Strategic Management Research In Hospitality And Tourism: Past

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International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management Strategic management research in hospitality and tourism: past, present and future Robert J. Harrington Prakash K. Chathoth Michael Ottenbacher Levent Altinay Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) Article information: To cite this document: Robert J. Harrington Prakash K. Chathoth Michael Ottenbacher Levent Altinay , (2014),"Strategic management research in hospitality and tourism: past, present and future", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 26 Iss 5 pp. 778 - 808 Permanent link to this document: http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/IJCHM-12-2013-0576 Downloaded on: 08 November 2014, At: 05:27 (PT) References: this document contains references to 134 other documents. To copy this document: [email protected] The fulltext of this document has been downloaded 463 times since 2014* Users who downloaded this article also downloaded: Cristian Morosan, John T. Bowen, Morgan Atwood, (2014),"The evolution of marketing research", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 26 Iss 5 pp. 706-726 http:// dx.doi.org/10.1108/IJCHM-11-2013-0515 Bob Brotherton, (1999),"Towards a definitive view of the nature of hospitality and hospitality management", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 11 Iss 4 pp. 165-173 Hadyn Ingram, (1999),"Hospitality: a framework for a millennial review", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 11 Iss 4 pp. 140-148 Access to this document was granted through an Emerald subscription provided by 382580 [] For Authors If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.com Emerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services. Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. *Related content and download information correct at time of download. The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at www.emeraldinsight.com/0959-6119.htm IJCHM 26,5 Strategic management research in hospitality and tourism: past, present and future Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 778 Received 26 December 2013 Revised 12 March 2014 1 April 2014 Accepted 5 April 2014 Robert J. Harrington School of Human Environmental Sciences, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Arkansas, USA Prakash K. Chathoth Department of Marketing, School of Business and Management, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates Michael Ottenbacher Faculty for International Business, Heilbronn University, Heilbronn, Germany, and Levent Altinay Oxford School of Hospitality Management, Oxford Brookes University, Headington, UK Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this study is to review the hospitality and tourism strategy literature to identify trends related to key topical areas of research. The study objectives include identifying hospitality and tourism strategy challenges; presenting a synthesis of frequent strategy topics; and identifying opportunities for future research. Design/methodology/approach – Earlier studies in the hospitality strategy literature were reviewed and synthesized to identify trends, gaps and opportunities. Findings – Hospitality strategy research continues to improve and extend the boundaries of strategic thought in the hospitality literature. In assessing the literature from 1980 to 2013, it was apparent that the literature was following the mainstream trend of combining theoretical perspectives to some degree as well as applying more process-based concepts to hospitality strategy research. There were several challenges for propelling hospitality strategy research forward; these included the educational infrastructure, theory development and the quantity and quality of researchers in the field. Research limitations/implications – Given the depth and breadth of the strategy topics and research, it was difficult to ensure sufficient coverage was provided in the limited space of one journal article. Originality/value – The study provides a good foundational understanding of where the hospitality strategy research had been and the trajectory of where it was headed. Further, it serves as a valuable resource for current researchers and those entering this area of research. Keywords Strategy, Strategic management, Hospitality management, Hospitality, Strategy research, Strategy topics International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management Vol. 26 No. 5, 2014 pp. 778-808 © Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0959-6119 DOI 10.1108/IJCHM-12-2013-0576 Paper type Research paper Introduction At the crux of an organization’s ability to sustain an advantage laid the deployment of strategic (unique) resources that tapped opportunities in the firm’s immediate Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) environment or countered threats to create value for key stakeholders (Olsen et al., 1998, 2008). This concept was foundational to the existence of organizational forms which researchers in the generic strategic management as well as the hospitality and tourism domains had tried to capture in various attempts over the past several decades. Prior to the 1960s, there was extensive existing literature on management (Penrose, 1959; etc.), but limited academic publications specific to strategy or business policy. During the 1960s, seminal authors such as Chandler (1962) and Ansoff (1965) developed key research questions, concepts and ideas using a phenomenological approach (drawing conclusions from observed things). While study on traditional issues such as the strategy-structure debate continued into the 1990s (Amburgey and Dacin, 1994; Donaldson, 1997), strategy research during the 1970s developed theory along with constructs and propositions using an ontological approach. The basis for theories of strategic management were initially drawn from researchers with roots and training in economy theory (Bain, 1956; Caves and Porter, 1976; Teece, 1980) and organizational theory (Hambrick et al., 1982; Hrebiniak and Joyce, 1985) with contrasting views of strategy content (what) and strategy process (how). The 1980s and 1990s saw a proliferation of empirical testing of strategy models and concepts using epistemological methods to test the limits of strategy knowledge and relationships. After the year 2000, a “strategy as practice” agenda marked a clear departure from traditional strategy models and concepts dominating the research studies at the beginning of the twenty-first century. Strategy as practice research aimed to understand the real-life complexities of strategy and strategy-making by going inside the world of strategy practitioners as they struggled with competing priorities, multiple stakeholders and excessive but incomplete information (Whittington, 2003). Researchers exploiting this research agenda were concerned with the detailed aspects of strategizing; how strategists think, talk, interact and politicize and what tools and technologies they used to strategize. In contrast to the continuous, evolutionary progress of the generic strategy research, it had been suggested that hospitality and tourism strategy research had always been in the embryonic stage, as the researchers in the field had traditionally followed the research agenda set by the generic strategy researchers (Okumus, 2002). Therefore, this study provided an overview of the hospitality and tourism strategy literature from 1980 to 2013 to demonstrate its evolution during this period; identify hospitality and tourism strategy challenges; present a synthesis of frequent strategy topics; and identify opportunities for future research. The evolution of research within the hospitality and tourism domain had been captured using the mainstream strategic management literature as a reference point. In general, our review of the hospitality and tourism literature indicated that research within the domain had been largely influenced by the works of mainstream strategy researchers. The 1980 to 2013 time frame was selected for several reasons. First, as discussed above, the 1980s ushered in a new era of strategic management research in both the general strategy literature and growth in interest in hospitality and tourism. Empirical testing and theory development began to proliferate during this time, and many of the schools of thought that emerged starting in the 1980s were still at the core of strategic thought (Barney, 1986; Mintzberg and Waters, 1985; Porter, 1980, 1985). Second, interest in hospitality and tourism strategy research emerged during this time with several authors testing strategy concepts in a hospitality and tourism context (Canas, 1982; Hospitality and tourism 779 IJCHM 26,5 Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 780 Olsen and DeNoble, 1981; Reichel, 1986). Given that hospitality and tourism research (and the general strategy research for that matter) had progressed at a much faster rate over the past decade-and-a-half, the end of the 1990s was used as a cutoff period. This also allowed for a better understanding of the evolution of research during this time frame. To capture the evolution of research within this domain, three research questions formed the basis of enquiry during the review process: (1) What research efforts had been undertaken under the major strategy as well as the hospitality and tourism strategy research themes? (2) What were the major contributions of these efforts? (3) How did research under these themes evolve across major periods? The basic themes in this review were identified from Harrington and Ottenbacher (2011), which were further refined based on the topical area of research within the hospitality and tourism domain. These themes were used as a basis for the organization of the hospitality and tourism strategy sections that follow. This review process provided a foundational understanding of hospitality and tourism research to date as well as a trajectory of where the domain was headed and research opportunities that lay ahead. Evolution of hospitality and tourism strategy research As stated above, the basic themes in this section followed those identified from Harrington and Ottenbacher (2011) with further refinement based on the topical area of research within the hospitality and tourism domain. Key themes included the environment and the contingency perspective (strategy and uncertainty); corporate and business strategies (strategy and the internal perspective including competitive strategies); and organizational/firm structure/core competencies and strategy implementation. Harrington and Ottenbacher (2011) provided a framework that captured the essence of strategy as conceptualized and developed within the hospitality and tourism domain that aligned well with that of the mainstream. The depth and recency of their work provided a good basis for selecting it as a framework for tracking the evolution of topical areas within the domain. The evolution of research within the hospitality and tourism domain was tracked from 1980 onward and divided into two periods (1980-1999 and 2000-2013) to capture the evolution of research in a meaningful way. Given that hospitality and tourism research had progressed at a much faster rate over the past decade-and-a-half, this allowed for a better understanding of the evolution of research during this time frame. With the previous as the precursor, the following sections reviewed the evolution of hospitality and tourism strategic management-related research. Hospitality and tourism strategy research: 1980-1999 The work carried out during this period was both conceptually and empirically oriented, which “tested various hypotheses designed to investigate the relationships among strategy, environmental scanning and firm structure” (Olsen and Roper, 1998; p. 112). Olsen and Roper (1998) pointed out that, by and large, research during this period was conceptual (Canas, 1982; Reichel, 1986; DeNoble and Olsen, 1982; Olsen and Bellas, 1980; Reid and Olsen, 1981; Olsen and DeNoble, 1981; Zhao and Merna, 1992; Nebel and Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) Schaffer, 1992; Tse and West, 1992; Webster and Hudson, 1991; Slattery and Boer, 1991). According to them, the nature of research “can best be described as strategy-related models, developed in other sectors, being applied to the hospitality industry without the actual conduct of empirical investigation” (Olsen and Roper (1998) p. 112). Theory, theory development and testing. Nonetheless, some researchers were empirically oriented in building theory in the hospitality and tourism field while testing the models developed by researchers in mainstream strategic management such as Chandler (1962), Miles and Snow (1978) and Porter (1980, 1985), among others. These contributions included Tse and Olsen (1988), West and Olsen (1988), Dev and Olsen (1989), Crawford-Welch (1990) and Schaffer (1987a). Research conducted during this period can be largely categorized based on the influence from mainstream research. Whereas survey research methods were used by researchers during this period, some embarked into case study-based exploratory research (Zhao, 1992, Schmelzer and Olsen, 1994; Dev and Klein, 1993) owing to the limitations of survey and statistical research (Olsen and Roper, 1998). The hospitality and tourism strategy literature reflected that the contingency perspective and the strategy-conduct-performance paradigm were the main focus of researchers during this period, as detailed below. Primary schools of thought During this period, two complementary models of competitive advantage dominated the strategy landscape. The first model was derived from the ideas of Industrial Organization (IO) economics and focused on cost and differentiation; basically, the model contended that the environment selected out firms that were inefficient. The industry was the level of analysis and was viewed as relatively homogeneous. The theory of advantage was based primarily on external opportunities, threats and industry competition. Michael Porter was one of the key proponents of this model and pointed out that sustaining an advantage meant presenting competitors with a moving target (Porter, 1985). The second model was developed from the “Austrian” school of strategy and placed more recognition on the effects of uncertainty, change, continuous innovation, disequilibrium and other unobservable factors (Jacobson, 1992). This second model was described as resource-based theory or the resource-based view (RBV); it draws from the early work of Schumpeter (1950). This model centered on the importance of a firm’s resources, driven by factors internal to the firm (i.e. strengths and weaknesses). While the dominant models of competitive advantage during this time were the IO and RBV models, several researchers suggested models of strategic planning and process using a variety of lenses or schools of thought. Authors had focused on micro-level decision-making models (Grandori, 1984), a “fit” and continuum approach (Ansoff, 1987; Chaffee, 1985; Mintzberg and Waters, 1985; Nonaka, 1988) and the integration of strategy formulation and implementation (Bourgeois and Brodwin, 1984; Hart, 1992). Further, during this time, Mintzberg et al. (1998) proposed that the strategy literature had created ten “schools of thought” that could be divided into three groups: (1) schools that prescribed how strategies should be formulated (design, planning and positioning); (2) schools that described how strategies actually got made (entrepreneurial, learning, power, cognitive, cultural and environmental); and Hospitality and tourism 781 IJCHM 26,5 Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 782 (3) schools that viewed strategy formulation as a process of transformation (configurational). The above schools of thought had an influence on hospitality and tourism strategy research in that several researchers within the domain used them as lenses to study strategy. A synthesis of the 1980-1999 time frame is provided in the following sections. The firm’s external environment and the contingency perspective. The role of the environment had been defined in the strategy literature as being contingent on the organization. Historically, the contingency notion was developed in the mainstream strategy literature in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, which resulted in the origination of related work in the hospitality and tourism strategy domain. This perspective gave credence to the role of the external macro- and micro-environments in developing and shaping the firm’s strategies. Hospitality and tourism strategic management research developed in the 1980s and 1990s with greater emphasis on strategic planning and the environmental school of thought. The latter took center stage during this period, as hospitality and tourism researchers’ main focus was on testing models developed in the 1960s and 1970s in the strategic management literature. The role of the environment in formulating and implementing strategies and their impact on firm performance was the central thesis of such efforts. Research conducted by environmental scientists such as, Chandler (1962) and others was the precursor to the works of Reid and Olsen (1981), Olsen and DeNoble, (1981) and others during the early 1980s. Such work was carried forward into the 1990s by Olsen et al. (1994), Go and Vincent (1995), Costa and Teare (1997a, 1997b), Costa et al. (1997) and others, who studied the environmental scanning practices of top management executives of multinational hotel companies. Based on the work carried out during this period, the environment was categorized into “general” and “task” environments (Costa et al., 1997; Olsen et al., 1998). The focus of the above efforts was on the importance of external environment analysis based on effective environmental scanning with the objective of identifying strategic opportunities and threats (Costa et al., 1997; Zhao and Merna, 1992). This was possible only if firms were able to identify forces in the macro external environment or the general environment to develop a cause-and-effect analysis of their impact on the firm’s immediate environment, i.e. task and industry environments (Costa and Teare, 1996; Costa et al., 1997; Olsen et al., 1998). The identification of opportunities and threats was at the crux of such analyses (Olsen and DeNoble, 1981). It should be noted that the relationship between firm scanning behavior and performance was established in some studies, notably West and Olsen (1988), which tested the correlation among these constructs within the US food service sector. Some authors also suggested the importance of a continuous formal process to environmental scanning for hospitality firms to be able to perform better (Costa and Teare, 1996; Olsen et al., 1994). However, others (Reichel and Preble, 1984) attributed the importance of environmental scanning to the volatility and complexity of the external environment while suggesting that both formal and informal environmental scanning systems and processes were needed for firms to succeed. Research on the role of the firm’s external environment and the emphasis on environmental scanning was also carried out outside the US and UK contexts. Notably, Costa and Teare’s (1994) conceptual study suggested the use of environmental scanning Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) in Portuguese hotel firms. In the same vein, Go and Vincent’s (1995) study identified environmental scanning as an integral part for hotel development within the Asia Pacific region. The formulation of the firm’s strategies was dependent on the effectiveness of the environmental scanning process and the subsequent analysis of the factors in the macro- and micro-environments of the firm. Olsen et al. (1998) referred to this process as the alignment between the firm’s external environment and the strategy choice. In hospitality and tourism strategy research, historically, value creation had been defined as the process through which “organizations [sought] alignment with the forces in their environment in order to achieve sustained performance” (Olsen and Roper, 1998; p. 111). This view emphasized that value creation was dependent on the alignment between the firm and its environment. Specifically, the firm’s ability to align its resources in conjunction with environmental forces that emanated from outside the firm through the formulation and implementation of effective strategies which led to superior performance (Olsen et al., 1998, 2008). The sustainability of superior performance over a period was dependent on how the organization was able to align its resources while underlying its competitive strategies with the environmental forces. Note that the literature clearly pointed out that these environmental forces created opportunities as well as imposed threats for the organization (Costa et al., 1997; Olsen et al., 1992; Zhao and Merna, 1992), which, in tandem with the latter’s strengths and weaknesses (Tse and Olsen 1988), led to the exploitation of strategic resources or core competencies (Olsen et al., 1998, 2008). A firm that was able to balance the internal and external environments from a strategic perspective was able to add sustained value to its key stakeholders. With the major focus of strategic management researchers in the 1980s shifting toward testing the viability of the models put forth by Miles and Snow (1978) and Porter (1980, 1985), hospitality and tourism strategy researchers gradually transcended from conducting research on the external environment and its impact on strategy formulation to the study of strategy formulation itself. The major emphasis was either on competitive strategy and its impact on firm performance or the relationship between the external environment and the strategy choice constructs and how they impacted firm performance. For instance, Dev and Olsen (1989), while testing the relationship between environmental uncertainty, business strategy and the financial performance of firms in the US lodging industry, suggested that an alignment between the firm’s environment and its business strategy was essential for it to achieve high performance. Other studies during this period were more explicit in identifying the role of the environment as an anteceding factor or moderator as opposed to playing a dominating role. The emphasis shifted from the role of the external environment as playing a dominant role in defining the firm’s strategy to influencing the strategy choice of firms, as detailed below. Corporate and business (competitive) strategies. The growing popularity (and critique) of Miles and Snow’s typology and Porter’s competitive strategies framework in the mainstream led to an increased interest in the late 1980s on this topic area with various dissertation efforts in the hospitality and tourism field using these frameworks to test their viability in the hospitality and tourism industry context. These included, among others, the works of Dev (1988), Tse (1988), West (1988), Crawford-Welch (1990), Murthy (1994) and Jogaratnam (1996). The research model formulation included two or more of the constructs such as environment, strategy, structure and performance purported by mainstream researchers. Further, what was intriguing was the attempts to Hospitality and tourism 783 IJCHM 26,5 Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 784 capture the effects of the strategy types on firm performance, with or without the inclusion of anteceding factors (i.e. the environment construct), did not lead to successful outcomes, despite the fact that the authors’ scrutiny was comprehensive in their own respect. Successful outcomes denote the viability of the model from a holistic perspective within the hospitality and tourism context. To elaborate, Schaffer (1987a, 1987b) focused on identifying the effectiveness of Miles and Snow’s typology (prospector, analyzer, defender and reactor) in differentiating between the levels of lodging firms’ performance. In addition, Shaffer also included structure and its match with strategy in explaining firm performance. Along the same lines, Dev (1988) and Dev and Olsen (1989) included business strategy while using Miles and Snow’s typology to capture lodging firms’ strategy. Perceived environmental uncertainty was used as the anteceding factor and financial performance was the outcome. The findings suggested that performances of lodging firms based on the types of strategy pursued could not be discriminated. On the other hand, West (1988), West and Olsen (1988) and Tse and Olsen (1988) used Porter’s generic strategies model to capture the strategy construct. Whereas West’s (1988) objective was to study the relationship between environmental scanning, strategy and performance in the restaurant industry, Tse (1988) included strategy, structure and performance as part of the model using the same setting. The inclusion of the structure-related construct in Tse’s study (along with Schaffer, 1987b) could be considered as one of the earlier empirical attempts to capture firm or organizational structure-related variables in any empirical work within hospitality and tourism strategy research. West’s aim was to explain the difference in firm performance (i.e. high vs low) based on at least one of Porter’s generic intended strategy types. However, to the contrary, the findings indicated that there was no relationship between strategy and performance and that the firms that did not use these types actually outperformed the firms that did. For the most part, Tse’s work used the same approach but differed from that of West in using three categories of firm performance (i.e. low, medium and high). Tse’s overall conclusion was that the relationship between strategy, structure and performance remained inconclusive despite the fact that the relationship between strategy and performance in the case of one performance variable (i.e. return on sales) was significant. Other efforts in the early 1990s included Crawford-Welch (1990), who captured the relationship between strategy and performance in both the lodging and restaurant industries using the Miles and Snow typology. As in the case of previous efforts, Crawford-Welch’s study could not suggest any difference in the Miles and Snow strategic types in terms of performance. West and Anthony (1990) used Dess and Davis’s (1984) scale to operationalize strategy of restaurant firms while attempting to explain the difference in performance across the firms based on the strategy types. While differing from previous efforts, this study was able to differentiate between strategy types based on the level of performance. Firms that used product-service innovation strategy outperformed those that used focus differentiation or no strategy. However, this study was not able to purport any causal relationships between the constructs. More comprehensive research efforts to uncover the complexity of the relationship between the environment, strategy and performance constructs were carried out by Murthy (1994) and Jogaratnam (1996) in the mid-1990s. Multidimensional Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) characteristics of the model were given credence by these researchers. Moreover, the focus was on the development of competitive methods for the lodging and restaurant industries. For instance, Jogaratnam’s (1996) and Jogaratnam et al.’s (1999) studies revealed that a significant relationship between posture, environmental munificence and performance existed when the relationship between the two antecedent factors were considered independently on the outcome factor. However, when the model was considered holistically, the environmental munificence and strategic posture constructs were not significantly related to firm performance (Jogaratnam et al., 1999). Research on competitive methods/strategies continued during this period notably through the work of Olsen (Olsen 1995), who studied them in the context of multinational lodging firms over a ten-year period while also exploring the business environment of these firms. Using content analysis, Olsen was able to identify “the choice and number of competitive methods chosen by each organization and firm performance over the ten-year period from 1984 to 1994”; whereas, the Delphi technique involving senior executives was used to arrive at the factors which drove change in the environment of the firm (Olsen and Roper, 1998 p. 113). Despite multifarious attempts spanning the 1980s and 1990s, which, without a doubt, enriched the hospitality and tourism strategy research domain, the literature to date remained largely inconclusive on the empirical viability of the strategyconduct-performance paradigm with or without the inclusion of environment-related variables as moderators. If the models purported during this period were foundational to the development of the hospitality and tourism strategy domain, questions arose as to why there was not a lot of successful research (in terms of confirming the models tested in the mainstream) carried out during this period. In this vein, it was suggested that despite many attempts (Tse and Olsen, 1988; West and Olsen, 1988; Dev and Olsen, 1989; Crawford-Welch, 1990; West, 1988) to replicate or extend the works of Miles and Snow (1978) and Porter (1980, 1985) within the hospitality and tourism context, “these efforts have been less than successful, partly due to the complex multivariate nature of relationships making up the strategy paradigm and partly due to measurement challenges” (p. 67). They attributed this to the complex nature of the constructs and the relationships among them as well as “the metrics and constructs that [might] not have reflected the nature of the hospitality industry” (p. 67). They also pointed out that the statistical methods used might not have adequately addressed the complexity issue. In fact, Chathoth and Olsen further pointed out that as per Murthy (1994) and Jogaratnam (1996), the reasons for failure might have been as a result of borrowing the models from the manufacturing industry. Moreover, there might have been issues related to obtaining data from industry sources on measures related to realized strategies as opposed to intended strategies in addition to the use of appropriate statistical methods to test the model. Even though the research carried out during the 1980s and 1990s could not “confirm the relationship between […] the constructs purported by management theorists, these efforts were significant in that they incrementally added to the hospitality and tourism literature on strategy” (Chathoth 2002, p. 1). One noteworthy aspect of the incremental research conducted in the 1980s and 1990s was the conceptualization of the “Co-alignment Model” (Olsen et al., 1998). Although the model had not been empirically tested holistically, the theoretical underpinnings of the model were used as the foundation to build the literature through empirical research in the 2000s. Hospitality and tourism 785 IJCHM 26,5 Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 786 Organizational/firm structure/core competencies and strategy implementation. The focus on firm structure and strategy implementation was not at the forefront of the research objectives during the 1980s and 1990s. The most comprehensive effort in the field during this early period was by Schmelzer (1992) and Schmelzer and Olsen (1994), who uncovered the components of organizational structure that had an effect on both the strategy and performance of firms. This work delineated between strategy implementation-based context and process variables in the US multiunit restaurant setting. As pointed out earlier, Schaffer (1987a, 1987b) and Tse and Olsen (1988) also empirically explored the structure construct which paved the way for the work by Schmelzer and others in the 1990s. Further exploration of this construct came about through the identification of core competencies influenced by the work of Barney (1991) and others in the mainstream. For instance, the role of information technology (IT) in multinational hotel companies was investigated at a time when it was being identified as a source of competitive advantage owing to the major changes in technology. Brotherton and Shaw (1996), Roberts and Shea (1996), De Chabert (1997) and Rispoli (1997) delved into core capabilities/competencies as a source of competitive advantage in the lodging/ restaurant industries within the US and UK contexts. While emphasizing the importance of considering the alliance option, Dev and Klein (1993) identified the importance of the alliance strategy to leverage core competencies across organizational boundaries within the hospitality industry. Emphasizing the alliance strategy through the assessment of the firm’s core competencies – and, not simply “going it alone”, Strate and Rappole suggested “why hotel and restaurant companies form[ed] strategic alliances and offer[ed] a framework for doing so” (1997, p. 50). The authors noted the importance of value creation through the consideration of transaction costs in conjunction with the alliance option while assessing the (non)availability and efficacy of putting firm-specific assets to productive use. Critical elements included “the hotel’s desired market position and its competition; the feasibility of running the hotel company’s own restaurant concept versus buying and operating a franchised brand versus leasing space to a restaurant company; the compatibility of the hotel’s corporate culture and goals with those of the restaurant company”, among others (Strate and Rappole 1997, p. 50). As such, strategy implementation-related research was few and far between during this period (Olsen and Roper, 1998). A few efforts identified the importance of this construct; but, apart from a handful of research works (mentioned above), there was no significant thrust toward the development of this construct during this period, despite some emerging research (Olsen and Roper 1998). One significant effort was that of Okumus and Roper (1999), who reviewed literature that encompassed five different schools of thought from strategic management and hospitality and tourism management fields. The authors observed what appeared to be a chronological relationship across these five approaches in addressing weaknesses in earlier schools of thought (i.e. planning, learning, contingency, etc.) as well as some level of integrative connections between these schools of thought. Further, they recognized the complexity of the strategy implementation process while comparing and contrasting the implications of disparate approaches to implementing strategies; and at the time of the study, “no conceptual or empirical studies seem[ed] to exist that evaluat[ed] what the strategy implementation process should be in service firms” (Okumus and Roper, 1999, Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) p. 31). At the same time, only two empirical studies related to strategy implementation in hospitality and tourism (Schmelzer, 1992). The work carried out during the 1980-1999 period within the hospitality and tourism domain witnessed the emergence of the contingency perspective and strategy formulation research with some emphasis on core competencies and a scant amount related to strategy implementation. By and large, the formulation of research was based on major contributions by mainstream researchers. Hospitality and tourism strategy research: 2000-2013 The mainstream strategic management literature had a significant influence on research carried out by hospitality and tourism strategy researchers during this period. While few, truly new schools of thought had emerged in the 2000-2013 period, the earlier schools of thought had become more nuanced and complex with greater theory articulation within the school as well as among the general schools of thought (Mintzberg et al., 2005). A review of the strategy literature revealed several trends. First, the domain of strategy literature was no longer restricted to business or management but was extended to strategic thinking in psychology, education, leadership, entrepreneurship, political science, sociology, etc. (Mintzberg et al., 2005). A second trend in the strategy literature was the growing complexity and nuances involved in theoretical models and hypothesis testing. Although many of the theories continued from the previous two decades, researchers were formulating more complex models using unique combinations of theories to extend theoretical propositions and explain cause-and-effect relationships. While the relationships among top management teams (TMTs), boards and strategy were still a popular research area (Hambrick, 2007; Krause et al., 2014), recent research had integrated more process-oriented methods and broadened theoretical propositions to reflect more nuanced realities (Raes et al., 2011). Additionally, while many of the same basic theories that applied to strategy continued (agency theory [Deutsch et al., 2011], institutional theory [Jain and Sharma, 2013], RBV [Chatain, 2011], upper echelons [Hmieleski et al., 2013], dynamic capability [Danneels, 2011], etc.), these theories were being applied in new complex ways or combinations (Hmieleski et al., 2013; Danneels, 2011; Chatain, 2011). The above developments in the mainstream strategy literature had an influence on hospitality and tourism strategy literature and research. Hospitality and tourism strategy research had become more nuanced and complex with greater emphasis on relationships specific to the hospitality and tourism context while articulating these relationships. These findings are reflected in the following sections using the strategy categories as that of the previous time frame section. The firm’s external environment and the contingency perspective. Hospitality and tourism strategy research during this period progressed toward understanding the role of each construct in terms of value creation. For instance, Costa and Teare (2000) investigated the environment scanning activities of hotel units from 11 hotel chains operating in Portugal while making several propositions related to decision-making and the environment scanning process in hotel firms. Altinay and Altinay (2003) presented a case study of the environmental factors that influenced the international expansion plans of an international hotel chain. The study outlined the literature on the internationalization of hospitality organizations and identified expansion opportunities for hotel chains in Europe by highlighting the importance of external trends. Likewise, Hospitality and tourism 787 IJCHM 26,5 Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 788 Okumus (2003) emphasized the importance of the firm’s external environment and the need of an effective environmental scanning system, as well as identified the major challenges and problems in developing a formal ES approach in hospitality organizations. One aspect that was noteworthy from Okumus (2003; p. 124) was that “those studies advocating the introduction of formal ES procedures belong to the traditional planning approach; whereas other studies, critical of formal ES methods, [fell] under recent strategic management approaches, including the emergent, configurational and complexity approaches”. This brought up the issue of the researchers’ background and the bias inherent in the research carried out, including the importance given to a particular topic and the underlying logic. In the hospitality and tourism field, such biases had been inherent in studies with emphasis given to certain paradigms owing to influences from the mainstream as well as the researcher’s own background and area of interest. Harrington and Kendall (2005) delved into the measurement of environmental dynamism and environmental complexity using previous hospitality and tourism strategy research on environmental constructs (i.e. uncertainty, dynamism, complexity and munificence), while comparing and contrasting the measurement of these constructs used in the general strategy literature with that of the hospitality and tourism strategy literature. They found that dynamism and complexity are separate and distinct constructs and purport that these latent variables should be duly considered in hospitality and tourism strategy research as independent and control variables. The authors suggested that “further clarification in the measurement and impact of these variables should provide a clearer understanding of the relationship between the industry task environment, strategies, structure, and performance” (p. 245). On the other hand, research emerged during this period that emphasized drawing from multiple mainstream domains. For instance, Chathoth and Olsen (2007a) studied the environment risk construct while identifying its dimensions as economic risk, business risk and market risk. This was one of the first attempts within the hospitality and tourism domain that defined the constructs while using the underpinnings from the mainstream business literature, which included both strategy and finance research. The relationship between environmental risk and firm performance as well as the simultaneous effects of environmental risk and corporate strategy on firm performance were captured and supported using secondary data. Other empirical investigations focused on the environmental school of thought included Costa and Teare (2000), whose main focus was on environmental scanning in 11 hotel chains within Portugal while comparing formal and informal scanning approaches. This study emphasized the importance of environmental scanning in hospitality and tourism organizations. Note that the research questions may be related to the ones formulated by hospitality and tourism researchers in the early 1980s and 1990s, thereby pointing toward the static nature of the research. To some extent, this could be said of Jogaratnam and Law’s (2006) research as well; however, the focus of these efforts was to identify the sources used for scanning while attempting to extend the existing literature on environmental scanning within the hospitality and tourism domain. Corporate and business (competitive) strategies. Studies emerged during this period that focused on extending the literature on corporate- and business-level strategies. For Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) instance, Wong and Kwan (2001) analyzed the competitive strategies of hotels and travel agents using the Asia-Pacific context (Hong Kong and Singapore). They identified cost competitiveness, mobilizing people and partners and building a robust service delivery system as the primary competitive strategies from a senior management perspective. Leveraging IT and product differentiation were not prioritized as important (these managers showed least confidence in them). Garrigós et al. (2005) studied competitive strategies and performance of Spanish hospitality firms. Findings revealed that according to Miles and Snow’s (1978) typology, prospectors, defenders and analyzers were likely to perform well, whereas reactors were likely to perform poorly. It may be noted that hospitality and tourism research attempted to apply Miles and Snow’s model (developed in the late 1970s) 25 years after it was first conceptualized. As indicated by Okumus (2003), this lag effect had been a characteristic of hospitality and tourism research since it came into being, which raised questions about the research objectives within the domain. The above may be said of other research efforts that focused on strategic groups with the objective of applying the concepts to the hospitality and tourism industry. Claver-Cortés et al. (2006) rekindled research that was conducted in the late 1970s and 1980s in the mainstream while applying the concepts to hospitality and tourism firms. According to the authors, strategic groups were a useful tool “for the planning and implementation of strategies by hotels that help[ed] to determine their competitive strategies and advantages” (p. 1,101). The groups were defined using resource commitment, tourist activity scope. Implications for measuring performance of these firms using strategic groups were also examined within the Spanish hotel sector. Extending their 2006 effort, Claver-Cortés et al. (2007) focused on key strategic variables (size, type of hotel management, category and competitive advantage) and their impact on hotel performance. In the same vein, Pereira-Moliner et al. (2011) investigated performance differentials across strategic groups while identifying the linkage between strategic groups and firm performance using a multilevel analysis of hospitality firms in Spain. The findings revealed that intragroup differences explained firm performance better than intergroup differences, which supported the research conducted in the 1970s in the mainstream on the importance of strategic groups in analyzing strategies of firms. The Spanish context was maintained in other studies (Rodrı=guez, 2002) that identified entry choice for international expansion while empirically examining the key factors that influenced Spanish hotels to choose an entry mode for international expansion using transaction-cost, agency theory and organizational capability (including the knowledge perspective) to explain the mode of foreign expansion. Here again, the static nature of research was reflected in terms of the objectives. Strategies of hospitality firms were further investigated by Chathoth and Olsen (2003) while drawing from the literature on strategic alliances. They reviewed the mainstream strategic alliance literature from the 1980s and 1990s while extending the application of the theory to hospitality firm alliances. Using evidence pertaining to the evolution of alliances, the authors developed propositions that explained how hospitality alliances moved from equity to non-equity modes of alliance arrangements using technological platforms. In the same vein, Altinay’s (2006) research identified that hospitality organizations used both partner and task-related criteria to select potential franchisees. The paper discussed the real-life complexities of selecting franchise partners and illuminated the challenges hospitality franchising organizations faced Hospitality and tourism 789 IJCHM 26,5 Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 790 internationally in their determination to grow. Building on this, Altinay et al. (2013) recently identified and evaluated the partner selection approaches, processes and criteria used by hospitality franchisees to select their franchisor partners. The study contributed to the understanding of franchisee partner selection through demonstrating the selection criteria, approaches and processes’ impact on franchisee satisfaction post-contract signature. Chathoth and Olsen (2007b) delved into corporate strategies of restaurant firms while questioning their excessive focus on the growth imperative. According to the authors, the growth imperative had been the mainstay of the industry which needed to be addressed by considering the liquidity strategy. Both growth and liquidity strategies were options that needed to be given due consideration by restaurant firms (in the US context) with more emphasis on liquidity if the primary objective was to add value to stakeholders. During this period, emphasis was also given to the underlying factors influencing the conceptualization of strategy. Harrington (2005) delved into the “How and Who of Strategy Making” by proposing a typology of ideal types with two main dimensions (i.e. deliberate-emergent and individualistic-collective approaches) with the overall objective of addressing “how” strategies were formulated or implemented and “who” was involved in the process. Findings revealed that food-service industry firms needed to consider the degree and type of dynamism and complexity, firm size, level of analysis, level of strategy or tactic, culture and institutional factors during strategy formulation and implementation. By systematically reviewing contemporary research in the area of hotel internationalization, Litteljohn et al. (2007) concluded that modal choice research had now reached a stage where it could provide greater depth of understanding in the relationships between this choice and organizational capabilities. Recently, Xiao et al. (2012) delved into the effects of corporate strategies on firm performance by investigating the role of owners in hotel firms. They found the existence of corporate effects in that corporate strategies do influence hotel property-level financial performance within the US lodging industry. “Specifically, a hotel owner’s expertise in implementing superior strategies regarding segment, brand, operator, and location (i.e. state) [were] critical to hotel unit financial performance” (p. 122). From a competitive strategies perspective, research in the mainstream and hospitality and tourism domains was rekindled by purporting a model for researchers within the hospitality and tourism research domain to consider while extending the Porter’s generic strategies model (1980, 1985). They posed questions pertaining to the multidimensional nature of the competitive strategies model using research in the mainstream (i.e. Kotha and Vadlamani, 1995), while suggesting that secondary data that captured the causal effects between the cost leadership and differentiation dimensions on firm performance would be holistically a better model than the ones that had been purported previously in hospitality and tourism strategy research. They specifically addressed “the complexity and multivariate nature of relationships making up the strategy construct” (p. 67). The authors suggested that “this model, once tested, will provide lodging strategic business unit managers an overall strategic orientation as well as a resource allocation decision framework for their firms” (p. 67). A limitation would be in finding relevant data which hospitality and tourism firms would be willing to share. This was given that corporate data available through secondary sources alone would not be sufficient to test the model. Organizational/firm structure/core competencies and strategy implementation. Strategy implementation received more emphasis within the hospitality and tourism context during Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) the 2000-2013 period than during the 1980-1999 period. One such significant contribution was that of Okumus (2001), who investigated two international hotel groups while identifying key variables, (i.e. multiple project implementation, organizational learning and working with external companies). He proposed a revised framework while emphasizing contextual variables in implementation. Further, these industry-related, strategy-implementation factors were given due importance in Okumus’ (2003)study, which purported a holistic implementation framework while emphasizing the complexity of the process. Drawing from previous research in the mainstream, Okumus’ (2003) framework included factors such as strategy development, environment uncertainty, organizational structure, organizational culture, leadership, operational planning, resource allocation, communication, people, control and outcome. These 11 factors were further grouped into strategy content, strategy context, operational process and outcome. Further research on strategy implementation within the sector was conducted by Hwang and Lockwood (2006), who studied hospitality and tourism firms to uncover the challenges of implementing best practices in hospitality and tourism. The authors’ findings revealed that seven key capabilities underlie the adoption/implementation of best practices including customer-focused goals, planning and control, partnering and networking, internal and external communication, achieving consistent standards, strategic workforce management, cash flow and performance management. Additionally, six barriers to implementing best practices included changing demand, limited resources, lack of skilled labor, lifestyle, lack of competitive benchmarking and location. Kandampully and Duddy (2001) identified the service system as the key to sustaining competitive advantage. The authors’ study purported a model that interlinked empowerment, service guarantees and service recovery to deliver superior service in hospitality and tourism firms while being a means to sustain competitive advantage. In furthering strategy implementation-related research within the hospitality and tourism domain, Harrington and Kendall (2006) studied the success factors related to strategy implementation in hospitality and tourism firms. Specifically, they uncovered “the direct and moderating effects of managers’ perception of environmental complexity and firm size on level of involvement during strategy implementation” (p. 207). Greater complexity led to more involvement of organizational members during implementation with firm size and complexity showing significant interaction effects. Food-service firms that utilized more organizational members across various levels of firm hierarchy achieved greater implementation success. The relationship between external complexity and implementation success was mediated by level of involvement. From a firm’s internal perspective pertaining to resource/core competencies, Gursoy and Swanger (2007) empirically examined managerial perspectives of the internal strategic factors likely to influence company financial performance in hospitality and tourism firms. The links between the internal strategic factors and financial performance were explored, which revealed that four internal strategic success factors (sales, R&D and distribution, IT and human resources [HR]) had a significant impact on company financial performance. This gave further credence to the RBV (Barney, 1991) and its application to the hospitality and tourism industry. The above perspective with regard to internal strategic factors was further explored by Chathoth and Law (2011) in terms of the impact of IT on hotel service operations, specifically transaction costs, and whether the impact on these costs affected the decision-making framework. Using a multiple case study approach which included a Hospitality and tourism 791 IJCHM 26,5 Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 792 two-stage interview process, the researchers suggested a positive impact for IT when objective views were captured; however, the managers’ subjective views revealed that the impact was only superficial. The authors suggested that the gap between objective and subjective perceptions about state-of-the-art IT systems was a result of bounded rationality in managerial decision-making. Further research analyzing the firm’s approach to its current situation from an internal perspective was seen in a few studies during the 2000-2013 period that addressed turnaround. To cope with the growth imperative, firms would need to consider turnaround strategies when performance decline or failure was imminent. This was the focus of Chathoth et al.’s (2006) study of restaurant firms. While drawing from the model of Robbins and Pearce (1992), this study identified the gaps in the approach adopted by two prominent industry players within the US context while highlighting shortcomings based on the underpinnings (including retrenchment and recovery turnaround measures) of the Robbins and Pearce model. In continuing with this research theme, Solnet et al. (2010) suggested the importance of turnaround in the hotel sector given that many businesses failed or performed below expectations. The holistic perspective. Olsen et al.’s (2008) definition of strategy (an extension of the Olsen et al., 1998) entailed “the ability of the management of the firm to properly align the firm with the forces driving change in the environment in which the firm competes” (p. 6). To do so, the emphasis must be on investments in key competitive methods that add value to the firm. Here value was defined from a financial perspective, not restricted to accounting measures of performance alone, but encompassing cash flow-related measures of performance as well. Further, the firm needed to have a structure in place that was able to monitor and manage effective allocation of resources through a process that was able to discern between value-adding and non-value-adding opportunities with the overall objective of attaining competitive advantage in its market (Olsen et al., 2008). Chathoth and Olsen’s (2007a) research essentially used the above definition that captured the simultaneous impacts of the surrogates from the environment risk, corporate strategies and firm structure on firm performance while drawing from mainstream strategic management and corporate finance theory and applying them to the US restaurant industry. The study provided some veracity to the robustness of the environment-strategy-structure-performance relationship taken holistically and simultaneously in a cross-sectional study within the hospitality and tourism domain. Tavitiyaman et al. (2011) made an attempt to capture the holistic strategy model comprising industry factors, strategies and performance using hotel incumbents’ perceptions of various factors underlying the contracts. Specifically, this research used Porter’s five forces model and Barney’s RBV while making an attempt to integrate them in testing their impact on performance. The study delved into IT, HR and customer strategies. The results indicated that hotels that were low on threats related to the bargaining power of customers and new entrants revealed stronger strategies that were HR and IT-orientated. Hotels that were perceived as having an advantage over competition did not show any significant competitiveness pertaining to strategies inherent in brand image, HR and IT. In a different study, the authors (Tavitiyaman et al., 2012) investigated the influence of competitive strategies on performance of hotel firms. They found that the HR strategy had a direct impact on behavioral performance and the Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) IT strategy had a direct impact on financial performance. Organizational structure moderated the relationship between HR and IT strategies and behavioral performance. Discussion The current study provided important insight into the state of strategic management research in the hospitality and tourism field. Using an original approach to identify basic themes of hospitality and tourism strategy research over more than a three-decade period, the primary areas of research appeared to fall under the key themes of the environment and the contingency perspective, corporate and business strategies, organizational/firm structure/core competencies, strategy implementation and a more holistic perspective to the concept of strategy. To summarize, hospitality and tourism strategy research during the 1980-2013 period witnessed significant progress which was observed in the various topical areas of interest that researchers within the field had pursued. Even though the impetus and formulation of research were largely influenced by the mainstream strategic management domain, nuances in strategy formulation and implementation that were unique to the hospitality and tourism industry had been captured in multifarious attempts within the domain since 2000. The research during this period also witnessed the use of different research methods that included both qualitative and quantitative methods. Based on this review, the study identified several hospitality and tourism strategy challenges as well as opportunities for future research. Hospitality and tourism strategy challenges First, several gaps were apparent when comparing the general and hospitality and tourism strategy research. Part of this gap lay in the substantially smaller quantity of research and researchers worldwide that focused on hospitality and tourism strategy topics. This lack of volume in the hospitality and tourism strategy literature explained, in part, a lack of coverage of strategy topics and empirical testing. A second explanation for this gap was apparent from the small number of PhD programs in hospitality and tourism having any sort of strength in strategic management as a major area or minor area of study. In looking at the backgrounds of the researchers in the area, a majority had a connection to the PhD program at Virginia Tech and Michael Olsen, particularly, through the 1990s and early 2000s. As pointed out earlier, there appeared to be a lag effect between the general strategy literature and hospitality and tourism domain testing as well as a gap in schools of thought, theories tested and theoretical development. The hospitality and tourism strategy research was overwhelmingly driven by testing and application of theory developed in the general strategy literature. In fact, the gap between general strategy theory and hospitality and tourism testing was large with primary emphasis to date on the environmental and design schools of thought. This also pointed to a gap in theory development in hospitality and tourism strategy. One notable exception of an attempt at theory development and strategy definition was Olsen’s co-alignment theory. These gaps provide evidence that pose several questions for future research. First, in regard to the hospitality and tourism environment – is the hospitality and tourism firm general and task environment unique to the field? While several studies to date have attempted to address the hospitality and tourism environment and strategy question, there is a need for clearer clarification in the measurement of environmental variables to Hospitality and tourism 793 IJCHM 26,5 Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 794 understand relationships among the task environment, strategies, structure and performance in the hospitality and tourism context. Second, is there a theory of hospitality and tourism strategic management? Is there a consensus of researchers in the field on how hospitality and tourism strategic management is defined? And, does this gap provide an opportunity for hospitality and tourism strategy-specific theory development and testing? By and large, research conducted to date within the hospitality and tourism strategy domain has been orientated toward applying the models developed in the mainstream strategy domain. Even though exceptions to the above viewpoint exist in terms of research within the hospitality and tourism strategy domain, they have been few and far between. Based on this, it might be stated that past research within the hospitality and tourism strategy domain did not support the thesis that a separate hospitality and tourism strategic management research stream existed. Even if such research existed, they had not been able to develop an agenda that was relevant, holistic and long-term-oriented. This weakness calls for a concerted effort by hospitality and tourism strategy researchers to put forth a plan that is able to incorporate the domain-specific idiosyncratic factors while developing a strategy framework for hospitality and tourism firms. The viability of the plan should be based on domain-based uniqueness of strategy formulation and implementation frameworks. Needless to say, replication of mainstream research would deemphasize the rationale for such an agenda. A challenge with the hospitality and tourism strategy research to date was also that the vast majority of focus had been on the primary industries of lodging and restaurants as well as US and UK contexts. This issue was likely to be a function of access to data and data collection as well as biases by the researchers in the area. Further study in other areas of hospitality and tourism (i.e. events and conventions, other types of food service, leisure businesses, etc.) may provide additional insight into hospitality and tourism strategy and a theory of hospitality strategic management. Hospitality and tourism strategy opportunities and recommendations In general, hospitality and tourism strategy research continued to improve and extend the boundaries of strategic thought in the hospitality and tourism literature. In assessing the literature from 1980 to 2013, it was apparent that the literature was following the mainstream trend of combining theoretical perspectives to some degree while applying more process-based concepts to hospitality and tourism strategy research. The use of the mainstream strategic management literature as the basis to develop the research agenda of the hospitality and tourism strategy domain was ongoing. Therefore, assessing the direction of research in the mainstream literature would provide a basis to understand the future direction of research within the hospitality and tourism domain. It should be noted that the objective of this paper was not to assess the viability of such research trends. Because the hospitality and tourism strategy literature had a tendency to follow the mainstream strategy literature, it seemed logical to assess recent and frequent topics in the general strategy literature as one method to predict future hospitality and tourism strategy research opportunities. Moreover, the authors’ assessment reflected a deductive approach to theory construction within the domain using the existing literature as the basis. Essentially, general strategy literature evolved from a small number of schools of thought to more nuanced, complex and eclectic hybrids within various themes (learning, Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) entrepreneurial, configurational, RBV, internal process, etc.). These hybrid and complex approaches appear to reflect the greater sophistication of strategy practice and competitive environment as well as a more mature field of study embracing a broader range of approaches from various disciplines and theoretical models. To discuss the most recent period of general strategy research, the study followed the method of Harrington and Ottenbacher (2011) to categorize dominant topic areas in strategy. Specifically, these research tracks were specified in the most recent Strategic Management Society (SMS) meeting. SMS is arguably the largest and most respected strategy-based organization worldwide with more than 3,000 members. It functions as a key catalyst for disseminating new ideas in strategy research, practice and teaching centered on the core issues in strategic management (Strategic Management Society, 2013). Based on these tracks, 15 dominant themes were identified and defined. To get a sense of the popularity of each topic area in strategy in current research, three journals from 2011 through 2013 were reviewed. This time frame was used to balance the interest in identifying the most recent manuscripts for topic popularity and ensure the analysis was broad enough to adequately reflect various strategy topic frequencies in the current era. Further, to avoid any discrepancy in coding whether articles were in fact predominately strategic in nature (Harrington and Ottenbacher, 2011), three journals were used that were devoted solely to strategic management research. These included Strategic Management Journal (SMJ), Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal (SEJ) and Global Strategy Journal (GSJ). All three were associated with SMS; SMJ had been in publication since 1980, SEJ since 2007 and GSJ since 2011. While SMJ is a top-tier strategy-devoted journal, the selections of SEJ and GSJ were included due to their quality and focus, reflecting the evolution of strategic thought into areas of entrepreneurship, innovation and global issues. This process resulted in a review and categorization of 295 manuscripts. Table I provides the frequency of strategy topics in each of the 15 topic categories. The top five most frequent strategic topics included corporate strategy (20.3 per cent), strategy process (15.3 per cent), strategy practice (10.3 per cent), strategic leadership and governance (9.2 per cent) and competitive strategy (7.8 per cent). The middle five in frequency included behavioral strategy (7.5 per cent), knowledge and innovation (7.1 per cent), global strategy (6.1 per cent), strategic human capital (4.1 per cent) and cooperative strategy (3.4 per cent). Finally, the bottom five topics in current frequency included entrepreneurship and strategy (3.1 per cent), social dimension (2.7 per cent), stakeholder strategy (2.4 per cent), sustaining advantage (0.3 per cent) and stewardship and sustainable development (0 per cent). Some of the findings of this analysis provide a glimpse into trends in the general strategy literature. First, based on the definitions of the key general strategy topics and frequency, general strategy research appeared during the 2011-2013 period to lend itself to greater recognition of more process-oriented aspects and unobservable aspects of strategy. While it can be argued that corporate strategy was predominately content in nature and the most frequent topic in recent literature, the frequency of several predominately process-based topics made up a substantial percentage of recent publications. For instance, the combination of strategy process, strategy practice, strategic leadership and governance, behavioral strategy, knowledge and innovation, strategic human capital and the social dimension represented 56.2 per cent of Hospitality and tourism 795 Entrepreneurship and strategy Strategic human capital Strategy practice Knowledge and innovation Strategy process Global strategy Corporate strategy Competitive strategy Social dimension Stewardship and sustainable development Issues and topics that related to the theoretical and empirical underpinnings of the concept of sustainability and of sustainable advantage at the organizational level Focused on stewardship (reduction in resource consumption for its own sake) and sustainable development (meeting the resource needs of the present without compromising the ability to meet future needs) as two avenues that led to sustainability The symbiotic relationship between the good of society and the good of the firm. This mutually supportive relationship was often overlooked or undervalued by firms in the development of their competitive strategies Focused on questions concerning firms’ competitive interactions within product and factor markets over time Explored research questions concerning the management of the diversified firm, the vehicles of growth and retraction and trade-offs in alternative vehicles of growth and decline Furthering understanding how multinational firms developed strategies for operating effectively and successfully across various institutional environments Focused on questions concerning how strategies are formed, implemented and changed. Research streams encompassed a broad range of phenomena, including strategic planning, strategic decision-making, strategy implementation, strategic change, strategy-making, strategy formation and dynamics of four strategic elements over time Focused on understanding how managers could leverage the knowledge of their organizations and innovate to build competitive advantage Focused on strategy-making and the ways by which it was enabled and constrained by organizational and societal practices Focused on the integration of strategy and entrepreneurial perspectives and concepts Examined the role of human capital in generating firm performance. The capacity of the firm to attract, retain and develop human capital was particularly central to its ability to sustain performance and develop sustainable strategies Sustaining advantage Table I. SMS topic categories and frequencies based on 2011-2013 publications Description of area focus 796 Strategy topic area Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) (continued) 3.1 4.1 10.8 7.1 15.3 6.1 20.3 7.8 2.7 0 0.3 Frequency of topic (%) IJCHM 26,5 The intersection of strategic management, stakeholder theory and corporate sustainability–to address some of today’s most challenging issues Cooperative arrangements often enabled organizations to sustain their competitive advantage and could serve for enhancing efficiency and growth in turbulent times Addressed the core issues of the strategic leadership and governance (e.g., the composition and influence of the TMT and the board of directors; institutional differences around the world; the use and effectiveness of corporate governance mechanisms) Sought to ground strategic management in realistic assumptions about human cognition, emotion and social interaction. Topics included bounded rationality in competitive markets; cognition and decision-making; cognitive biases and heuristics; cognitive schema and management perception; individual and collective beliefs and ideologies; prospect theory, reference points and risk-taking; emotions, motivations, personalities and pathologies; the psychology of bargaining and organizational politics; anomalies in strategic learning; and the social psychology of group decision-making Stakeholder strategy Behavioral strategy Strategic leadership and governance Cooperative strategies Description of area focus Strategy topic area Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 7.5 9.2 3.4 2.4 Frequency of topic (%) Hospitality and tourism 797 Table I. IJCHM 26,5 Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 798 manuscripts. These findings seemed to mirror the earlier study by Harrington and Ottenbacher (2011) on hospitality and tourism strategic management research during the 2005-2009 time frame, indicating that the literature tended to be more process-oriented and more applicable to aspects at the business-unit level. In reviewing the most recent topics in general strategic management, it appeared there were several gaps in: • trends in topic areas; • theories covered; and • theories tested in the current hospitality and tourism literature. Several of these gaps appeared to be areas that may provide opportunities for real contributions to the general literature or a theory of hospitality and tourism strategic management. For instance, the general strategy topic area of the “social dimension” (i.e. the symbiotic relationship between the good of society and the good of the firm) seemed to be at the heart of the definition of hospitality. Thus, this gap provided one example of combining the concept of the “innkeeper” as a strategy whether tied to extending the theory of service-dominant logic or the RBV. Further, more process-based topics appeared likely for hospitality and tourism contributions in areas such as strategy-making, strategy practice, behavioral strategies, strategic human capital and strategic leadership due to the high-contact service and labor-intensive nature of the field. Finally, the industry structure appeared to provide an opportunity to address gaps in the general literature and hospitality and tourism in the areas of global strategies (given the geographically dispersed nature of the firms), cooperative strategies (due to the unique combinations of ownership structure and relationships with various stakeholders in the hospitality and tourism infrastructure) and strategic entrepreneurship (due to the relatively high percentage of independently owned firms). It was obvious that the general strategy research continued to move beyond predominately prescriptive approaches to strategy formulation and content to more process-oriented theoretical models and approaches. Evidence of this trend was shown in the methods used, hybrid and more complex combinations of theories, the expansion of strategy journals specific to entrepreneurial and global settings as well as the frequency of process-oriented strategy topics. With these trends in mind, there remained tremendous opportunity for researchers in the hospitality and tourism strategy field to both mimic these trends applied to the hospitality and tourism industry as well as to contribute in unique ways to address gaps in the strategy literature. A few examples of potential research areas with applications specific to hospitality and tourism follow. Opportunities in TMT research. The study of leadership and governance has received much less attention in hospitality and tourism strategy, and the role and function of firm leadership have changed substantially over the past several years. Over the past two decades, additional functional TMT positions have emerged (i.e. COO, CMO, CIO, CSO, etc.); yet, little research has been completed to assess the role and impact of these functional TMT positions. Therefore, research opportunities exist in the areas of the nature of their work; TMT members and processes used; members’ interactions up, down and across the firm; member impact on strategic decision-making; and TMT member role changes overtime (are these a function of “fashion” or needed roles in the current competitive environment?) (Finkelstein et al., 2009; Menz, 2012). Given the Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) dispersed nature, unique ownership structure and flat organizational structure of hospitality and tourism business units, these research questions appear paramount to hospitality and tourism strategy questions of the impact on the ability to monitor and manage effective resource allocations to maximize value creation, successfully implement strategy and impact firm performance. Opportunities in contingency research. The notion of “it depends” is a core concept in management research. This contingency approach is not a new one and strategy research using contingency hypotheses has seen much growth and refinement over the past three decades in both the general and hospitality and tourism strategy research. Over this time, there has been a significant shift in theory testing and increased attention to less common modeling methods. There remains an opportunity for scholars using more recent methods of gestalt, matching, covariation and profile deviation to explore new research questions as well as more refined versions of earlier study (Boyd et al., 2012). For instance, more refined modeling of the institutional environment using a variety of factors (Holmes et al., 2013) or analyzing the industry context using one of the newer methods, providing a better reflection of its dynamic and complex nature and offering opportunities for strategy research. Contingency approaches in areas such as signaling theory (Connelly et al., 2011), strategic delegation (Sengul et al., 2012) or testing more traditional ideas such as strategic groups using the idea of ’fit as gestalt’ (Short et al., 2008) are also examples of gaps and opportunities for future research in hospitality and tourism. Further, the concept of fit as gestalt appears to associate with Olsen’s concept of co-alignment theory. Thus, while many hospitality and tourism researchers have quoted this theory, the ability to test this idea using gestalt methods provides new opportunities for theory testing specific to hospitality and tourism. Opportunities in the demand-side approach to strategic management. Many scholars advocate resource-focused approaches to management research (e.g. heterogeneous resources or dynamic capabilities) (Barney, 1991), and the RBV has seen continued use in both hospitality and tourism as well as general strategy research. In essence, this concept looks inside the firm, forming the basis for the RBV and has become the “preeminent” theory in the general strategy field (Lockett et al., 2009, p. 9). However, scholars in the areas of innovation, entrepreneurship and strategy have started to focus on the demand-side of this equation rather than on the internal, resource side. Demand-side research “look downstream from the focal firm, toward product markets and consumers, rather than upstream, toward factor markets and producers, to explain and predict those managerial decisions” (Priem et al., 2012, p. 347). In contrast to marketing research, demand-side management research focuses on how key strategic decisions or choices (such as inter-industry diversification) might provide an enduring value creation advantage (Ye et al., 2012). Therefore, research opportunities exist using this demand-side perspective in classic strategy questions as well as in the strategic areas of “value co-creation (Chathoth et al., 2013), industry evolution, consumer and firm heterogeneity, diversification, opportunity finding, and systems for judging value […]” (Priem et al., 2012, p. 356). An area of research generally specific to hospitality and tourism research is the concept of revenue or demand management. This area appears to be one that hospitality and tourism has taken a lead in and appears to fit with the notion of a demand-side approach to strategic management. This may provide an opportunity for a demand-side theory specific to Hospitality and tourism 799 IJCHM 26,5 Downloaded by OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY At 05:27 08 November 2014 (PT) 800 hospitality and tourism with applications to lodging, food service and other hospitality and tourism fields. Conclusions and the hospitality and tourism research landscape Hospitality and tourism strategic management researchers also need to consider the changing landscape of hospitality and tourism research to produce research that is of high quality, innovative and meaningful. It is important to note that there is a withdrawal or at least reduction of state research funding in higher education in some parts of the world, including Europe, the USA and the UK. On the other hand, the importance of scientific hospitality and tourism research and accordingly research funding is growing in emerging economies including China, India, Brazil and Russia. In addition, the quality indicators for research are diverse and it is not clear globally what constitutes quality. Moreover, there is a worldwide trend of aging academics with PhDs. All these trends have implications toward the development of hospitality and tourism strategy research. First, hospitality and tourism strategy researchers need to respond to the needs of the industry, where there is a growing recognition of the value and relevance of research in the corporate world. However, the ability to complete meaningful research will require strong relationships between researchers and industry to provide access to qualitative and quantitative data as well as better understand the unique characteristics of the field to enhance the quality of hospitality and tourism strategy research. The research suggests that hospitality and tourism strategy researchers equip themselves both with academic and research skills as well as skills of selling their ideas and consultancy. Second, in countries with emerging economies, awareness of the importance of research and knowledge exchange has increased research funding. Thus, strategic hospitality and tourism researchers need to benefit from international research collaborations and knowledge exchange. International researchers that develop collaborative projects may help in internationalizing research outputs by offering insights into the strategic issues in these emerging economies, thereby challenging the domain of hospitality and tourism research beyond national borders. However, this would require hospitality and tourism researchers to develop social science-informed research ideas by bringing new concepts and perspectives into the hospitality and tourism domain from areas such as economics, sociology, psychology, law and geography. This process would result in the advancement of hospitality and tourism strategy research and produce research output of highest quality internationally. Finally, maximizing the benefits from the changing landscape of research requires hospitality and tourism schools invest more in PhD training, as the number of doctoral programs with strengths in strategic management and theory building in hospitality and tourism is lacking. This issue limits the quantity and quality of hospitality and tourism strategy contributions, the development of theory in the area and contributions to general strategic thought. 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