HOS807 Strategic Management In Tourism And Hospitality: Crown Resorts Limited Assessment 2 Answer

Answer :

Strategic Management in Tourism and Hospitality

Executive Summary 

The primary objective of this report was to identify strategic issues in a business organization operating in the hospitality and tourism industry.  For this purpose, Crown Resorts Limited was selected which is operating in the gaming and entertainment industry of Australia. This report has identified that the increase in competition due to the introduction of local organizations as well as multinational organizations was the contributor towards increasing competition. This report has provided a description of the Global strategy adopted by the organization to deal with such competition and the reason that resulted in the failure of this strategy. In addition to the recommendations are provided which will help the organization to deal with this is a strategic issue and develop over the period of time. 
Introduction 

This report will be concerned with strategic issues identified in business organizations operating in the tourism and hospitality industry. Tourism in the hospitality industry is very vast as this industry includes any business organization that is providing services to tourists. Therefore it can be said that organizations operating in the entertainment industry, restaurant industry, hotel industry, travel industry, cruise ship industry, etc. will all be categorized as hospitality and tourism companies. The main focus of this report will be to evaluate strategy issues identified in these organizations and providing the solution to the strategic issue identity. The business organization selected in this particular report is Crown Resorts Limited which is a gaming and entertainment organization (Ansoff, Kipley, Lewis, Helm-Stevens & Ansoff, 2018). This organization has been operating in Australia for a long period of time and it is currently the largest gaming and Entertainment Company in Australia. The main focus of this report will be to identify strategic issues in Crown Resorts Limited. At the end of the report, recommendations will also be provided to the management of this organization on the manner in which these strategic issues can be dealt with over the period of time.

Findings

Crown Resorts Limited has been operating in this industry for a long period of time and it can be said that it is one of the most successful organizations in Australia. Management has also been able to maintain effective and efficient profitability over the period of time which has resulted in such a huge market capital. Still, this organization is operating in the tourism and hospitality industry which faces different kinds of strategic issues over the period of time. In addition to that, it is very common for large scale organizations to face these strategic issues in day-to-day operations. 

After analysing the industry as well as the nature of business operations it can be said that the level of competition in this market is one of the strategies issues that are currently being faced by the organization. There are different organizations a surfacing in this Industry that giving a tough competition to Crown Resorts Limited. Competition is always a very important strategic issue in any kind of business industry as over the period of time the number of organizations in every industry has been increasing significantly (Moutinho & Vargas-Sanchez, 2018). The globalization of business organizations can also be considered as one of the important contributors to an increasing level of competition. Business organizations from different part of the world that are establishing in Australia that is creating a lot of problems to cope up with the level of competition.   

Globalization is the increasing level of competition in the hospitality and tourism industry because financial resources available with such organizations are significantly higher as compared to local organizations. These organizations can provide offers and discounts to the customer in order to provide services at a lower cost. With a limited amount of financial resources, local organizations such as Crown Resorts Limited cannot provide such discounts and they are undercut by global organizations. Customers will definitely prefer business organizations that are providing similar services at a lower cost (Hitt & Duane Ireland, 2017). In addition to that these global organizations have also developed a brand name on the global market which also attracts customers.

Management of Crown Resort Limited has also tried to make the organization a global brand but this is the strategy of the organization that has failed miserably. Chief executive officer of the organization has discussed in the annual general meeting in 2017 that their Global strategy has failed but there was no financial loss. It was disclosed that management has purchased sub-concession in Macau in order to expand its business operations in Macau through investment in big Macau casino group i.e. Melco Crown. Management has to sell off its share due to the arrest of 16 staff members in China in 2016 (Patrick, 2017). It can be said that management was under pressure to deal with the level of competition and it was one of the primary reasons that management tried to establish themselves on a global level show that a brand name can be developed. Lack of strategic management was one of the contributing factors towards the failure of the Global strategy.

In addition to globalization, an increase in local gaming and entertainment organizations is also hurting the mission business operations of the company by increasing the level of competition. These organizations are operating on a very small scale and overall fixed and indirect expenses of such organization and very limited as compared to a large scale organization such as Crown Resorts Limited. Automatically their selling price to customers will be lower as compared to large scale organization and this is affecting the overall profitability of Crown Resorts Limited (Lasserre, 2017).

Recommendations

Global presence- First of all it can be said that steps taken by the organization to create their presence in the global market were the very efficient steps to deal with the level of competition in the market. Execution of the strategy was not very efficient and it seems that it was done in order to gain a competitive advantage in a short period of time. Merger and acquisition strategy can be adopted by the organization to ensure that they are able to achieve the Global Goals and objectives in a short period of time. In this strategy, one of the most essential factors to be considered in analysing the business organization under consideration of merger and acquisition strategy (Litvin, Goldsmith & Pan, 2018). Financial performance, as well as brand name of such an organization, is required to be evaluated in advance before making the investment. 

Merger and acquisition strategy can only be valuable for an organization if it is executed in an effective manner. Another important aspect of merger and acquisition is to ensure that all the stakeholders involved in the process are satisfied with the decisions taken by the organization (Schuckert, Liu & Law, 2015). In the absence of such approval, the probability of backlash from shareholders in case of failure of merger and acquisition will create negative publicity for the company. Expansion strategy adopted by the organization in 2016 was kept as a secret from all the stakeholders and it was informed to the stakeholder after the failure of the strategy (Patrick, 2017). This mistake should not be repeated in the future as the cooperation of shareholders and other stakeholders are required.

Cost efficiency- One of the primary factors that help in gaining a competitive advantage to any business organization is prices charged from the customer. There are two factors that are generally considered by any customer in the hospitality and tourism industry i.e. quality and price of services. Management is required to attain cost leadership in Australia to deal with local organizations that are creating a high level of competition in the market. First of all, management is required to reduce the indirect cost of operation by eliminating unnecessary stuff. In addition to Resource Management and efficiency strategies are required to be implemented so that the overall potential of the organization can be increased along with attaining cost efficiency. Creating the presence of organization through the mobile application and official websites can also help the business organization to attain cost-efficiency (Evans, 2015). This can be done by inviting other organizations to create the advertisement and charging such organizations to earn additional revenue which can be used to reduce selling prices.

Conclusion

On an overall evaluation of this report, it can be said that dealing with strategic issues is one of the primary functions in any business organization. It is very essential for the organization to identify such issues and prepare alternative solutions for effective and efficient management. This report was focused on the strategic issue in Crown Resorts Limited and it was identified that increasing the level of competition was affecting the financial position of the company. The introduction of local organizations, as well as multinational organizations in tourism and hospitality industry of Australia, was one of the primary reasons behind the increased competition. Recommendations to deal with this increasing level of competition were provided in the report. It is suggested that management should undertake a merger and acquisition strategy for global expansion. In addition to the increasing level of competition from local organizations can be achieved by attaining cost leadership in the market.