Are We Teaching Strategic Management Right?

ABSTRACT

This article reports the key findings from a research project that investigated how strategic management (SM) courses are taught in tourism and hospitality (T&H) schools. Further to conducting an extensive literature review, a survey was designed and data were collected from faculty members who were teaching SM in T&H schools. The research results did not reveal any significant differences between the undergraduate and graduate level SM courses in terms of course objectives, content, and teaching methods. Overall, they highlight the fact that, the traditional top-down planning school of thought is still very dominant in teaching SM in T&H schools. In-class lectures and case study analysis were found to be main teaching methods used when delivering SM at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Given the changing trends and new developments in the business environment as well as in SM approaches, the findings raise important questions about the appropriateness of objectives, content, and teaching methods of SM courses in T&H schools. The article provides a number of conclusions and recommendations for future research and teaching this course in T&H schools.

KEYWORDS:

• Education
• hospitality
• management
• strategic management
• strategy
• teaching
• tourism

Acknowledgments

This article is part of a research project which was funded by the School of Hotel and Tourism Management, the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, SAR China.