Potency of proliferation (part 2)

Mind your Ps and Qs (38)

To put this second part of the article please re-read part 1

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In face of major calamities or catastrophes, we are living in an era of potency. During such times hope gets trampled upon, people and decision-makers become stupefied, and pushback from imposing change dominate. And yet people persevere. We can be thankful that we do not live in a world of quitters.

Why then is so much being said about the about the death of tourism? Somewhat surprisingly, The End of Tourism podcast doesn`t decry tourism as much as it scolds tourists for not being immersive travelers…vacationers that Hilton believes represent a market of “whycationerss”. Though I contend that few visitor-serving organizations have explicit understandings of the holistic “whys” for visits. I might also say that too many shy away from perfecting experiential hospitality, particularly in helping visitors think in depth about their ‘whys’ or the myriad of ways to accomplish their “whys” while visiting.

While there is a need for intense research on this topic, it is important to note that some businesses do track the interests of visitors…a partial response to the podcast lead who makes a plea to practice a radical form of hospitality which, in part, demands active listening to visitor needs and requirements. While being `radical` can be quite endearing, I can imagine how the critics and cynics among us will revel in such naivety.

Too bad, because the notion of ‘radical’ can be interpreted, better understood and applied if tourism operators focused attention on the jobs-to-be done continuum that reflects on the relationships between tasks, jobs and aspirations.

In any case, back to the notion of there being an end to tourism. Why conflate tourism with death? I think the idea is misplaced. Would it not be more appropriate to reconstrue it as `a new beginning` - the reconceiving, strengthening and realization of a healthier and holistic tourism?

It could if channeled through a Connective Tissue Framework that calls for a renewal of civic opportunism (based on beliefs that all communities have options, unique and distinctive possibilities) enabled through connection and participation but also through attempts to decelerate, explore resonance and re-invest in social energy…an interesting concept offered by Hartmut Rosa.

While I will not elaborate any further, do listen to the interview, and then take a few moments to pause and relax as you contemplate how you and your community might start anew.

Obviously, Most of us know how hard it is to turn our own lives around, and how hard it is to turn places around especially with the advent of ecolibertarianism. An approach that demands immediate responses to climate change and has been parlayed into a call, this time, for chapters in the proposed book, The End of Tourism: The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse…a title that continues a theme that conjures up a fateful end and, seemingly, a renunciation of incremental approaches to adaptation.

Unfortunately, there are no fast ways to renewal or new beginnings. Like all industries and activities, tourism is always in a state of (slow) renewal, though you might not realize it. In my view, the industry has always favored fighting or adapting to the forces that serve to reshape it.

In the ensuing years, however, the issues of concern will extend beyond climate to resolving growing disparities in wealth, fixing the gender gap, and worrying about the problems associated with financial time bombs (too much credit, debt, and leverage in the system, including the eventual bursting of the AI bubble, all of which could trigger a major market crash, as explained in the book 1929.

So, what must be done now to detect and address the challenges forcing communities and companies to reckon with their futures…lessen or minimize the impacts emanating from a polycrisis? How should communities and the industry incentivize and push for action? A response that demands prevention and a moral re-imagination, not timid adaptation.

While it takes time to get new beginnings underway, everyone involved with change management recognizes how calcified opinions can be about amending existing procedures, practices and policies. A problem exacerbated by distrust in a post-truth world and political interference that seeks to alter facts about climate change and gender equality.

While many people in certain destinations voice frustration with the tourism’s negative impacts such as proliferation, most communities-as-destinations, in reality, suffer from stagnation (a shortage of visitors) and may not share the same apprehension and foreboding, particularly when it is perceived to be someone else`s problem, which is troubling.

Consider the vulnerability of small villages, rural and nature-based areas that are doing everything in their power to become magnets for visitation but without caution. If only they were attentive to the concerns of such icons of popularity as Les Petits Villages de France and the region of Provence. Good and bad things happen when “you get what you wish for”, and as such there is nothing worse than being unprepared or unable to tap into the necessary resources and wherewithal to deal with the prospects of being overwhelmed.

Let us be honest, privileged and multi-starred designations galvanize attention. High rankings may seem to make sense but regional tourism authorities that seek such designations cannot afford to neglect responsibilities for ensuring longevity and sustainability. If they do, their sense of place is bound to diminish or plummet over time.

As fashion ability dissipates, fate takes over. So, rather than attempting to disperse or equitably share visitor loads throughout a region – working harder to share or`equalize possibility` - the crowds will unavoidably choose to descend and gather en masse in those places that marketers only deem worthy destinations. Of course it doesn’t help when nimbyism, zoning regulations, and the inherent drawbacks of regional tourism planning encourage densification elsewhere.

The dark legacy of proliferation`s potency also hangs over many high-profile mega projects. In evidence: Poor planning, financial improprieties, a lack of prudence and inadequate guardrails. The Olympics being a case in point, but with exceptions. Here I point to Greece that used the Games as a means of making massive improvements to the county`s infrastructure, and as an opportunity to bolster the country’s national image, energize and expand tourism’s much needed contributions to the country`s gross national product (GDP). Identifying the opportunities to advance the potential of mega events to create a cascade of mutually beneficial outcomes may be rare, but they do exist.

Of course, there are (sacred) places that should always be off-limits. But then again, what happens when pleas such as “please do not discover us” are broadcast? Everyone wants to visit. Positive word-of-mouth, spread over social media, inevitably propels a deluge for which few are prepared.

Such are the realities manifest throughout communities as they struggle with the concept of being destinations…struggle to achieve possibilities…struggle with their image and inadequacies …struggle with lack of access and aging infrastructure…struggle to resolve a myriad of setbacks that their citizens worry about (e.g. affordable housing)…struggle with facilitating an abundance mindset…struggle with maintaining their existing popularity…struggle with being forgotten when the preferences of visitors shift. As soon as despair sets in, growth recedes or declines.

As revealed, the potency of proliferation that takes place in certain destinations is location specific. In large part it results from a lack of options (perhaps due to economic reliance on tourism), the concentrated and congested nature of tourist districts or an undersupply or scarcity of other worthwhile or worthy facilities/ services/attractions/ experiences/ neighborhoods, all of which signal “not worth visiting”.

Such arguments could be considered gratuitous, except for the fact that many communities don`t take sufficient interest in tourism, fulsome placemaking or the necessity for dispersion or flow management. Many lack the means or fail to invest in being functionally adequate or proficient…do not provide enticing attractions…tend to locate attractions in close proximity to each other…ignore how best to ensure how marketing and branding could be used more effectively to influence and guide choice behaviors.

Obviously, it does not help when existing public and private enterprises, educational institutions, chambers of commerce, industry associations and business improvement districts do not step in, take up the slack, do what is right or in the best interests of their communities.

But that is not all. Tourism is far more likely to go into severe decline when those managers responsible for operational success, employee training, marketing, procurement, and financial accountability fail to do their jobs properly and thoughtfully. Such neglect does not signal `the end of tourism` but it does annul a community`s dreams from becoming a noteworthy destination.

No organization or community can afford to be oblivious to a broad canvas of what matters…the need for retrospection, rejuvenation, regeneration, renewal, refinement, reform, replacement, as well as desires to be perceived as unprejudiced, equitable and fair.

Nor can unwanted (unproductive and unprofitable) products, services or experience be allowed to linger, they must be jettisoned if visitor-serving enterprises hope to thrive. Even though they can be dysfunctional, their presence or existence will not result in the `end of tourism`. That is more likely to occur when communities signal that they do not care, are perceived negatively, fail to resolve their problems, strive to be off the tourism grid or seek isolation.

In an inter-dependent industry and a global world in which societies are dependent on others, all communities-as-destinations can thrive without excess proliferation. Governments and communities, however, will need to adopt a sustainable abundance mindset – equated to investing equitably in opportunities for sustainable development throughout regions in order to make ends meet, curtail congestion, overcrowding and pollution, and struggle to rebound after catastrophes such as Martha`s revenge on the Caribbean nations.

But that will never be sufficient. Communities need guidance to ensure transformation or metamorphous leads to specified outputs and outcomes designed to avoid the destruction of value while at the same time creating value that is perceived to be meaningful and valuable for all stakeholders.

As a guide to developing a playbook for ongoing transformations, there will be a necessity to:

· Build a coalition that strives for civic opportunism made possible through connection and participation.

· Invent your desired future today to change tomorrow, and be intent on doing so.

· Activate people`s imaginations and creativity,

· Overcome self-limiting beliefs…believe in your community-as-destination`s ability to master the art and science of longevity. (Watch the interview and assess its relevance.)

· Integrate a fragmented industry with and within your community.

· Establish a purpose and set of principles for the equitable pursuit of tourism.

· Be more attentive to balancing and protecting people’s ‘freedom to’ and ‘freedom from’, and not just in relation to travel.

· Ensure tourism serves the needs of your community, its companies and citizens…their `wellth`, quality-of-life and realization of community shared value from tourism.

· Pay particular attention to community-led placemaking that stands out, impresses and enhances your brand by avoiding blandness

· Become operationally astute, listen and learn as to what various types of visitor-serving enterprises require if they are to survive and thrive.

· Serve with grace the specialized needs of those visitor markets that communities desire.

· Build your capabilities to manage capacities and visitor flows through appropriate access routes, parking, transportation and transit services, reservation and revenue management systems.

· Be attentive to tourism`s expressive exuberance while concerned about limits of acceptable change, as exemplified in Barcelona.

· Push those (green) agendas and investments that favor sustainable growth and continue to serve various private and public interests within your community.

· Prepare and ready communities and workforces for the transitions to transformation.

· Untangle tourism from strict financial development and economic growth requirements while embracing community development and the appreciation of all forms of capital.

· Differentiate between tourism-led or non-tourism-led growth.

· Utilize research and data that does not mislead i.e. lead to unsubstantiated causal interpretations (Simpson’s paradox).

· Understand the relationship between tourism expansion, corporate earnings and a destination`s overall prosperity…how tourism adds to but does not eliminate community shared value.

· Recognize the need to identify and measure all essential outputs and outcomes…what gets measured gets managed (though not all things lend themselves to measurement).

· Proceed to, but utilize care in, using tourism to unlock untapped potential that is simultaneously economic, social, and cultural in nature.

· Encourage and energize entrepreneurship and lean start-ups; recognize them as an attitude of solving problems, pursuing opportunities, creating leverage, being innovative and meritorious on behalf of the community.

· Remain resilient and prompt, yet circumspect, in resolving setbacks and crises.

· Create forms of tourism that foster learning and a deeper appreciation for nature, cultures, the planet and everybody and every being that inhabits it.

· Take care of mother nature and pursue a radical form of hospitality.

· Learn to innovate and invest under conditions of uncertainty.

· Align your marketing and branding efforts and activities with your priorities and goals for sustainability, prosperity, and community shared value.

There can be no denying, tourism is one of our (beloved) activities that has led to what I have termed `the potency of proliferation`. A phenomenon, spurred by our collective effervescence, that will not lead to the `end of tourism` but to gradual and evolutionary ‘new beginnings’… communities-as-destinations acknowledging the need for more expansive abundance mindsets that add considerably to healthy and value-laden productivity quotients while expanding opportunities and choices that don`t overwhelm capacities but do cultivate thriving community and workplace cultures.

As a journey where progress is determined through integrity, purpose and principles, we can all be involved so long as we recognize our collective role as (chief) learning officers…an expansive role for leaders and leadership that gives extraordinary meaning to social, economic, cultural and intellectual `growth`, saves communities-as-destinations from oblivion, and strengthens their abilities to foster prosperous futures.

Time now to bring your community`s “sweet dreams” to life. Your love for your community is going to lift it up.