Innovation Strategies for Organizational Change in a Tea Restaurant Culture: A Social Behavior Perspective

When economic growth slows, the tourism and hospitality industry typically suffers a major decline (Hu, Horng, & Sun, 2009; Kim, Chen, & Jang, 2006). Thus, in order to survive, restaurants and hotels need to implement transformation strategies to allow them to react more swiftly to changes in the economic environment (Eyster, 1993). The catch phrase "innovate or perish" further underlines the fact that innovation is crucial to organizations being able to maintain their vitality and competitiveness. Porter (1990) observed that, theoretically, prosperity derives from competitiveness, and that the key to improving competitiveness lies in innovativeness. In a general sense, entrepreneurship involves actions intended to create newness or to renew existing organizations. Effective creative practices allow for adaptation to change and this requires an array of innovations such as strategic entrepreneurship or leadership (Ireland & Webb, 2007). From an organizational development perspective, changes in organizational beliefs, personality, attitude, or behavior facilitate organizational innovation (Krause, 2004). The more positive motivation, charisma, and professional knowledge a leader possesses, the greater will be his/her willingness to share these qualities and abilities with staff and promote, innovation and creativity in his/her team (Hu, Horng, & Sun, 2009). Furthermore, although all leaders expect their companies to be innovative, few possess the knowledge of how to increase organizational motivation and lead their company to achieve optimal innovation results. To date, few researchers have examined such issues. Based on findings in previous studies, this study was aimed at exploring leaders' personalities and changes in organizational motivation, structure, transformation strategies, and innovation in the hospitality industry. Thus, the main purpose of this study was to investigate creativity and innovation strategies for promoting organizational change from a social behavior perspective in a tea restaurant.

ORGANIZATION CHANGE AND INNOVATIVE TRANSFORMATION FROM THE SOCIAL BEHAVIOR PERSPECTIVE

Organizational reform and management, include organizational structure, personnel, and technology. Organizational change and development can help resolve tensions resulting from conflicts between organization culture and motivations; innovation is seen not only as a reason for, or a driver of, change, but also as an important outcome of successful development (Darling & Heller, 2009).

Visscher and Rip (2003) developed a typology of change agents, presenting different ways of coping with the chaos caused by change processes. To meet corporate objectives and achieve success in the ever-changing business environment, firms require a robust culture to motivate staff to bring about organizational change. Mangelsdorf (2009) found that companies looking to facilitate innovation should look for employees who are motivated not by job security, but rather, by intellectual challenge. The contextual basis of workplace culture and managerial style may affect employee creativity by either facilitating or inhibiting various social-psychological factors including intrinsic motivation, which according to Amabile (1996) is essential for creative and innovative performance. According to Zhou (2003), high levels of intrinsic motivation may be present, when an individual pursues a task for its own sake without regard for obtaining monetary or social rewards. Based on the intrinsic motivation theory of creativity, Amabile, Conti, Coon, Lazenby, and Herron …