Attraction and Destination Management - Essay Example

Introduction. Visitor destination is a grouping of attractions and attraction activities that provide tourism Experience. This is one of the most difficult products to manage due to its numerous products. These attractions are managed at different levels by different firms hence the need for cooperation of different firms to give the tourist the best experience. There is need to build, maintain and manage the best package of appealing destination. A tourist experience starts with the air services all the way to the taxi, accommodation, restaurant, meals, entertainment and visits to desired attraction spots .With increased competition; each destination with the aid of the marketing department strives to attract and maintain as many visitors as possible. A default in any of the destination greatly affects the proceeding destination. For example, poor transport system to a destination will reduce its visitor in flow since they will always dread the unpleasant journey to the destination. Close relations with different firms, stakeholders and the government should be maintained to give room for consultations on how to improve visitor experience at all levels of the destination chain. Resources have to be combined and pull together for a better integrated and management system. Brand destinations should be effective and promotion of visitor experience must be intensified. Forecast to future issues and strategic challenges are a necessity to destinations. This should be done by reliable tourism forecasters you can rely on. Wide research and intensive readings should be done to discover new trends in customer demands. (Lengyel 2007) Publicly owned destinations require sensitive management skills. Community’s adamancy to change may pose as a great threat to a public destination. The way of life accustomed by a community is not easy to change especially if it is their source of income. Activities like hunting game meat, felling of trees for firewood and charcoal and selling of game products like ivory, or skins greatly reduce the number of wild animals that are a tourist attraction. It’s a managers challenge to create awareness in the community on the importance of these destinations to the country’s economy and encourage them to change their way of life while assisting in the conservation if the destination. “According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) for every €150,000 of revenue generated, 5-6 jobs in tourism can be created, principally in restaurants and hotels.” (Prospects and limits of tourism development n.d). Managerial Challenges. Destination management faces challenges in the area of competition with other firms in the field especially the private destinations which are always catalyst to change. Good performance is a must and can be measured by evaluating customer satisfaction. This is evident by high turnover of visitors and appreciation by visitors. Management should strive to offer the best packages and services thus need for extensive marketing. The firm should appeal to the visitors by providing exclusive offers to the prospective clients. Economical achievement is the major aim of the firm. The manager has a task in ensuring that apart from providing the best rates and services, he is able to gain the maximum profits. Contrary to other destinations religious sites are managed not only for the profit and the visitor capacity but managed for their legacy and information attachment (Shackley, 2001). This is quite hard to achieve considering that nothing classic is cheap. This is quite challenging to a manager. It is the role of the manager to ensure the sustainability of the firm in the market. Long term strategies to survive in the market should be put in place. Diversification may be an option e.g. offer transport services, hotel and accommodation. This is efficient especially if offering five star services to ensure the visitors only get the best. Management at different levels in the firm should be coordinated to ensure you offer the same level of first class services to visitors. This is possible by hiring qualified and highly trained staff according to the firm’s level. Motivation to staff and nice packages ensure nice performance. This ensures achievement of targeted goals by stakeholders like community, donors and management. Environmental pollution is a challenge that the manager tries hard to avoid. A hotel destination will opt for cleaner production technology to reduce solid waste. Marine destination has a challenge in maintaining the environment. Motorboats used in water tour have been accused of spilling oil thus endangering the marine life. Airplanes and vehicles ferrying the tourists do release a lot of smoke that leads to air pollution. Animal right activists discourage activities like whale and dolphin watching, and bull fighting as not good to the animals. Caging of animals is said to be disturbing the feeding cycle of animals thus endangering them. Swimming on the beach is said to be eroding the natural habitat of the sea life. This form of disturbance to the natural ecosystem can lead to global warming causing climatic change to the ecosystem (Neto, 2002). Publicly owned destinations like beaches, are a bit tricky and need special responsibilities to manage them. Maintenance of these destinations need financial support in which most communities are not at ease when charged. Meetings can be convoked with the community and inform them on the importance of conserving the environment. Degradation of natural environment is a threat to destinations erosion of land exposes the habitats of underground animals causing migration or extinction. Wild fires lead to maximum destruction of animal habitats. Some animals may be killed during such tragedies. This makes the destination unattractive and cost quite a fortune to refurbish and bring it back to its glory. In the year 1997-1998, raging fires made Indonesia emit 700 million metric tones of Carbon dioxide into the atmosphere making Indonesia one of the largest polluters of greenhouse gases. (Reiley 1999). Erosion of river banks does increase silt leading to death of animal food thus endangering the life marine animals. Acidic rain endangers the plant attraction causing death and extinction. Manager should ensure that visitors are provided with innovative appealing experiences to attract mass visitations. Tourists have choice behaviors that need to be keenly studied by tourist destination managers so as to satisfy their needs (D’Silva 2008). Effective promotion to create awareness is a step towards achieving objectives of economic development by the managers which is and the most important objective of the destination and suitability of the social and environmental surrounding. A destination cannot exist without the surrounding community thus must be involved in the policy formation planning and development. Some communities may become hostile to the firm if not involved in the management. Planning and managing of tourist experience is major concern to the manager. (Ulaanbaatar 2007). This is a very receptive subject that need be addressed in order to maintain and attract visitors. Managers must have insight cofactors influencing tourist experience as a visitor. Planning includes booking of resorts or other destinations, transport facilities, meals, accommodation and weather study. This avoids last minute rushing which can lead to visitor getting stranded or not getting services of desired class. Always evaluate difficulties in tourist experience like poor weather and finding solution to counter disappointments. For example if tourist was to go mount climbing and it got foggy and unsafe, he can visit a hot spring instead. Good prior planning can avoid disappointments to tourists (Lengyel 2007). The ever changing climatic conditions are a threat to the tourism industry. Global warming has led to the increase in temperatures especially the equatorial regions. (Neto 2002). This is a health threat to visitors due to the sunburns and heat waves that can cause fatal death. Changing rain pattern has led to unexpected droughts that lead to massive migrations of animals and birds from the parks in search for food. A lot of resources are used on purchase of fuel and equipment to pump water to the animal spots to reduce death tolls. Heat causes scarcity of animal food and it is quite expensive for the manager to supplement animals with food. An unpredicted calamity like sudden floods leads to massive deaths reducing animal count. Crisis management is fundamental and visitors should be provided with maximum security. In event of political instability or political clashes, visitors tend to reduce drastically. Through the management office, the marketing and advertisement department will have to use a lot of resources to convince visitors to visit the destination and assure them maximum security. Natural calamities which are difficult to manage should have preventive measures put in place. Calamities like flooding can be prevented by construction of water runways. Fire extinguishers should be made available and enough water be provided to reduce fire damages. Human resource should be educated on the use of such facilities. Climate calamities can be managed by constant communication with relevant departments to minimize disasters caused by events such as earthquakes, tornados, volcanic eruptions and others by evacuations. (Mansfeld n.d). Manager should ensure that the health of the tourist is maintained all the time. There is need to have a doctor around in case a visitor suddenly falls ill. Management should have records of visitors medical history to enable easy handling of visitor in case of illness e.g. when there is an asthmatic visitor, the firm when suggesting places to visit will avoid the cold regions and its always easy to know what type of first aid to give. In case of a disease outbreak like bird flu, vaccinate visitors without creating much panic and avoid feeding them on bird meat to reduce chances of infections. The health sector has a potential to capture into tourism destination attraction. In the year 2007, more than half a million Americans did tour international medical treatment centers for medications (Ochre media 2008). Governments play a great role in marketing and promotion of tourism in their respective countries. This is evident when the government advertises the country and offers reduced taxes on the tourism industry. Government takes the initiative to promote culture, education to citizens on the importance of nature conservation and upgrading of transport and communication system. Political stability and security are vital in attracting visitors. When the government does not support tourism, it becomes difficult for management to achieve its aim successfully. According to the Unique Botswana more land has been dedicated to the reserve in the years 1970 and 1991. In 1971 a tribal land was reserved to the establishment of today’s Khutse Game Reserve. Destination management has the challenge to help community make decisions on tourism development by helping balance between costs and developments from benefits of the destination. Tourism benefits the society in areas like: providing employment, sense of belonging, maintaining economic stability, sense of pride among others. Negative impacts include; pollution, stress on facilities, increased crime, displacement of local residents and culture co modification. It is a challenge to ensure that the destination benefits the community, if otherwise is important to reconsider the necessity of the destination in the locality and work hard towards its improvement. Though tourism has great economic potential it carries with it a lot of negative moral and environmental impacts. Moral decay has greatly increased in areas with tourist destination .This is due to the fact that most tourist have a lot of money to spent on prostitutes. (Lengyel 2007) Proactive Management Strategies. Proactive strategies must be implemented to ensure successful management. First, effective research has to be launched to provide knowledge and understanding in new trends of tourism behavior. Frequent consultations with stakeholders can help a lot as most of them especially the community interacts a lot with the visitors and get their opinions (Ulaanbaatar 2007). Watching news and television shows, reading journals and news papers can provide quite a lot of information on tourist behavior. If your firm has specific clients who visit regularly, avoid monotony and go for challenging offers to maintain them. Secondly understand what the community wants as they may have crucial information on customer needs. The community also can be customers and its good to attract them and offer affordable rates to them this can enhance positive relations. The regional communities can be targeted for the off-peak season. This entails new strategy to accommodate packages that the locals can afford so as to feel part and parcel of the public utility. The services provided to the locals should always meet the company’s mission and objectives. Good understanding of the competition is vital and as a manager it’s good to know what you offer and improve on it (Geoffrey 1995). Find out what you do not offer and understand how your competitors do it best. Always enhance on performance and improve on productivity. Many tourists love new experiences, therefore the new source of fun should be out of the box. It will be best if the new and not just copied from the competitors. Thirdly, find out the impact of the tourism activity especially to the local community but then its contribution to the country. Hold consultations with their community to find out their preferences e.g. in a conservative society it will be offensive to host shows like nude dancing. The manager has to cooperate with the stakeholders since they are the employers to avoid conflicts. Cooperation at the destination level either by the private sector or public is efficient in enhancing productivity. A manager should be willing to listen to his juniors and take in their views. This makes them feel appreciated and in the system thus enhancing performance. The services provided at the destination must be above par so as to keep the tourists. As a basic principal a happy tour guide makes a happy tourist stay. The payment package has to be reviewed annually, plus incentives to the high performing employees. The structure of the human resource office has to maintain high level of professionalism in order to maintain a high degree of efficiency in management. Collectively, as a manager all the departments of a destination should be well oiled with smart professionals who can implement the directed proactive strategies (Geoffrey 1995). Poor politics of the locality of the destination can tarnish the hard earned name of the tourist destination. There is need for good relations to be maintained with local authorities and government for the overall performance to be achieved fully. Many governments have gained from tourism. It is estimated that, in 2002, the Government of Ireland earned EUR 2.2 billion through tourism (National tourism policy review of Ireland 2004). Sometimes a shanty may be erected at the outskirts of the destination thereby leading to poor waste management systems. The waste from such public utilities may find its way into the beaches and the sporting rivers. The water will smell foul and some biodiversity will be affected. The challenge can be cumbersome to overcome if the local authorities have no expertise on how to deal with the waste. Waste water could flow into the destination centre causing havoc. Some business competitors may use such to derail the good course of your management and the need to be in good term with the environmentalists. Therefore it is good to have an environmentalist as part of your decision panel if such a challenge pops up. The community has to benefit from the destination for them to take active role in the conservation of the attraction biodiversity. This could be tabulated into dividends and buying of shares by the locals. The community could be encouraged to form a cooperative to sell their products directly to the tourist center and also to the tourists. The manager can now sell space to the cooperative’s activities such as conference facilities. Through the cooperation the manager gains platform raise awareness on such challenges as waste management by the locals. The community will then be able to see the need to manage their environment for the benefit of all. The management can facilitate language tutors for the locals to learn and break language barrier. Beach boys, tour guides and art and craft business people need to have knowledge of soft skills to enhance easy co-existence among all the people interacting. (National tourism policy review of Ireland 2004). Formulation of entertainment activities that can attract a few heroes and heroines can attract a big crowd of funs to the destination. Use some special events such as Valentine to invite a special musician or comedian who can in return sell your Hotel and restaurant as an activity centre. The marketing and advertisement departments have to work in junction with other department to deliver the expected services. Most international managed visitor destinations do hold special events that come to be regarded as part of that destination. “Hosting competence is an important part of the standard.” (Inger 2008).The destination’s ability to woo in international or regional business friendly events is the true reflection of the managerial skills of a destination spot. The basis is that the business has to have live ties with the government and non-governmental organizations that sponsors such hot events. To Land on such deals entails lots of grasp of the social-political structures and realistic quotations. The competitors ability should be taken into the account, have an inside man in your competitors’ palaces in order to be well updated of the great business opportunities out there. Audit on all the expenditure expected to attract the event home and the returns must speak volumes to say the least. Application of relevant local politics at the same time keeping the societal well fed can be earn a manager great deals. The managerial skill need to be coupled up with customer care skills to achieve maximum reaps from lucrative business events that require conferencing services. Efficiency and effectiveness of the subordinating staff has to be instilled at all levels. Follow up the visitors with a greeting card and a few other gifts. Manager should show accountability of public resources. To encourage workers’ cohesion, hold frequent informal and formal meetings. Sometimes hold a party for the workers to appreciate their good work. Invite some guests and stakeholders as well to appraise the organization’s work force. Issues that surround the workers’ leaves should be addressed for the benefit of the whole human resource fraternity. Each employee should be entitled to a leave at least once a year. Hold an annually party to welcome all the friends, workers and their selected relatives and stakeholders. The workers rights have to be articulated well by the management office. The office should be open to all to ensure equality quality of services rendered (Ulaanbaatar 2007). In conclusion, tourism industry is sensitive and must be handled delicately. Management should ensure that good relation exists among all departments in the sector. Stakeholders especially the community that owns the destination is actively involved in the management and administration of the destination. References: 1. LENGYEL, M 2007. Destination management and conceptual framework and the case of Hungary. International conference on destination management Budapest, 7-9 February 2007. viewed 23 April 2009, 2. Prospects and limits of tourism development. Accessed 23 April, 2009 3. Geoffrey, I 1995, Destination competitiveness and the role of the tourism enterprise, accessed 23 April, 2009 4. Inger, S 2008, Norway’s Experience with Standard for Accessible Destinations, accessed 23 April, 2009 5. Berman, D 2006, Adventure Sports Center in Garrett County tourist destination, Daily Record, the Baltimore, Nov 2, 2006, accessed 19 April 2009 < http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4183/is_20061102/ai_n16831232/> 6. D’Silva, B 2008, Perception of tourists towards India as a Preferred Tourist Destination-An Empirical Reseach, accessed 19 April 2009. < http://dspace.iimk.ac.in/bitstream/2259/552/1/159- 164+Dr+Bernadette+D'Silva.pdf. >. 7. Shackley, M 2001, managing sacred sites: service provision and visitor experience, London, Continuum. 7. Neto, F 2002, Sustainable Tourism, Environmental Protection and Natural resource Management: Paradise on Earth, accessed 19 April 2009, 8. Cicek, N n.d, Dubai- A Memorable Tourist Destination An Evaluation of the Paradigm Shift, Knowledge Management in the Hospitality Industry, p.4, accessed 18 April 2009, 9. Mansfeld, Y, Pizzam, A n.d, Tourism and Crisis- Management Issues, accessed 20 April 2009, < http://www.download- it.org/free_files/filePages%20from%20IV%20Tourism%20and%20Crisis- Management%20Issues,%20Summary%20and%20Conclusions.pdf.> 10. Ochre media 2008, Health Tourism The Growth Phenomenon, accessed 18 April 2009, 11. Unique Botswana n.d, accessed 18 April 2009, < http://www.discover-botswana.com/articles/unique_botswana.php>. 12. Jeffrey, R, 2005, Edinburgh's Tourism industry looks into the future, accessed 22 April 2009, < www.scottish-enterprise.com/sedotcom_home/news-se/news- fullarticle.htm> 13. Reiley, D 1999, A review of fire projects in Indonesia, CIFOR Bogox, p.105 14. Ulaanbaatar 2007, Strategic Planning Development for the Mongolian National Tourism Organization, accessed 23 April 2009, < http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PNADN877.pdf. > 15. National tourism policy review of Ireland 2004, accessed 23 April 2009, < http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/40/39/33648366.pdf> Read More