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The Welcome in 2010: Service or Self-Service? Making way for additional human added value, or the advent of standardisation?

Francis SCHERLY - Associate Professor, HEC Lausanne - Founder of Interconsulting, Montreux, Switzerland

 

Introduction

Can tourism be made both more human and more competitive through innovation?

Before tackling this issue for a last time and dealing with the welcome in this sixth debate—and more particularly dealing with the choices that should be made in the coming years between man and machine (without necessarily confining ourselves to pure confrontation, but instead seeking the necessary complementarity)—it is of some use to recall two of the principal challenges that characterise our markets at the beginning of this century, to wit:

—on the one hand, the urgent need for the European tourism economy to recover part of the market share lost in the last decade...  According to the UNWTO, and by way of example, even if Europe remains by far the most visited continent on the planet, it had the weakest growth figures out of all regions last year; destinations at their best have been especially affected by the increased competition of destinations outside the euro zone—not only in Europe, but also in North Africa and the Middle East.

—on the other hand, the necessity of better promoting lesser-known destinations in order to make up, as far as possible, the imbalance that intensifies day by day between the site attractions of “leading” destinations, and the “stragglers”, which are often victims of marketing on the implacable altar of brands...

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Evoking the welcome by comparing service and self-service in 2010 first of all entails a momentary immersion in a European tourist environment that we know is marked by a few major trends, summarised here in four fundamental points:

-first, a population trend expressed by an impressive assertion of senior citizens with all the new opportunities and constraints that this creates;

-second, the spectacular awareness of the notion of wellness and health, raised again yesterday with Manfred Kohl's appropriate Austrian humour (...and long live Welltain...!), an awareness sublimated by the media, and that causes a prodigious growth of new products and services;

-third, an indisputable rise in the level of general knowledge with the advent of the civilisation of the mind and the resources of the great Web...

-finally fourth, a significant increase in leisure time and travel experience, causing a remarkable new mobility and a fresh perception of the potential rights and duties of the buyer of tourism services. In this way, helped by the Internet, the consumer more than ever vacations winding around and according to his mood through the twists and turns of a fragmented consumption...

That being the case, we ask the larger question: what does this consumer want: man or machine? More human warmth or more rational pragmatism?

The smart card or encountering the intelligence of the heart?

The sensing device when faced with a robot or the broad-spectrum smile of human added value?

Can the machine create the wealth of shared moments dear to the representative of Club Med heard this Wednesday?

While it will soon be necessary to express oneself in terabytes for anything related to the capacity of future hard drives, it is to be anticipated that the dialogue will soon become natural with these fantastic new tools that can even detect our moods...and in the meantime the first odour diffusers and other electronic noses are currently coming out of laboratories... Whew!

While it is necessary to agree that the tourism market still exists mainly in scenarios where the mutual physical presences of the seller and buyer are the norm, the revolution is on the move with the advent of a technology that has become very specialised, sophisticated and with more artificial intelligence than ever. Tourist products will now be available more and more frequently by an intermediary automatic system and not only “online”.

As everyone knows, virtual travel is already a fact, and the example of webcams—whose vocation in the near future is to bring into widespread use communication with the five senses—is in this respect especially significant.

If one goes by the remarkable essay entitled “ProspecTIC 2010*” published in September '05 by the Institut de Recherche et de Prospective Postale (IREPP) in Paris, “the combination of mobile networks and new geolocalisation techniques already acts quite considerably on individuals' abilities to obtain information, from the tourist guide over mobile phones to the information projected on eyeglasses or on a driver's windshield”... and the applications promise to be numerous. In every case, they leave us perplexed, and I cannot prevent myself from sharing with you a short excerpt from the conclusions of this research, which is so appropriate for our issue of the day:

Quote:

“In the longer term, the ‘metaconvergence’ of nanotechnologies (ed.: or all of the techniques enabling the manufacture, observation, and measurement of objects, structures, and systems),biotechnologies, information technologies, and other cognitive sciences (ed.: those that, as you know, are directed at the study and the understanding of mechanisms of thought)...this metaconvergence contains within it a potential for transformation without precedent... But at the same time, it brings out “metarisks” (metaphysical questions) that, if they are not clarified and discussed starting today, could generate violent backlashes”. (End quote)

More briefly and more clearly, it is indisputable that at the moment in which we find ourselves assembled here in Chamonix, many researchers from across the world are bringing the digital and the biological worlds together little by little, and are learning to control subcutaneous chips or to run a computer by thought, causing both hopes and fears at the same time. Hopes, certainly, but also muted fears, expressed in terms of the cost of freedom, protection of data, or even in terms of free will, according to the conception dear to St. Thomas Aquinas.   

In such a scenario where communication tools become so powerful, one has the right to once again ask the fundamental question: who, the human being or the machine? What share to give to one and to the other? Up to what point can they cohabitate?

Some among you will have no doubt noticed that this is—nearly—the same question that was asked 250 years ago, at the beginning of the industrial revolution, at a time when muscle, animal, wind, and hydraulic energies were being gradually replaced by steam... And even if we have since then (theoretically) attained the civilisation of the mind that was evoked a little earlier, any attempt to understand this will only find its raison d’être if the tourism actor succeeds in joining it with his direct concerns.

So, to attain success, is standardisation going to resolutely migrate in a generalised way from the back office to the front office? Is the scenario of the human being's gradual withdrawal from the offer in the field unavoidable or at the very least bearable?

Or, on the contrary, will the rise in power of our two-tier economic world contribute towards reinforcing both, to the detriment of average-quality services/products doomed to failure? Where will one preferably find human beings as the interface between the seller and the buyer of tourism: before, during and after? ...or only during?

But priority must now be given to the concrete realities of the field, and the organisers of this meeting have quite opportunely invited figures from fundamentally different backgrounds. 

Consequently, in the course of this final debate, we will hear in succession Mr. Miguel Rocha da Silva, founder of Amazon Nut Safaris in Manaus, a small business with an ecotourist bent in the heart of the Brazilian Amazon; then Mr. Hathaijanok Kritikara, executive chairman of the important Thai Hotel Association, whose investments at the service level are well known; and finally Mr. Ralph Krebs, deputy director of the REKA Swiss Travel Fund, the Swiss social tourism organisation par excellence, with its successful family housing estates spread out across Swiss territory and in several neighbouring countries.

All three will present their organisations to us and conclude their speech by telling us how they perceive the welcome.    

(I) Amazon Nut Safaris (BRAZIL). Small, local ecotourist organisation in the Brazilian Amazon

Miguel Rocha da Silva, a citizen of Manaus, Brazil, born in the Amazonian jungle to an Indian mother and a Portuguese father, prodigal son and prodigy, the only member of a large family having had the opportunity to pursue a quite privileged course of education, and that—outside of traditional university—led him away to attend management courses not only in Rio de Janeiro, but also in Miami, Florida, in Caracas, Venezuela, and in Göteborg, Sweden, before developing his hospitality organisation on the Rio Negro.

Miguel Rocha da Silva is the founder and president of an admirable Foundation, Almerinda Malaquias, that sets out to train young Amazonians in the wood trades, and was founded in 1994 and financed by the Swiss from the Association Ailleurs Aussi. Currently, seventy families in the heart of Amazonia live off the activities and products generated by this organisation, which received UNESCO's green seal ten years after it was created.

It should be noted that Mr. Rocha da Silva had the honour—and vice versa (!)—of personally welcoming on his boat for extended Amazonian explorations such great figures as Captain Cousteau, and the yachtsman Peter Blake, not to mention another famous Peter, Peter Benchley, the author of the famous best-seller “Jaws”... Finally, those of you who pick up BBC shows are seeing for the first time live in Chamonix the one who—in the field—made it possible to publish the Amazon Abyss series, which has just come to an end in September this year.

If the answer to the question he is asked seems obvious, he will undoubtedly tell us why in person:

Dear Miguel, with regard to your tourist customers in 2010: will they still be relatively wealthy and demanding visitors in search of authenticity, or could they become only mass tourism’s temporary and economically nourishing migrants ?                      

(See Mr. Rocha da Silva's presentation)

***

(II) Thai Hotel Association (Bangkok)

Large, international tourism organisation

Hathaijanok Kritakara (Mr. Nok to simplify) is currently chairman of the executive committee for the Thai Hotel Association, as well as chairman of the executive committee for the Thailand Chapter of the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA). He is of the opinion that PATA should have a more prominent profile in government circles and is therefore working on creating a platform for PATA to be recognised by the travel industry and the government; recently, he has asked for PATA HQ’s support in this endeavour.

Naturally, Mr. Nok has been greatly involved with the after-effects of the tsunami generated by the earthquake one year ago in the Indian Ocean (Dec. 26, 2004), one of the deadliest disasters in modern history.

Professionnally, Mr. Kritakara is also advisor to the chairman of the Tourist Committee in Thailand. He has twenty-five years of experience in the travel industry, mainly in sales and marketing for different hotel groups, such as Mandarin Oriental, Hilton, Holiday Inn, Swissôtel, and Choice International; next year, he will celebrate his very important 50th anniversary.

Last, but not least, and as far as I know, Hathaijanok Kritakara is a descendant of the Royal Family of Thailand, a member of the current generation from King Rama the Fourth (King Mongkul).

Question: In view of the new offers by emerging countries and the competition from new destinations, do you think–yes or no–that “quality of service” is really at the heart of success? And will it still be the case in the year 2010?

(see Mr. Kritakara's presentation)

(III) The case of a medium-sized tourism organisation working primarily at the national level in central Europe (REKA)

We now turn towards a significant social tourism organisation, the Swiss Travel Fund (REKA) and its deputy director, Mr. Ralph Krebs. Mr. Krebs will tell us his highly anticipated point of view. Ralph Krebs has a degree in economics from the University of Bern. After having held a position as assistant to Professor Jost Krippendorf at the Research Institute for Leisure and Tourism for several years, in 1984 he joined the Swiss Travel Fund (REKA), in which he ascended through (nearly) all the ranks, going from building management to the position of finance director. We also share memories of the founder of the REKA Swiss Travel Fund, Professor Walter Hunziker, of the distinctive and effective Bern sense of humour...a sense of humour that, I suspect, has been passed down to today's speaker, also from Bern... So the floor is given to the Swiss Travel Fund's official representative, who is going to speak to us about his organisation, and in particular respond to the question:

“Revitalising the parahotel industry: how does Switzerland want to resolve this matter? The example of the Swiss parahotel initiative”

***

For a conclusion 

And here is Chamonix almost at the heart of metaphysical anxiety... First of all, a sincere thank you to our participants coming from so far away to bring us their testimony. A thank you as well to the audience for the highly relevant questions raised this morning, evidence of a laudable and justified interest in the issue analysed.

So then, the welcome in 2010? More service or self-service?

You will have no doubt agreed, ladies and gentlemen, that it was a privilege this morning to hear the representatives of three fundamentally different models express themselves in succession on this subject: on one side, a small ecotourism organisation from South America; on another side, a medium-sized social tourism organisation working primarily at the national level in central Europe (REKA); and finally a large organisation from the Asian continent. All invariably converge towards a strengthened welcome, and opt for elevating services in general in the medium term: hence, an offer always centred on highly personalised services for Amazon Nut Safaris in Brazil; new measures intending to reinforce the welcome by means of setting up “clusters” in the REKA sites in Switzerland and in neighbouring countries; and finally, in Bangkok, the PATA and Thailand hotel corporations more specifically declare they also want to reinforce the welcome and innovation in services, and do so at all levels.        

Allow me to now offer some final avenues for reflection: 

First of all, the unquestionable modification of lifestyles generated by the advent of information technologies today represents many strategic signals. This mainly entails:

-the obligation of creating new products and services in order to now respond more appropriately to a particularly elastic modern demand seeking to satisfy the five senses;

-this entails the new and reinforced establishment of the public-private sector partnerships of a mixed economy;

-consequently this entails more participation by local communities in the development of tourism resources with, at the end of the day, a legitimate, gradual return on investments made;

-finally—and especially for tourism activity—this entails the gradual disappearance of amateurism in favour of a general rise in quality; and it is precisely at this level that the notion of welcome takes on its full importance!   

(Who was saying thirty years ago that communities with a confirmed tourist density should institute welcome sensitisation courses in primary schools?)    

Certainly, the challenge of the new millennium has become cooperation: the dynamics of networks, interdependence, etc. In tourism services and especially in the back office, everything leads us to believe that the networks of collaboration will assert themselves decisively in order to gain market share, thanks to new technological tools; this virtual collaboration, synonymous with survival for many businesses and destinations at a time when the offer is increasing exponentially through the activity of emerging countries and regions, is at present taking such a novel shape that one could practically consider it pure innovation.

If at first sight the information and networking resources—combined with the unrestrained mobility observed during the last few years—prompt one to paint a scenario demanding ever more automation in the front office of many tourist services as well, it clearly seems that one then comes up against the wish of a consumer who is not always inclined to help himself and who is fortunately still eager to develop interpersonal relationships. 

In fact, does the same go for the visitor's purchasing power or purchasing desire to consume automation? Does he consider automation as a benefit or a nuisance? As a liberty or as submission? As a pleasure or as a check on the speed of accomplishing something?

In breaking down the six fundamental steps of the tourist transaction (canvass customers, provide their transportation, organise their accommodation, satisfy their five senses, inform and host them once onsite, and follow up with them), it goes without saying that it is in the canvassing, informing, and following up that the effects of new technologies and the transitioning to self-service will continue to be felt for a long time.  

But observing what was said during this morning's presentation, and also with reference to many of the discussions coming from various corporations or investigations performed on the Web in these few last weeks, it emerges in every case that contemplating the future spread of self-service to all types of customers and tourist services is not a defensible scenario.

Recourse to self-service at the front of transactions will undoubtedly always vary according to multiple factors, such as the type of service sought, the location in space, the time available, purchasing power, age, and the level of knowledge, to cite only the most important. The era of the maître d’hôtel robot, the ski instructor or mountain guide robot being as widespread as the food processor is without a doubt not on tomorrow's agenda. Logically, SERVICE and SELF-SERVICE will always attempt to complement each other further.

Consequently, during the past few years and for several years to come, the entire sector of the tourism offer seems to have resolutely entered into a trial-and-error phase, in search of the optimal balance between service and self-service. 

In this month of December 2005, the most likely signs for 2010 and beyond are evolving towards a gradual adaptation of the offer and of the tourist demand to the economic structures of a two-tier world that asserts itself day by day: on one hand, it is likely that more top-of-the-line, increasingly personalised services will be offered for which the human added value and pleasure will always be more sought-after; and on the other hand, basic, original, and recreational services for rational utilitarians, dispensed on a wide scale and at particularly competitive price points. But one thing is certain: there will be no future for businesses incapable of dedicating themselves to strategic reflection and of emerging from the dangerous routine of what some denounce as “tenacious mediocrity”.

With the definitive transition from a sellers' market to a buyers' market, the service quality level and especially the welcome provided to the clientele will undoubtedly constitute a true strategic tool; the integrated “high tech/high touch” approach will remain eminently essential in an increasingly complex tourism world, as it remains founded largely on emotions.

Twenty years ago, futurist John Naisbitt (The Year Ahead, 1985) sensed the important transformations that, at the beginning of this century, were going to distinguish our global economy:

Quote:

“the rise in power of new technologies with its corollary, new sensibility;then the victory of alternation, with the gradual advent of the notion of noneconomic added value.”

I think that John Naisbitt was not wrong: and moreover, it has been observed that “every trend creates a counter-trend”. From then on, at a time when automation is tending to migrate inexorably from the back office to the front office of businesses, we are—as, undoubtedly, are you—among those who think that maintaining the quality offensive in a context of human personalisation remains definitely essential for European tourism. And while technology gets carried away, the new added value now seems composed of elements again more centred on quality of life than on the standard of living, in the literal sense of the term. And moreover, it is here that the famous notion arises of the marginal that sells the principal (or, what seems secondary in fact becomes the most important).

It is of course a small step from there to wager that technological innovation connected with the personalised welcomeis the key to success. One step that we will cheerfully take without restraint, parodying Voltaire a little, who wrote even at death's door, “I have decided to be happy; it's good for the health”.

On top of that, consider this thought from Bernard Werber in The Tree of Possibles:  “The future is difficult, even impossible to foresee. But even so, you lose nothing by trying...” 

Thank you for your attention.