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This paper explores the challenges Malaysian tourism and hospitality organisations faced during the COVID-19 pandemic and assesses how they coped and strategized with these challenges. Next, the study explores innovative action and best practices in dealing with the pandemic. Additionally, the study focusses on the efforts of policymakers. The paper also reviews government policy and support programmes made available to the business sector during the pandemic.

The paper identifies the key pandemic-related issues and challenges faced in the tourism and hospitality industry through open-ended questions with senior industry practitioner insights and policymakers.

The study highlights emerging challenges and issues for Malaysian hospitality and tourism businesses. In addition, it offers specific recommendations and strategies to enable industry stakeholders to respond to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

These findings are of interest to Malaysian tourism and hospitality industry stakeholders and policymakers as they highlight challenges and offer possible post-pandemic solutions.

The paper reflects current issues and challenges from the perspective of tourism and hospitality practitioners on managerial and operational issues relating to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The environmental impact of excessive use of natural resources such as energy and water in the tourism industry has increased significantly. Thus, it is crucial to investigate the notion of frugality in this industry. Particularly, this study aims to examine the effect of green marketing strategies (eco-labelling and environmental advertising) and hotel guests’ green attitude towards frugality in the context of the Malaysian hotel industry. Furthermore, the mediating effect of green attitude is also examined.

Stimulus-organism-response theory was used to develop the research framework. The data were collected via a self-administered survey questionnaire, which yielded 150 complete and usable responses. A partial least square-structural equation modelling approach was used to validate the proposed model.

The results of this study revealed that environmental advertising and eco-labelling, directly and indirectly, affect frugality. Moreover, the link between green attitude and frugality also was supported. Furthermore, data supported the mediating effect of green attitude in the relationship between green marketing strategies and frugality.

The findings from this study can benefit hoteliers who are targeting frugal and environmentally conscious consumers. Moreover, the hoteliers will be able to understand the drivers of frugality in the tourism industry. It can assist them to formulate better marketing strategies in attracting and retaining frugal consumers.

The findings from this study offer a number of important social implications for society, the local government and the city and tourism council. Particularly, understanding the strategies towards frugality can pave the way towards the formation of a “less consumption” community. Moreover, it will serve as the guideline for designing the green and sustainability campaign for the nation.

This study is among the pioneers to investigate the issue pertaining to frugality in the tourism industry context. This study examines new linkages such as the indirect effect of green marketing strategies towards frugality. Moreover, the mediating effect of green attitude in the relationship between green marketing strategies (eco-labelling and environmental advertising) and frugality is comparatively a new link.

Globally, the hospitality industry has entered a new era of growth and transformation due to the Industrial revolution 4.0 and generational change among the consumers. The Malaysian hospitality industry is facing some issues and challenges due to this shift in the global economy, game-changing service innovation, increasing alternative service providers and the disruption of technology. The study aims to identify the issues faced by industry experts and to provide some practical solutions for industry.

The paper identifies the key issues and challenges faced by the hospitality industry by using an open-ended question-based approach among senior industry practitioners and the management representative of the Malaysian Association of Hotels.

A number of innovative recommendations are offered from an industry perspective (including best practices and benchmarking) that if adopted would be beneficial to all stakeholders and encourage tourists to embrace the Malaysian hospitality industry.

The paper underscores issues and challenges stemming from rapid tourism growth and some operational issues relating to hospitality development. The paper also identifies some recent innovations that hoteliers could implement in their respective hotels.

This paper aims to investigate the economic impacts of the current coronavirus disease, which is globally known as (COVID-19) pandemic, on small businesses in the tourism and hospitality industry, including food and beverages (F&B) industries in Malaysia during and after the enforcement of the Movement Control Order (MCO) and conditional (CMCO) with the emergence of new business models.

In this paper, the implemented methodology involved a secondary qualitative research design based mainly on the existing literature, the World Health Organisation (WHO) reports, the government’s documents, in addition to online sources and observations regarding local business experiences.

The findings revealed that implementing effective strategies of recovery, shaping resilience solutions and supporting policies such as the National Recovery Plan, which is backed by the government played a pivotal role in avoiding the turndown of small businesses.

This critical review is submitted as an original research paper, which aims to provide important perspectives regarding the COVID-19 pandemic impacts on the tourism and hospitality industry in Malaysia. This paper serves as a scholarly platform for further in-depth studies on various resilience solutions of small businesses.

This paper aims to examine the factors that measure different satisfaction levels between the Asian and Western travellers during their stay in hotels in Malaysia. The paper also seeks to analyse the importance of the tangible and intangible factors in the hotel industry.

The research questions are utilised to measure the differences between Asian and Western perception of hotel attributes. A questionnaire with five‐point Likert scale is applied to measure customer satisfaction. Data is analysed using SPSS software by employing factor analysis, multiple regression, and analysis of covariance (ANCOVA).

Results indicate that there are significant differences between Asian and Western evaluations of hotel quality, with clear indication that satisfaction levels Malaysian hotels were higher among Western travellers than the Asian travellers. Both Asian and Western travellers perceive hospitality as an influential factor in determining the overall satisfaction level.

The limitation of the study is that the sample is taken only from travellers who are leaving Malaysia by plane. Future research can be carried out on the travellers arriving at and depart from Malaysia using different mode of transportations.

For practitioners, it is worth noting that Asian travellers are exclusively concerned with the value for money services, while Western travellers regard security and safety, and food and beverage as important factors for them to stay in the hotels or revisit the country.

Malaysia is an emerging market for tourism industry and the information obtained from the travellers can be utilised to enhance a much more efficient marketing strategy in the hotel industry. This paper contains material relevant to education as well as to the tourism industry, and implementable solutions are sufficiently well suggested.

In the prevailing COVID-19 pandemic, organizations now are expected to serve customers who are highly conscious of safety and sanitation. Among others, the hospitality industry is significantly and negatively influenced by this pandemic. Given the unique characteristics of services, using advanced technology is not enough to create a memorable experience without physical interaction between service providers and customers. Thus, this study aims to define the “new normal” for service customers and to explore the “new service design” for the hotel industry.

As most of the Southeast Asian countries heavily rely on the tourism industry, this study focuses on one of the emerging tourism destinations in this region, Malaysia. The data is collected through in-depth interviews with 17 potential national and international tourists.

The results suggest that considering the “new normal” for customers, there is an immediate need for the hotel industry to revamp their service design by mainly practicing disinfection and sanitation activities, re-designing overall infrastructure and introducing promotional offers.

This study is novel in its kind as it provides useful guidelines for both practitioners and academicians/researchers. Under this crucial time, very few research is conducted specifically focusing on the hotel industry and tourists’ behaviors amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. The study will provide in-depth knowledge about tourists’ expectations from the hotel services, especially in their own voices.

Hotel labour costs in Malaysia are increasing. This paper aims to explore Langkawi hotel managers’ perceptions about reducing labour costs using various information and communication technology (ICT) innovations.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with managers from 19 budget and boutique resorts on Langkawi Island, Malaysia. Qualitative data were recorded, transcribed and content analysed using latent coding.

All hotel managers reported using some form of ICT. The purpose for ICT adoption found was to increase productivity and efficiency. A hotel’s customer mix, the need of the organization and the technology budget available influenced the outcome of technological innovation. Langkawi hotels had successfully implemented Property Management Systems (PMSs), but self-check-in/out kiosks were not seen as important as they do not meet their customers’ service expectations.

This study identifies some factors influencing uptake by hotels of technological innovations. This initial qualitative exploration of the technology adoption feasibility in Langkawi suggests that implementation to reduce labour cost is more likely for employee-operated devices rather than customer-operated devices.

This study contributes to the human resource (HR) management literature by providing insight into the reasons hotel managers introduce technology in a developing country context. Results suggests that hotels face challenges in reducing labour costs through technology. These insights may serve to guide policymakers and hotel managers in other developing countries that are planning to use technology to solve their HR issues. Luxury hotels can consider adopting ICT for back-of-the-house operations such as using a HR information system within the HR department and PMS for the hotel overall operation.

These findings can increase the Malaysians awareness of ICT importance, especially in the hotel industry.

The Malaysian national minimum wage order policy was introduced in 2012. This policy has resulted in increased labour costs and suggests a need to adopt ICT. This paper is the first to examine the viewpoints of hotel practitioners as to the viability of this strategy. Whilst many studies on the adoption of ICT in the hotel industry focus on its impact on productivity and firm’s performance using quantitative methods, this study used qualitative methods to explore hotel managers’ perceptions on its feasibility to reduce dependence on labour.

The purpose of this paper is to use SERVQUAL to measure Generation Y’s (Gen Y) perceived service quality and its effects on their satisfaction toward the Malaysian hotel industry.

The required data were collected through questionnaire, distributed to 200 respondents in four areas of Klang Valley. The collected data were put through multiple regression to identify the effect of SERVQUAL dimensions on service quality.

The results reveal that all the elements of SERVQUAL, except tangibility, had a significant and positive relationship with customer satisfaction.

It is a niche area research which is done on a small population in a specified geographical area within Malaysia, though its research implications are significant and add significantly to the tourism literature with respect to Gen Y.

This research holds importance in the growing service tourism and hoteling industry in Malaysia, where Gen Y holds a key economic position and is predicted to grow even further in the near future.

It is a niche area research done on very specific consumers in Malaysia. It, therefore, adds to the emerging field of tourism in relation to Gen Y.

The purpose of this study is to explore how senior managers of independent hotels perceive the notion of corporate social responsibility (CSR) through a holistic analysis of motivations of undertaking both social and environmental initiatives.

This study conducts qualitative interviews with 22 Malaysian senior hotel managers together with ethnographic observations.

Emergent themes show that CSR is a dynamic concept involving complex struggles and trade-offs between fulfilling business objectives, paying heed to personal ethical values and considering cultural norms when making decisions regarding the adoption of a range of environmental and social initiatives.

This study contributes to legitimacy theory by highlighting that in the absence of pressure from key stakeholders for responsible initiatives, managers still proactively engage in CSR initiatives. More surprising still is that they set expectations instead of simply aligning or responding to the key stakeholders’ pre-set demands. Meanwhile, the uniqueness, size and purposeful selection of the sample limit the applicability of the findings to wider geographical and cultural locations.

While Malaysian hotel managers are willing to use CSR practices to demonstrate their commitment to their employees and the local communities where they operate, it is equally important that they utilize other media (such as their websites or social media) for both promotional and legitimacy building purposes. Within the context of growing tourism for economic development, the Malaysian Government can develop more effective strategies, rewards or incentives for encouraging businesses to undertake and improve CSR adoption for sustainability of this industry.

By extending the scope of CSR studies beyond firm performance issues, we attempt to show the wider set of motivations and contexts considered important in determining hotel engagement in CSR programs.

The World Islamic Tourism Mart in Malaysia has been attracting Muslim tourists from all over the world to choose Malaysia as their Islamic tourism destination. This paper aims to implement the concept of the travel career ladder (TCL) with the main purpose of the antecedents of travel motivation toward Malaysia for Islamic tourism destination (MMITD).

The theoretical model was tested using the structural equation modeling technique with partial least squares. A self-administered questionnaire was designed, distributed and collected from 180 effective participants who had visited Malaysia.

The findings revealed that the Islamic compliance with self-esteem needs, the Islamic compliance with relationship needs and the Islamic compliance with physiological needs have significant effects on Malaysia My Islamic tourism destination.

The scope of this research paper is limited to TCL including the Islamic compliance issues with self-fulfillment, self-esteem, relationship, safety and physiological needs. A small sample size was obtained with participants from the Muslim countries. A future study should be comprehensively conducted on larger and diverse sampling methods with participants from the Muslim and the non-Muslim major countries, as this paper particularly discusses the theoretical and managerial implications for the anticipated future studies.

The study yet attempts on the part of academicians in Malaysia, what travel motivational factors influence Islamic tourists to travel MMITD. Based on the previous literature and researcher’s experience, it is a new phenomenon and investigation on MMITD.