The geographical concentration of hotels in Switzerland and the industry life cycle

Empirical studies of numerous products and industries have shown that the evolution of variables such as the market price of a product, output and the number of competitors in an industry are non-monotonic and follow a typical pattern over the life span of that industry. The Swiss hotel industry has been experiencing stagnation, even decline, for a period of over 20 years. This can be measured in terms of arrivals, overnight stays and, perhaps most importantly, the number of firms. Thus the number of hotels in Switzerland has declined by over 10 per cent in the past decade. This decline is forecast by the life-cycle model. These models, however, tell us little about where geographically the decline would take place. The aim of this paper is, first, to verify if the evolution of the Swiss hotel industry fits some of the stylized facts of the industry life cycle. The second aim is to verify if there is evidence of geographical clustering of the hotel industry, and, by extension, of tourism. The third aim is to verify a hypothesis that the decline or final phases of the industry life cycle will lead to greater concentration of an industry; in other words that the decline manifests itself mainly in decentralized locations

Perceived trends and uncertainty in the hotel industry: an exploratory investigation

This paper describes the outcome of an exploratory study conducted on how organizations perceive environmental changes. Based on the notion of the separation of task and general environments, we proposed a conceptual framework to a convenience group of hotel managers which they used to identify changes in the external environment of their organizations. We found that organizations place a greater importance on changes in their task environment than in the more general environment. There was less agreement on the interpretation of particular trends than on the trends’ existence. Next we surveyed a second group of managers on the uncertainty linked to these trends, dividing this uncertainty into state, effect and response uncertainty. We tested a number of hypotheses about the relationship between the three types of uncertainty. The results showed that these managers generally felt less state uncertainty than effect uncertainty, and less effect uncertainty than response uncertainty. In general our results lend support to the contention that the interpretative process of environmental change can be broken down into three steps, each leading to a specific and differentiable type of perceived environmental uncertainty

Attendance, employability and learning technologies: are we getting it right?

This short paper discusses the possible detrimental effects of low attendance on the achievement of important learning outcomes, in terms of "soft" employability-enhancing skills among undergraduate students in Business Schools, and explores how the use of learning technologies may contribute to high or low class attendance levels. The paper describes the exploratory results of a survey carried out among final year bachelor students attending a strategic management course, the findings of which suggest that a significant number of students view virtual learning environments as a substitute for lectures. Only very limited evidence is found that such students actually attend classes less than other students. It is found that reasons for non-attendance are similar to those reported in existing literature

Strategize, transform, perform: the story of the new post.

The postal sector has witnessed an intense transformation. In this presentation an overview will be provided of the three imperatives in this environment: strategize, transform and perform

Transformation and diversification in the context of regulated industries: the case of Poste Italiane and PosteMobile

This case describes the diversification of Poste Italiane, the Italian postal operator, into the mobile telecommunications market, with the launch of PosteMobile in 2007. The case starts by explaining the general context of transformation and modernisation of Poste Italiane. The case was written for use in a final year undergraduate strategy course, but could be equally useful for postgraduate or MBA courses

Senior and non-senior traveller behaviour: some exploratory evidence from the holiday rental sector in Switzerland

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to test a number of hypotheses concerning the differences between senior and non-senior travelers in the particular context of holiday rentals. A further aim is to provide exploratory evidence for these differences. Design/methodology/approach – A brief review of the extant literature leads into the formulation of some hypotheses. The hypotheses are tested using survey data. Data from the same survey are used to explore further data. Findings – It was possible not only to find some evidence to support the hypotheses, but also to find significant differences between the preferences of seniors and non-seniors, as well as between pre-seniors and seniors. Thus, pre-seniors exhibit a higher willingness to pay for holiday rentals than seniors, whereas seniors have a higher preference for domestic travel. Seniors are less interested in technology than other age groups. Originality/value – This paper reports on survey findings for a segment of the tourism market that has received practically no attention in the literature – the holiday rental market. The results pave the way for further investigations within this segment

Can the performance effect be ignored in the attendance policy discussion?

Should universities require students to attend? Academics disagree. One side in the discussion of university attendance policies has tried to dismiss any association between attendance and student performance, insisting that students have a fundamental right to choose what and when to attend. By merging student record data and course attendance data for three cohorts of final-year undergraduate students at a London-based university, we are able to isolate attendance effects for 674 students, giving us a large sample, without the inherent weaknesses of more traditional survey methods. We provide fresh empirical evidence for the positive association between attendance and exam performance, and argue for a more balanced view in the attendance policy discussion. Politicians and higher education policies are increasingly focused on employability, student retention, and completion indicators. Carefully crafted attendance policies can have positive effects on pass and completion rates, primary policy targets of higher education funders and policymakers. Attendance effects therefore cannot be ignored

Tutoring executives online: what drives perceived quality?

Studies of learning and student satisfaction in the context of online university programmes have largely neglected programmes catering specifically to business executives. Such executives have typically been away from higher education for a number of years, and have collected substantial practical experience in the subject matters they are taught. Their expectations in terms of both content and delivery may therefore be different from non-executive students. We explore perceptions of the quality of tutoring in the context of an online executive MBA programme through participant interviews. We find that in addition to some of the tutor behaviours already discussed in the literature, executive students look specifically for practical industry knowledge and experience in tutors, when judging how effective a tutor is. This has implications for both the recruitment and training of online executive MBA tutors

A study on attendance and academic achievement

In this study we attempt to answer Romer’s (1993) question: “Should attendance be mandatory?” Contrary to many existing studies, we conclude that in the case of business and management programs the answer is ‘no’. In a study of over 900 undergraduate strategy students, spanning four academic years, we examine the link between attendance and exam results. Unlike prior research on this topic, our findings show that attendance is not the best determinant of student performance. We find instead that the best determinant of student performance for third year bachelor students is their over-all degree classification, which we see as a proxy for academic ability. We suggest that attendance may simply be a reflection of student conscientiousness, engagement and motivation. We also challenge the assumptions about gender differences found in prior research on student attendance and student performance. We do not find such differences to be consistently significant in our study