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Tourism movements are increasingly of interest as economic, social and cultural events, which annually, and on a country basis make one destination more popular than another. Additionally, tourism is an important factor for establishing international peace, cultural and trade activities between human beings, increasing employment, furthering interaction between communities and bringing financial support to economies. In the tourism sphere, competing countries are trying to cope with each other by mentioning and emphasizing their differences. In this context, using the tourist supply in an efficient and productive way will increase the level of tourism support to countries and to regions on a large scale. In order to reach this aim, analysing and examining the differences in tourist demand in certain periods have key importance. The aim of this research is to examine the profiles and expectations of tourists coming to the Antalya Region of Turkey.

Tourism has become one of the important events in the world with travel taking less time and becoming ever cheaper. Today many people are travelling to see new places or to have new experiences, and these movements result in considerable changes in community life (Do_an, 1987). From the beginning of tourism movements different inputs and mutual interactions have been faced. These emerge in some changes in community structures. When congress tourism and tourism movements are studied together, it can be seen that they have many common parts. In congress tourism, varying types can be seen: conferences, seminars, symposiums. A comprehensive name can be given for all these efforts: a “meeting”. Meetings can be summarized as conversations for information exchange among people gathered in a meetingplace. Sometimes the congress tourism concept can be used instead of meeting. Meeting delegates have high income levels and their spending amounts are generally higher than those of normal tourists. With only limited time, meeting delegates depart quickly after the meeting. Beside the meeting delegates, there are also accompanying people, and these people are also a good potential in meeting efforts (Tekeli, 2001). Since the importance of tourism is increasing day by day, this importance brings strong competition. Countries have to compete for new tourism markets as well as keep existing markets. In this context, congress tourism can be evaluated as one important type of tourism. In this article, congress tourism movements are examined in the world and in Turkey. Developments, the important countries, cities, and efforts related to this subject have been investigated.

To investigate job satisfaction of middle and upper level managers working in 5‐star hotels and first‐class holiday villages and to note interests of tourism professionals regarding the subject of job satisfaction.

Questionnaire technique was used for the sample of 102 middle‐ and upper‐level managers. For data evaluation SPSS program was used. T‐tests, correlation, Anova and Scheffe tests were carried out.

According to the findings it can be mentioned that there is a general satisfaction among middle‐ and upper‐level managers in the sample. This finding can be evaluated as being hopeful according to Turkey's working conditions. In Turkey, generally personnel have long working hours, poor physical working conditions, lack of support from their colleagues and by international standards, insufficient salaries. Therefore the research findings are surprising.

The results are limited within the sampled middle‐ and upper‐level managers in 5‐star hotels and first‐class holiday villages, so the results cannot be generalized.

This study can be evaluated as useful information for tourism industry professionals regarding the subject of job satisfaction.

In the last 10‐15 years rapid changes in the world along with globalization have had great effects on almost all countries and enterprises. This is especially the case for companies faced with international competition. Also, these enterprises have had to take notice of scarce resources becoming more so. All these developments force companies to make decisions in light of their strategic positions, and these developments directly or indirectly affect hotels. They increasingly find themselves in types of competition previously unknown: their customers are demanding more and more for their money and these demands can also be noted in the sector of information technology. Hotels must increasingly make use of the new technologies, and at this juncture total quality management attempts may spell out the decisive differences between the hotels and their ultimate survival. In this study the role of re‐engineering is taken into consideration within the scope of total quality management. The goal of this study is to propose a new process model for a five‐star hotel.

To investigate the main expectations of students from the tourism industry who are studying at the Akdeniz University School of Tourism and Hotel Management in Antalya.

A questionnaire containing 16 closed questions and a multi‐item attitude scale was used for 689 students ranging from the first class to the fourth class.

The results generally show negative perceptions and attitudes toward the tourism industry, but some positive perceptions and attitudes are also apparent. Positive emotions were usually mentioned by students who had chosen the tourism and hotel management school within their first three rank order in the university entrance exam, who had chosen the school willingly, and who had carried out their practical work experience outside Turkey.

It is not possible to generalize the findings to other tourism schools, but the findings can be evaluated as a useful source of information regarding the perceptions and attitudes of the sampled tourism students in Antalya, Turkey.

The findings are of value for government officials, academicians, tourism professionals and also tourism students.

To provide an useful way for tourism industry professionals regarding defining training needs of hotel personnel and noting the interests of hotel managers in the training subject.

Questionnaire technique was used both for superiors and staff in a sampled five‐star hotel in Antalya. For statistical evaluation the SPSS program was used.

According to the combination of the scoring table used in questionnaire, the training areas given before and in the sampled hotel, for superiors and staff most suggested are; organizational structure, management and organization, communication, motivation, accounting‐budgeting, foreign languages (German, English and French) and customer relations.

It is not possible to generalize the findings for all five‐star hotels in Antalya, but this study can be evaluated as a starting point in defining training needs of hotel personnel. In addition to this, much more researches must be done may be in other parts of Turkey in order to compare the results of this study.

Useful information in orienting tourism professionals to defining needs. Beside this study benefiting from managerial observations and forming of focus groups can be suggested.

The findings can be seen as a practical implications for tourism professionals and academicians as well.

Developments in today’s information technologies are dazzling. Using information technologies results in having advantages in competition, decreasing costs, gaining time, and getting and sharing information. Now it is possible to state that there are different types of usage within the information technologies. Internet, intranet, e‐mail connections, electronic trade, central reservation systems, and Web applications are some examples. In a rapidly increasing trend, touristic establishments are benefiting from the new information technologies. Evidence of this trend is clearly seen in the advantages to touristic establishments and their budget shares for technology. For example, travel agencies are using the Internet as a communication tool, and hotels are using it to market their goods and services, to receive reservations, and to evaluate customer complaints/suggestions. In this paper, Web sites and Web applications of five‐star hotels operating in the Antalya region were examined.

With the increase in competition in the hospitality sector, manpower has become an increasingly important factor. The labour‐intensive aspect of the tourism sector has put pressure on all entrepreneurs to act according to the needs and expectations of internal customers (personnel) and external customers (customers, suppliers). This paper studies personnel policies, recruitment methods and resources, future developments and the reasons for job changes for sample hotels in the Antalya Region in Turkey. A questionnaire was designed for all four‐ and five‐star hotels and first‐class holiday villages which were open during the winter period (January‐March 1999). For the questionnaire evaluation the bio‐medical data process was used. Recruitment methods, popular departments of sample hotels, most‐needed qualifications for personnel, training methods and changes in qualifications and in departments over the next five years, etc. are all discussed in this paper.

To investigate nine organizational dimensions that enable individual learning in hotel establishments and to note interests of tourism professionals to the learning of organizations subject.

Questionnaire technique was used for the sample of 129 staff working in three different five‐star hotels in Antalya. For data evaluation, SPSS program was used.

According to the findings, the highest pure value and variance explanation rated dimension was that of behavior of superiors. This result shows the importance and role of superiors in hotel establishments. In addition to this, the majority of the sampled staff engaged in teamworking and made dialogue with colleagues, but with some considerable occurrence; sampled staff rarely had training and rewards.

The results are limited within the sampled staff working in three different five‐star hotels, so the results cannot be generalized, but the scale in the study can be used in other researches.

This study can be evaluated as useful information and guidance for tourism industry professionals regarding learning of organizations.

The purpose of this paper is to assess the performance of a sample of Lebanese organizations vis‐à‐vis some of the core learning organization dimensions identified in the literature, focusing specifically on those dimensions that are considered most salient and relevant in the Lebanese context.

The paper capitalizes on a comprehensive literature review to identify the core dimensions of the learning organization construct to be tackled in the questionnaire. The questionnaire was then compiled, comprising 40 questions consolidated from the published literature, addressing seven key learning organization dimensions. Factor analysis following survey administration allowed for filtering five dimensions of learning organizations that are most salient in the Lebanese context.

Five salient characteristics of effective learning organizations are identified through factor analysis, namely employee participation, learning climate, systematic employee development, constant experimentation, and learning reward systems. The findings from the Lebanese sample vis‐à‐vis these five dimensions suggest that the main strength of Lebanese firms lies in systematic employee training, while their weakness rests in fostering continuous learning/experimentation.

This paper draws attention to the fact that varying dimensions of learning organizations are accorded attention in different cultures, and it is important to use measurement instruments focusing on these to derive value added insights.