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Tourism Research in an Age of Uncertainty
Anna Pollock
TTRA Canadian Chapter
Victoria, October 16th, 2008
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A Personal Approach
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A Fascination with Change
• Cursed by curiosity
• “ahead of her time”
• Fascinated by connections and patterns
• “where’s Copernicus when you need him?”
• Deep appreciation that we only see what we want to see. What lenses do we have on?
• What’s really happening?
• The clarity of a blank page.
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Change Isn’t New‘Italy relies on external resources and the
life of the Roman people is tossed daily on the uncertainties of sea and storm’
TACITUS
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but you can dress for rain………
“There are many methods for predicting the future. For example, you can read horoscopes, tea leaves, tarot cards, or crystal balls. Collectively, these methods are known as “nutty methods”.
Or you can put well-researched facts into sophisticated computer models, more commonly referred to as “a complete waste of time”.
Predicting the Future Always Problematic..
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The Challenges of Forecasting
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The Challenges of Forecasting“The CIA failed to warn the White House of: •the first Soviet atom bomb (1949), •the Chinese invasion of South Korea (1950), •anti-Soviet risings in East Germany (1953) and Hungary (1956), •the dispatch of Soviet missiles to Cuba (1962), •the Arab-Israeli war of 1967; and •Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait in 1990.
The CIA overplayed Soviet military capacities in the 1950s, then underplayed them before overplaying them again in the 1970s.”
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The Changes in My Life
Research the Past
Market Potential
Scout
Strategy
Change Agent
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RESILIENCE
COURAGE
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Adjusting to a new reality
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Adjusting to a new reality
Rabbits & Energy
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This troubled me
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We’re at the fork in the road
Tourism Doesn’t Operate in Isolation!
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This is Us!
How do we cross the chasm?
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Purpose
• A new set of lenses
• A new set of questions
• A new set of assumptions
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This Image represents RISK
• Risks associated with riding this path upwards
• Risks associated with not achieving this trajectory
• Risks associated with not having a Plan B
• Risks associated with not knowing what it really means
• Risks of being out of control
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The Key Driver
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INTELLECTUAL CAPITAL
NATURAL CAPITAL
SOCIAL CAPITAL
$ CAPITAL
energy
resources
sinksbiodiversity
population
aging
Income disparity
Changing values
Labour shortages Skill shortages
Migration Technology
Innovation
Complexity
Debt
Credit
Economy
Government funding
Change Drivers
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INTELLECTUAL CAPITAL
NATURAL CAPITAL
SOCIAL CAPITAL
$ CAPITAL
energy
resources
sinksbiodiversity
population
aging
Income disparity
Changing values
Labour shortages Skill shortages
Migration Technology
Innovation
Complexity
Debt
Credit
Economy
Government funding
security
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Population & Wealth• 3 billion more people than when I graduated
• Afghanistan will grow from 29-97 million by 2050
• 1950’s Europe’s neighbours numbered half that of Europe, by 2025, they will outnumber Europeans by a factor of four
• 4 billion people in poor countries; half living in slums but with access to mobile phones and TV
• Impact on free movement of people – essential for tourism;
• Will place enormous demand on emerging economies;
• Most vulnerable to changing climate
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Population & Wealth
• Boomers the perfect market
• Desire to travel
• Time and money …until last week
• Pension value and purchasing power dropped 30-50%
• Will this solve the labour shortage problem?
• If still working, will they stay closer to home?
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Energy
“World oil resources are judged to be sufficient to meet the projected growth in demand to 2030 on the assumption that the necessary investment is forthcoming…Although new oil-production capacity additions from Greenfield projects are expected to increase over the next five years, it is very uncertain whether they will be sufficient to compensate for the decline in output at existing fields and keep pace with the projected increase in demand. A supply side crunch in the period to 2015, involving an abrupt escalation in oil prices, cannot be ruled out.“
World Energy Outlook, 2007
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Climate Change and Tourism
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Climate Change and Tourism
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Climate Change
2020 BAU CO2 =2586 million
1990 CO2 = 673 million
2020 Target CO2 = 471 million
2.115 billion tons
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Ecosystem Vulnerability
• Every year we destroy 44 million acres of forest…
• Lose 100 million acres of farmland….
• Lose 24 billion tons of top soil
• Use 160 billion tons more water than is produced by rain
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Canada’s USP
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Capital and Credit
• Where will the capital come from?
• Aging population and social security; health care
• Capital to reduce dependence on fossil fuels
• Ecosystem restoration
• Crisis Response
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Something’s Wrong
• “Climate change is the greatest and widest-ranging market failure ever seen” Sir Nicolas Stern
• “The food crisis of 2008 has revealed market failures at every link in the food chain.”Economist, April 2008
• This is the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. You've seen the sudden deterioration of perceived credit quality of financial institutions around the world; you've seen the sudden failure of major institutions. John Lipsky, Head of the IMF
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Existential Risk • Looking in the wrong direction
• Wearing the wrong set of lenses
• Using a faulty operating manual or inaccurate map
• System Change
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We’ve planned as if we were an Industry
From Machines to SystemsMachines can be taken apart, and reassembled
Machines are complicated but staticSystems grow in complexity over time
Systems can adaptTheir character emerges
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When we’re really a network
AWARENESS AND IMAGINATION ARE EVERYTHING
WHAT YOU SEE IS WHAT YOU GET or WHATYOU GET IS WHAT YOU SEE
WHAT LENSES ARE YOU WEARING?
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Here’s a network you are familiar with
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We’ve planned as if we were an Industry
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We’ve planned as if we were an industry when We’re Really a Swarm
• Loosely coupled network
• An ecosystem
• Comprising a host of independent, self organizing agents
• A swarm
• How are swarms lead?
• How do you herd cats?
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When We’re Really a Swarm
• “It turns out that .. a collection of small, simple agents with limited intelligence, local decision-making capability, and a communication path to nearby peers can outperform a large centralized processor.
• Moreover, a decentralized system has several important advantages over a centralized one, most notably robustness and flexibility.”
Frank Lacombe of the Evolutionary and Swarm Design Group at the University of Calgary
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Air Traffic Patterns
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It’s Not Size but Connections That Matter!
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A Question For You?
What do Air Canada, Google, CISCO, YVR Airport Authority, TELUS, Translink and this
Hotel have in common?• We’re part of a business ecosystem
• We are linked by the communications and transaction flows of our customers
• We act as independent agents but somehow the sum of our activities shows order
• We’re all in the connections business
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CONNECTIVITY
INFORMATION and COMPLEXITY
1.5 billion Mobile phones
1.2 billion web users
108 million web sites
100 million blogs
6 billion people
9 billion people
More Connectivity = More Complexity
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Some Connectivity is Good
Wealth creation and growth are a story of connections
The more people connect the larger the market
The larger the market, the more people can specialise
The more we specialise, the more we exchange
The more we exchange ideas and capital, the more innovation and develop intelligence
The more intelligence the more resilience -- but only up to a point
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More Complexity = More Uncertainty
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Tightly Coupled Networks are the most vulnerable
Scale Free Networks
• Most points have small numbers of links
• Some have many & become hubs
• Hubs grow in size and complexity
• Become increasingly vulnerable
Example
• Air traffic routes
• Web: or Google or Facebook
• Electrical grid
• Key stone species in ecosystems.
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More Complexity = Less Resilience
• Complexity costs
• Increasing complexity produces “diminishing marginal returns”
• Over time costs increase and returns diminish
• Eg Oil
• Expanding portion of wealth/effort spent on maintaining or adding complexity
• Eg 9/11
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TRENDS
DRIVERS
PARADIGMS
Most damage comes from from what you can’t see coming at you on the surface
Are our leaders asking the right questions? How do researchers help leaders ask the right questions?
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What Accelerates Vulnerability?
• Interconnectedness increases potential shocks
• Interconnectedness extends scope and impact
• Interconnectedness increases speed and reduces detection and response time
• Interconnectedness produces “cocantenation” of change drivers - a.k.a “the Perfect Storm”
• Importance of anticipation; imagining the dynamic connections.
• More modeling the future; less measuring the past.
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REsearch: Issues to Ponder• If change is the only constant, are we looking forward
enough? How much energy are we putting into understanding the underlying dynamics of change?
• Have we understood the unexamined assumptions that underpin our perceptions? What lenses are we using?
• Are we asking the right questions or do we just obey orders?
• Are we spending too much time labelling and not enough conversing and engaging?
• Will seeing ourselves differently enable new solutions; help embrace new partners; use new technologies, channels and listening devices?
• Three specifics
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1. Are We Listening?• If markets are conversations, are we listening to the buzz?
• If destinations are brands, are we monitoring our changing reputation – what’s being said about us?
• Are researchers working with the web department?
• Are exploring new ways of connecting with customers?
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2. Are We Modeling Reality?• Lessons from complexity and networks
• Experimenting, testing alternative realities
• Carrying capacity – again!
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3. Developing Intelligence?• Intelligence of a system is a function of the connections and
the exchange of information.
• More intelligence = more resilience
• Are we building the infrastructures that enable and encourage knowledge sharing ?
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RENEWAL
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RENEWAL• Tourism will have to face natural limits and re-frame its
entire approach
• Yield and value growth will have to replace volume and commodification
• This has implications for • What we sell
• How we sell it
• How we enrich it
• What we charge for the experience
• How we steward the resources on which it is based