Innovation Management in the Hospitality Industry: Different Strategies for Achieving Success

Abstract

The importance of innovation as the key driver of sustained success has been well documented in the marketing and hospitality literature. In the past decade, several studies have investigated the success factors associated with service innovations. Few of these studies, however, have dealt with hospitality innovations. Hospitality firms develop innovations with specific objectives and goals in mind and have several approaches to measure performance accordingly. However, no research in hospitality innovation has addressed the question of whether hospitality firms should have different approaches depending on their objectives for the individual innovation projects. This study obtained data on 185 hospitality innovations and identified three performance dimensions: market performance, financial performance, employee and customer relationship enhancement. Of the 23 potential success determinants, 12 were found to be drivers of performance. © 2007 International Council on Hotel, Restaurant and Institutional Education.