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One of the most important service industries that emerged in the last decade is “Higher Education”. The most of the higher education institutes involve in marketing efforts to build up a good image, to improve the level of satisfaction of students and the stakeholders, to gain competitive advantage with respect to competitors and as well as to increase their market share. Within this intense competition universities should identify and meet the expectations of students to attract more and to retain the existing students. This study is to gain more insights into the dimensions of satisfaction of the university students and factors that affecting their judgments. SSI educational experience questionnaire is used to identify the importance and performance perceptions of students’ in Eastern Mediterranean University among different dimensions and also study find out the difference between importance and performance scores of eleven educational experience dimensions. Results show that “Academic Advising”, “Instruction Effectiveness”, “Recruitment and Financial Aid” and “Student Centeredness” was very important to students. Study also provides managerial implications as well.

The aim of this study is twofold: first to diagnose service quality perceptions of airline passengers and then links these perceptions to their satisfaction and repurchase intentions, specifically in a new emerging market in the Mediterranean region, North Cyprus. Airline transportation is a major and the most extensively used way to reach North Cyprus, as it is an island state; thus it is important to know passengers' quality perception regarding any quality improvement.

A recently developed, industry‐specific, 43‐item scale (AIRQUAL) based on eight distinct dimensions: airline tangibles, terminal tangibles, personnel, empathy, image, customer satisfaction, repurchase intention, and word‐of‐mouth communication fit well in this study, maintaining its reliability, validity and dimensionality issues. The sample of the study consisted of customers using the national airline company of North Cyprus, who were selected through the non‐probability judgmental sampling technique. A total of 583 questionnaires were found to be useful and data from these questionnaires were tested through SPSS and LISREL statistical software.

A rigorous statistical test indicates a reasonable fit of the eight‐factor model to the data on the basis of a number of fit statistics. Results revealed that, among the quality dimensions, “airline tangibles” was found to be the most significant to affect both customer satisfaction and repurchase intention. Findings also showed that customer satisfaction is positively related to repurchase and word‐of‐mouth intensions.

Since airline transportation is a major and the most important way of reaching North Cyprus, the results of this study provide important insights to practitioners and the tourism ministry about how marketing strategies can be designed to manage service quality perceptions and how the airline industry can use the service quality concept to formulate marketing strategies effectively.

Defining and measuring quality service is of importance to providers of hotel services. This study aims to diagnose the applicability of the perceived service quality measurement scale to European customers in a new emerging market which is North Cyprus – because tourism industry in Cyprus has been significantly influenced owing to political instability of the island since 1963 and the year 2004 has been of great importance owing to the 24 April referendum for a peace solution between South and North on the island Cyprus.

The sample of the study consists of the European tourists visiting Northern Cyprus hotels. Non‐probability convenience sampling technique is used to collect the data of survey instruments adopted from Parasuraman et al. SPSS 10.0 for windows was employed for the scale measurement. Descriptive analysis such as means, standard deviation and frequencies are calculated. Regression analysis was employed to observe the causal effect of independent variables to customer satisfaction. Reliability issues are tested and dimensionality of the scale is confirmed through an exploratory factor analysis.

Interestingly, the number of European tourists' arrivals has dramatically increased since the referendum. Apart from assessing the reliability and validity of the perceived service quality measurement scale, the results indicate that the nature of perceived service quality measurement instrument is found to two dimension tangibles and intangibles have for North Cyprus hotel services. The results reveal that tangibles and intangibles exert a significant positive effect on customer satisfaction, and European customers visiting North Cyprus are demanding improved service quality.

This research has certain limitations: first, the sample in this study is small and is limited to a relatively specific group of tourists (European nationalities) who stayed in North Cyprus hotels. Second, measurement of customer satisfaction was carried out using a single‐item scale and thus it was not possible to estimate its reliability.

The year 2004 has been great importance owing to the 24 April referendum for peace between South and North Cyprus. This study provides reflections of political sensitivity on North Cyprus hotel service quality; North Cyprus is both an island and a virgin market in the Mediterranean where quality of hotels is a significant strategic issue for increasing the competitiveness of the Mediterranean islands in the European tourism market. The study explores service quality in terms of the perceived service quality in the hospitality industry and help practitioners with the real concept of service quality. The results and implications of the future research are discussed in detail.

Aims to address the concept of the “zone of tolerance” in judgments of hotel service quality. The present study describes the zone of tolerance for customers’ service expectations and determines the customer satisfaction level in Northern Cyprus hotels – which is a new emerging market as an island destination.

The sample of the study consisted of customers visiting four‐star, five‐star, and resort hotels located in the Gazimağusa and Kyrenia regions of Northern Cyprus in June and July 2004. The questionnaire was based on service expectations and perceptions. As a result of the pilot study with 50 customers, the instrument was reworded for measuring service quality and the zone of tolerance for hotels. This modified instrument became the “HOTELZOT” instrument, which was used to measure customers’ service expectations and service perceptions. Psychometric properties of the scale (such as reliability) were tested, and the dimensionality of the scale was confirmed through an exploratory factor analysis.

The conceptual model (HOTELZOT) presented here, and the results of this study, demonstrate that evaluation of services can be scaled according to different types of expectations – “desired” and “adequate” – and that customers use these two types of expectations as a comparison standard in evaluating hotel services. The findings reveal that the customers visiting Northern Cyprus hotels have a narrow zone of tolerance in services provided by the hotels. The results also indicate that the HOTELZOT instrument presented here is two‐dimensional. The results with respect to gap analysis reveal that there was a shortfall in the service quality provided by the hotels in the sample, with the largest gap being found in intangibles.

First, the sample in this study is small and is limited to a relatively specific group of tourists. Second, measurement of customer satisfaction was carried out using a single‐item scale, and it was therefore not possible to estimate its reliability. Finally, this study examined the influence of two factors on customers’ zones of tolerance for hotels. As proposed by Zeithaml et al., there might be other factors that determine the width of the zone of tolerance.

This study is necessary, useful, and relevant because: it focuses on service quality in island destinations (which have received little attention in the past); Northern Cyprus is both an island and a virgin market in the Mediterranean where quality of hotels is a significant strategic issue for increasing the competitiveness in the international tourism market; and the study explores service quality in terms of the zone of tolerance in the hospitality industry.

To provide information on differences between recruitment methods and training practices used in SMEs and large organizations in Turkey, as a representative of a developing country.

A survey as designed by the Cranfield Network on International Human Resource Management (CRANET‐G) was used for this study. The survey aims to obtain data that is based on facts and it does not ask for information based on respondents’ opinions, attitudes or perceptions.

It provides information about recruitment methods and training practices used in organizations in Turkey. It suggests that, in Turkey, small businesses are more likely to rely on employment agencies, which are considered formal recruitment sources in order to fill managerial positions, contrary to the existing literature and theoretical propositions. Additionally, with regard to training practices, it shows that large organizations use more formal training methods compared with small‐and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs).

This study only includes SMEs and large organizations in Turkey as a representative of developing countries, but the findings may have implications for other developing countries.

A very practical study which provides further insights for academics and managers of both large and small organizations.

This paper fulfils the need of further enhancing the research in the field of HRM in developing countries, and offers practical help to individual managers operating in the same settings as Turkey.

The aim of this paper is to examine how the cultural context and other institutional factors may influence the amount of direct communication with employees in nine European countries.

Nine countries were selected from the Cranfield Network on Comparative Human Resource Management database varying from high to low context. The dependent or criterion variable, was direct communication, independent variables were organization size age and industry, strategic role of human resource management (HRM), union presence and communication culture context. Data were analysed using one‐way analysis of variance and hierarchical regression.

The results show that cultural communication context, union presence and strategic role of HRM all have an influence on direct communication. The authors also see that union presence and cultural context interact.

The paper relied on data collected from the human resource managers of the organizations; therefore the authors do not know how the communication is perceived by the employees themselves. Future research can investigate not only the amount, also but the quality of the communication by collecting data from employees.

In today's environment where people from different cultures and companies from different legal systems are increasingly working together, the authors need to realise that context matters. What has worked in one environment may not be successful in another. The authors need to develop models that can guide managers in how they can deal with the differences and be effective in communicating with their employees.

The paper investigates direct communication in low‐ and high‐context countries as well as medium‐context countries. European integration provides a move towards convergence in some practices, however, there remains cultural differences between groups of countries.