations that chain hotels are losing market share prompting outsourcing of restaurants and the cancellation of several service periods (Riley, 2000). This downgrading of food and beverage within these establishments has also been noted by Wood (2007) who advises that apart from a few hotels that are food led, the majority now make their money from room sales. A similar situation is occurring in Australia where the majority of international chain hotels have abandoned fine dining altogether reducing their food and beverage outlets to casual dining with the main emphasis on providing breakfast and 24 hour room service.

This conceptual paper argues that the current management paradigm in international chain hotels presents a barrier to innovation, which is compounded by a failure to recognise that hospitality and tourism experiences have important emotional dimensions. The paper explains that by understanding the hospitality transaction between hosts and guests commercial operators can deliver customer experiences that build customer loyalty. The paper then illustrates how a reflective hospitality curriculum can prepare hospitality management graduates to react to the dynamic environment that is today’s hospitality industry.


List of Articles
No. Subject Views Datesort
10 Think Tank XI An introduction of the Global Sustainable Tourism Coun... file 3305 Oct 14, 2013

The purpose of this presentation is to introduce the Global Sustainable Tourism Council and Criteria, in an effort to encourage the Criteria as part of a framework for sustainable tourism education. The history of the GSTC and Criteria will...

Author: Kelly Bricker 

Year: 2011 

9 Think Tank XI Environmental Attitudes of Generation Y Students: Foun... file 5404 Oct 14, 2013

Sustainability has long been a theme in the tourism research and planning literature and is a growing concern in the wider area of business and corporate management. Consequent to these trends in practice and research there has been a growt...

Author: Pierre Benckendorff, Gianna Moscardo & Laurie Murphy 

Year: 2011 

8 Think Tank XII The Way Forward: Event Management Education and the Fu... file 3778 Nov 06, 2013

The 2011 BESTEN Think Tank XI highlighted a number of issues and themes related to education and learning for sustainable tourism. The themes addressed issues such as learning tools for sustainability, sustainability courses and curricula an...

Author: Olga Junek, Leonie Lockstone-Binney & Martin Robertson 

Year: 2012 

7 Think Tank XII Mobile Learning for Sustainable Tourism Development: T... file 3873 Nov 06, 2013

This paper examines how mobility in higher tourism education may contribute to a dynamic leaning environment capable of integrating transnational and intercultural learning for sustainable tourism development. Central to this is the opening ...

Author: Janne J. Liburd 

Year: 2012 

6 Think Tank XII Virtual Mobilities and Sustainable Tourism: Virtual Fi... file 2993 Nov 06, 2013

Due to the financial constraints on the part of the educational institution as well as the student, offsetting the GHG emissions generated by the fieldtrip is often not regarded as financially feasible, or subject to doubts about the integri...

Author: Christian Schott 

Year: 2012 

5 Think Tank XII Are We Moving Towards Education for Sustainability? A ... file 6834 Nov 06, 2013

It is nearing the end of the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (2005-2014) (United Nations, 2011), an awareness raising campaign which “seeks to mobilize the educational resources of the world to help create a mo...

Author: Erica Wilson, Tania von der Heidt, Geoffrey Lamberton & Dayle Morrison 

Year: 2012 

4 Think Tank XI Broad Street Regeneration Initiative: Practical Sustai... file 16474 Dec 19, 2013

Professors of tourism management teach principles of sustainable tourism to students in the classroom. Practitioners teach by implementing sustainable tourism principles in community. The Blackstone Valley Tourism Council (Tourism Council) i...

Author: Robert Billington, Natalie Carter, Caitlin Amos & Myles Ellison 

Year: 2011 

3 Think Tank XIV A Multi-Stakeholder Perspective on Sustainable Tourism... file 7326 Jun 26, 2014

In this study, I take up the task to work towards a theoretical and methodological framework that allows using sustainability as a threshold concept for critically evaluating the assumptions embedded in both tourism management theory and pra...

Author: José-Carlos García-Rosell 

Year: 2014 

2 Think Tank XIV Values in Tourism Higher Education: the Case of Europe... file 8942 Jun 26, 2014

The primary rationale for embedding values-based learning in tourism higher education is to engage students’ learning-to-learn and learning-to-be, rather than simply learning about a topic, such as tourism management or sustainability (Libur...

Author: Tanja Mihalič, Janne J. Liburd & Jaume Guia 

Year: 2014 

1 Think Tank XIV Tourism Development as Greek Tragedy: Implications for... file 25139 Jun 26, 2014

Although tourism has been used as a development strategy in many parts of the world for several decades, there is little evidence that it is an effective tool for improving the wellbeing of destination communities. It is not uncommon to find...

Author: Gianna Moscardo, Anna Blackman & Laurie Murphy 

Year: 2014 

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