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==========> How color can enlighten and enrich our minds and lives but it's not included in most studies
The purpose of this research was to link the concepts of total quality management with sustainability-driven innovation and leadership styles in the hotel industry. This thesis was divided in five chapters, aiming to answer the research questions and fulfill the objectives of the study. The first chapter, the introduction, presented the structure of the thesis, as well as the research aims and objectives. Through the second chapter, the literature review, the foundations were set for the evolution of the thesis. The issues of Total Quality Management, Sustainability – driven Innovation and Leadership styles were analysed and synthesised, through the scope of the hotel industry. The third chapter presented the methodology which was followed during the primary research and the next chapter presented the data collected through the primary research and analysed them. This final chapter of the thesis presents the concluding remarks as they derive from the rest of the research.
It has been shown that Total Quality management has positive results in hotel management and needs to be implemented in the hotel industry. As a total quality management system does not exist in many hotels, the necessary steps should be taken in order to prepare the grounds for its formulation and implementation. As a service industry, the hotel sector is mainly focused on the quality of the offered services and therefore the implementation of a Total Quality Management system is more than necessary. Furthermore, such an action will not only monitor the evolution of service quality in the hotel but will also increase profitability.
Profitability in hotels can also be increased through sustainable driven innovation. The implementation of innovative and sustainable strategies in a hotel can lead to the creation of a competitive advantage towards other hotels, thus differentiating their offered product and leading to a further increase of profitability. Another factor leading to increased profitability is the decrease in cost as a result of implementation of innovation.
The leadership style has been shown to play an important role in the hotel industry, especially since the leader is the one expected to promote innovation and quality monitoring through a total quality management system. The style of leader which best corresponds to the hotel industry is the transformational one.
Though the analysis of the existing literature, three main hypotheses were extracted: Hotels that consider sustainability significant driver for innovation, present statistically significant increased profits in the past years, hotels which consider that TQM works well for them present increased profits in the past years and leadership styles closer to transformational leadership characteristics in Greek hotels impact positively on TQM implementation and sustainability-driven innovation and this positive effect leads to increased profits in the past years.
These hypotheses were tested through the primary research which was held in the Greek hotel sector. For the purposes of the research a questionnaire was formulated and tested to the Greek hotel industry. The questionnaire comprised of three sections, one examining the demographic data of the respondents, one examining the sustainability-driven innovation and total quality management of hotels and one to investigate whether the hotel managers are closer to the authoritarian, democratic or laissez-faire style.
The data gathered from the questionnaires were analysed through the use of inferential statistics, and especially through correlation analysis, with Pearson’s r coefficient, as well as with the use of structural equation modeling via a specially developed econometric model. Descriptive statistics were also used, in order to provide a fuller analysis of the questionnaire. The results of the research have shown that the majority of the respondents think that sustainability is important for the hotels and has affected innovation at the hotel and especially in terms of technology (74.4%), hotel design (61.5%), resource management (59%), waste management (23.1%), innovation (3.55%) and renewal of inventories (3.55%). More than half of the participant hotels do not implement Total Quality Management, and slightly less than half consider it works well for them and has proven to be cost effective. It has been shown through the research that service quality is considered an important factor for all research participants.
In terms of the leadership style, it has been shown that the Greek hotels demonstrate democratic leadership characteristics, but also authoritarian traits, while laissez faire is not preferred. Greek leaders adopt the style they prefer whenever appropriate, thus implying transformational leadership.
Inferential statistics has indicated that the first hypotheses formulating concerning a connection between sustainability-driven innovation and hotel’s profits in the case of Greek hotels is not verified, something which is not the case with the correlation between total quality management and profits. In the latter case the developed hypotheses is validated. The more the fields TQM is used to improve, the more possible the hotel’s profits in the past years to have been higher. This is important, as this suggests that if Total Quality Management is not implemented to improve the most aspects of the organisation, then it may not yield the expected results.
The primary research also implies that if authoritarian leadership is more possible to be observed in a hotel, this leads to more effective implementation of Total Quality Management. The same applies for the laissez-faire leadership style, as it affects Total Quality Management with the same way. Furthermore, the authoritarian leadership style is likely to lead to more positive results for the implementation of sustainability-driven innovation in the hotel. The effect though is smaller than in the case of Total Quality Management. The higher the benefits of the implementation of Total Quality Management in the hotel, the higher were the profits of the hotels over the past years in the Greek hotels case. As only Total Quality Management seems to impact significantly hotels’ profits, the final model implies that authoritarian and laissez-faire leadership styles determine Total Quality Management and its implementation directly and hotels’ profits indirectly, through the impact they have on Total Quality Management.
In order to sum up the findings of the research, it seems that in Greek hotels the authoritarian leadership style is the one which plays a significant role not only in Total Quality Management, but also in sustainability-driven innovation. It has been indicated that Total Quality Management positively and significantly affected the past years’ profits of Greek hotels. Therefore, the theoretical findings which associate the product and service quality with increased profits seem to be implemented in the case of the Greek hotel industry.