تبدیل هتل ها به سازمان یادگیرنده : یک استراتژی جدید برای جهانی شدن

Organisational learning and the learning organisation are concepts that have attracted a considerable amount of attention over the last two decades. This paper provides an analysis and evaluation of the main perspectives on organisational learning, particularly in relation to hotels as service sector organisations. The issues involved are an evaluation of the transformation process of a hospitality organisation and the key success factors to becoming a learning organisation in order to develop and maintain a competitive advantage within the global challenge. It identifies the issues which appear to be of prime importance when introducing organisational learning into hotels. The focus of this paper will be on the key points of the Turkish tourism sector's strengths and weaknesses in the adventure of becoming a learning organisation. Following of a literature review within which different characteristics of the service sector will be summarised learning organisation issues pertaining to Turkey will be discussed. This paper aims to discover future opportunities for the sustainable development of Turkish Tourism. However, this paper also maintains that, although organisational learning may be an important factor in building an organisation's competitiveness, by itself, it cannot guarantee success in today's fiercely competitive markets.

Though academic interest in how organisations learn dates back to at least the 1950s (see Argyris, 1992), it was only in the 1990s, through the work of writers such as Senge (1991) and Pedler, Burgoyne, and Boydell (1991), that the topic has attracted significant attention in recent years. In part, this is because there are two overlapping and competing concepts: organisational learning and the learning organisation (West, 1994). As Tsang (1997) notes, the tendency to use these two concepts interchangeably complicates our understanding of how learning takes place in organisations. Tsang also points out that, despite the volume of publications on the subject, there is a scarcity of rigorous empirical research in the area. He argues that one of the main reasons for this is that many of those writing on organisational learning are practitioners seeking to prescribe rather than describe or analyse. He believes that, as well as promoting the concept, they are trying to promote themselves and the organisations for which they work. A similar point is also made by Easterby-Smith (1997, p.1107): ‘much of the existing research into learning organisations is based on case studies of organisations that are said to be successful, and these sometimes seem to rely more on public relations than on any grounded studies’. Examples of successful learning organisations are Motorola, Shell, Xerox, Honda, Sony, Kodak and Rover Group UK and the case studies reflect only a picture of the ‘best practices’ in a limited period of time. For example, one of the best examples of a learning organisations in the literature is Rover Group, UK which has not been performing well financially and the ‘learning organisation image’ of the company was based on the compliments of the ex-workers or stakeholders of the company (Bayraktaroğlu, 2001). Despite this confusion, promoting learning within organisations is increasingly seen as vital to sustaining and creating a competitive advantage (Easterby-Smith, 1997). However, if organisations are to successfully adopt the learning approach to competitiveness, they need to understand both the theory and practice of organisational learning. In turn, taking Tsang's (1997) point into account, the evidence on practice must be based on rigorous empirical research. This paper seeks to address these issues by discussing how hotels (as examples of hospitality organisations) can transform themselves into organised learning environments to improve their competitiveness. The focus of this paper will be the Turkish tourism sector's strengths and weaknesses in the adventure of becoming a learning organisation. To explore the specific circumstances of organisational learning in a service sector, the different characteristics of the service sector will be summarised to enable us to move into the Turkish Tourism scene. This paper aims to discover a direction for the Turkish Tourism Sector, which is perceived as a model for the sustainable development of the Turkish Economy as a whole. The inclusion of learning organisations on sustainable tourism development arose from a recognition that the tourism sector is very labour-intensive and in today's business world the most valuable assets are ‘information and knowledge’ and ‘the human factor’. Thus, the coming together of these concepts creates an undeniable logic. As a result, this study is an attempt to bring two human-centred settings together: ‘learning organisations’ and ‘hotels’ as examples of service sector organisations. This paper will conclude by identifying fundamental issues when building organisational learning (especially in the hospitality industry) and it is hoped that this study will contribute towards an advanced understanding of how to enhance competitiveness and the success level of the tourism sector.

In this paper, the issues involved in the transformation process of a hotel into learning organisation were reviewed. Although there is a lack of empirical evidence about the transformation process into a learning organisation in Turkey, this paper is an attempt to analyse the possibility of such a transformation. As a result of our case study analysis, the key steps to becoming a learning organisation are: • mental transformation of the managers, • supporting innovative ideas from all levels in the organisation, • developing an organisational culture for sharing the vision of the organisation, and finally • creating a suitable learning atmosphere. In summation, the learning organisation mentality can be seen as a key factor for success in developing and maintaining a competitive advantage for the Turkish Tourism Industry.