PARADIGM SHIFTS

Recent research by Stevens & Associates has identified important paradigm shifts that are currently evident in the post-COVID environment that will directly, and significantly, impact on how DMOs evolve over the next few years

THE EIGHT PARADIGM SHIFTS AFFECTING TOURISM AND THE ROLE OF DMOS

1. HYBRIDITY & TRANSFORMATION: the appearance of novel, unique solutions, in product development, experience creation and tourist engagement that are blurring definitions and making it increasingly difficult to categorise and accredit these initiatives – and does it matter anymore to the customer if a product receives a 5* or a 2* assessment by a tourist board? Initiatives that boldly go where few have been before to make a positive transformational impact in their destinations

3. OUTLIERS: as part of the era of the hybrid, we are seeing the rapid emergence of projects that would have been regarded as being ‘left-of-field’ or quirky but now these niche outliers are fast becoming mainstream – ‘who would have thought it’ ideas are now becoming the expected.

4. CO-CREATION: multi-faceted, multi-layered, co-created, and collaborative unique experiences capable of commanding high value and capturing guest attention and involving the guest in their design will become a demand driver for destinations.

5. CO-DEPENDENCY: a cornerstone of co-created experiences is the need for destination stakeholders to work together and recognise a co-dependency tourism eco-system rather than a business-centric, ego-system.

6. ELASTICITY: the need for DMOs to be more agile, flexible, and fluid in their operations welcoming new ideas, different ways of working, and nurturing innovation.

7. TALENT:  exploring the idea that an individual’s talent may well be more important to a tourism business or a DMO than a traditional skill or qualification – the fact that your night porter in a hotel is the best fiddle player in the village might be more important than his qualities as a nigh porter?

8. VALUE: the culmination of these shifts is resulting in our need to re-calibrate all aspects of perceived and real value of tourism in our destinations and, ultimately, deliver new metrics of success.