Professor Fevzi Okumus is the Central Florida Hotel and Lodging Association (CFHLA) Preeminent Chair Professor within the Hospitality Services Department at the University of Central Florida’s Rosen College of Hospitality Management. He was the Founding Chair of the Hospitality Services Department at UCF Rosen College from 2007-2013.

He received his PhD in Strategic Hotel Management from Oxford Brookes University, UK. He has a Master of Science degree in International Hotel Management from Oxford Brookes University, UK, and a Bachelor of Science degree in hospitality and tourism from Cukurova University, Turkey. He worked in the hotel industry in various functional areas and roles before becoming an educator.

His main teaching and research areas include strategic management, leadership, hospitality management, services marketing, training, and lodging. He has over 330 academic publications (over 220 refereed journal articles, seven books, 12 book chapters, and 90 conference presentations and reports). Dr. Okumus has published in leading journals, including Tourism Management, Annals of Tourism Research, Journal of Business Research, Service Industries Journal, Management Decision, International Journal of Hospitality Management, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management and Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research. As of February 9th, 2025, his publications have received 30,774 citations, and he has an h-index of 80. He has chaired/co-chaired and served on numerous PhD dissertation and master thesis committees. He secured competitive grants, contracts, and scholarships totaling an amount of $550.000.

He is the Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management (IJCHM) (Impact Factor: 9.10); the Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Insights (JHTI) (Impact Factor: 4.80) and the Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Horizons (JHTH). He serves on the editorial boards of 25 international journals. He is a frequent speaker at national and international conferences.

Dr. Okumus has received numerous research awards and recognitions including “The Michael D. Olsen Research Award” in 2016; “The University of Central Florida Scroll & Quill Society Award” in 2017, the “CFHLA Preeminent Professor” again in 2017, and the John Wiley & Sons Lifetime Research Achievement Award from ICHRIE in 2018. Finally, Prof. Okumus was recognized as a “Highly Cited Researcher” in 2021; 2022; 2023 and 2024 by Clarivate, based on data from the Web of Science. Highly Cited Researchers™ are 1 in 1,000 of the world’s population of scientists and social scientists.