Influence of updating environmental knowledge through learning processes to improve performance in a tourist market

This paper examines the relationship between environmental knowledge, organisational learning and business performance through an empirical study of 87 companies in the Spanish hospitality sector. This study includes “time” as variable in the analysis by focusing on the need to update environmental knowledge six years after the learning process was originally implemented. The results of the study indicate that environmental knowledge has a positive impact on business performance. Therefore, our findings show that in order to achieve a sustained positive effect on performance, it is important for the organisation to keep its environmental knowledge stocks and flows up to date. That is, there is a need to review the environmental awareness across the organisation at regular intervals (in our research, six years after the initial analysis). This can be achieved by defining organisational learning processes which have environmental knowledge as one of their priorities. The paper discusses both conceptual and practical implications of the research for the development of successful operations and management strategies for hotels.