Crisis Management Research (2014-2023) in the MICE Industry: A Review and Research Agenda

Abstract

The 21st century is seen as a volatile business environment and requires a proper crisis management standard for most organizations including the MICE sector. Nowadays, managers seek to deal with a potential crisis effectively, with minimum losses or to avert the potential crisis in the best case. The goal is obvious: minimize the impact of the crisis or avoid a potential crisis. This study aims to investigate relevant research domains in the MICE/business events industry context. This paper found that there was very limited study on the topic. The topic of crisis management in the MICE/business events industry only started to gain much attention after COVID-19. To understand how crisis management practices have been adopted in the industry, the authors reviewed 32 articles including 29 papers on COVID-19, spanning 10 years, between 2014 and 2023. The findings showed that the research focuses on crisis management, crisis impact, response, resilience, communication, and recovery. Looking back, health-related crises (including COVID-19), political disturbances and terrorism themes are the biggest trends. This study addressed the need for more study on the topic for advancing knowledge, addressing emerging challenges, and applying findings to improve practice and decision-making as well as to develop a newly conceptual framework that places operational resilience on an equal footing with financial resilience, with indicators adapted to the risk profile of the operating model.