Strategic orientation and performance of tourism firms: Evidence from a developing country

    Authors

    U. Avci; M. Madanoglu;F. Okumus

    Comments

    Authors: contact us about adding a copy of your work at STARS@ucf.edu

    Abbreviated Journal Title

    Tourism Manage.

    Keywords

    Strategic orientation; Firm performance; Hospitality; Tourism; Developing countries; Turkey; ORGANIZATIONAL PERFORMANCE; MANAGEMENT; BUSINESS; MILES; DETERMINANTS; TURKEY; MODEL; SNOW; Environmental Studies; Hospitality, Leisure, Sport & Tourism; Management

    Abstract

    This study investigates whether tourism firms in a developing country, namely Turkey, which adopt one of the four strategic orientations of Miles and Snow (1978), differ based on their financial and non-financial performance. The study results show that there is a difference in both financial and non-financial performance based on the strategic orientations followed by tourism enterprises. Generally, prospectors were found to outperform defenders, whereas analyzers showed a comparable performance to prospectors. The findings of this study imply that in developing countries, tourism businesses may be indifferent when choosing between these two strategies based on their internal characteristics since they yield similar financial results. Specific factors and developments in the macro environment and company-specific factors seem to affect tourism firms' strategic orientation as well as their performance. Better understanding and closer analysis of such factors can help improve the performance of tourism businesses in developing countries. Further research using both perceptual and objective measures is needed to confirm the present results to better assess possible differences in performance among strategic orientations in some other developing countries. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

    Journal Title

    Tourism Management

    Volume

    32

    Issue/Number

    1

    Publication Date

    1-1-2011

    Document Type

    Article

    Language

    English

    First Page

    147

    Last Page

    157

    WOS Identifier

    WOS:000286305200016

    ISSN

    0261-5177

    Share

    COinS