Pilgrimage Strategic Management in Mashhad with Emphasis on Social Cultural Issues

As the traditional views of management is unable to meet the various needs of urban residents and requires newer models of management, pilgrimage management is also demanding new strategic approaches. Organization of pilgrimage in Mashhad needs comprehensive recognition of management issues. This article attempts to describe and analyze the status of pilgrimage management by qualitative and quantitative methods with the aim of recognizing the strategic pilgrimage management status quo and offering the suitable strategies in socio-cultural issues. In order to collect the required information, various methods such as documents, internet resources, interviews and questionnaires have been used. In this research 13 main organizations in Mashhad have been consulted to collect the data. 28 experts and authorities from these organizations are interviewed and the results of published interviews in different newspaper are also used. The results show that pilgrimage management in Mashhad is not in a good condition. In terms of internal factors (Strengths and weaknesses), it faces weaknesses and as for the external factors (Opportunities and Threats), it has not shown appropriate responses. It means that it doesn’t benefit from the opportunities and have shown little reaction to threats.