Flourishing in an Age of Disruption

TEFI 9: The Disruptive Power of Caring

Anna Pollock, Founder, Conscious Travel

…leading, forward-thinking network that inspires,

informs and supports tourism educators, students and

other communities of interest to passionately and

courageously transform the world for the better…

Tourism Education Futures Initiative

Previous TEFI Presentations

Conscious.Travel

Current Perspective

We stand at the tipping point of a new future.

The choices you and I make will impact the future of life for thousands of years.

Rather than that being a burden, it gives us the opportunity to live the most meaningful lives any

generation of human kind has ever lived.

Based on two Fundamental Beliefs - 1

Tourism can be a force for good in this world

but only if

We shift our focus from getting bigger & bigger to

Generating greater net benefit to all stakeholdersand

that will take a fundamental shift in consciousness

Based on two Fundamental Beliefs - 2

Focus Today

1. The necessity for and inevitability of deep change

2. The need to address Root Causes

3. Seeing patterns and changing stories

4. Getting from here to there

5. My dream

1. Why Change?

4 - 4.5% CAGR

1.2 billion international trips in 2013

What will doubling tourism in 17 years look and feel like?

What kind of leadership will be needed to manage that growth and impact?

International Tourism Arrivals

The Island Where Tourist Garbage is Stored in the MaldivesSource: Daily Mail

The Queue to Climb EverestSource: Guardian

• see: Can Tourism Change its Operating Model?

How will we handle congestion?

How will we handle waste?

How will we handle emissions?

How will we manage our thirst for water and land?

How will avoid residents’ backlash?

Protest Sign Erected by Young BalineseSource: ABC They Paved Paradise

How will we protect vulnerable people and cultures?

Can we really handle another 600 million in just 12 more years?

Assessing tourism’s global impact 1990-2010Stefan Gossling and Paul PetersJournal of Sustainable Tourism, 2015Vol23, No 5, 639-659

Business as Usual IS unsustainable

10 mega forces

All connected

“Population growth,

exploitation of natural

resources, climate change

and other factors are

putting the world on a

development trajectory

that is not sustainable…if

we fail to alter our

patterns of production

and consumption, things

will begin to go badly

Systemic breakdowns are breakdowns that occur in an entire system, as opposed to breakdowns in individual parts and components.

Challenges are systemic, structural & interconnected

Impact of Systemic Risk

Systemic risks are endemic everywhere – in supply chains, pandemics, infrastructure, ecology, and climate change, economics and politics.

Unless we are better able to address these concerns, they will lead to greater protectionism, xenophobia, nationalism, and, inevitably, deglobalization, rising conflict and slower growth.

2. Root Causes

If the Future were an iceberg, what should you pay attention

to?

TRENDS

• HIV/Aids• Ebola Virus• Ozone Layer• Immigration• Flooding• Decline in visitors• Congestion• CSR initiatives• Philanthropy

• China outbound

• Millennials• The Sharing

Economy• Athletic Events

& Challenges• Social Good• Luxury

PROBLEMS

TRENDS

DRIVERS

Change Drivers

• Climate Change• Wealth disparity• Resource scarcity• Global connectivity• Transparency • Democratization of

everything• Changing Values• All sorts of technology

These are all “WICKED problems”

Hypothesis

The global spread of mass tourism based on the

industrial-production model is a wicked problem

TRENDS

DRIVERS

DEEPER

TECTONIC

FORCES

Tectonic Forces

• Affect the entire human species

• Expressed as universal dynamics/patterns

• Involve deep questioning

• How do we respond?

The world we have created is a product of our thinking; it cannot be changed without changing our thinking.

No problem can be solved with the same consciousness that created it.

We must learn to see the world anew.

Need to change our minds, our mindsets

That means …

Behaving

Being

Seeing

Action

Values

Perception

That means …

Behaving

Being

Seeing

Action

Values

PerceptionWaking up

Growing up

Stepping up

The shift has begun

How do YOU spot a tectonic

shift?

Look for simple, universal

patterns

THE DOMINANT

PATTERN

Waking Up to the Real Nature of Change The Promise The Reality

Dr. Butler’s TALC modelSigmoid Curve

No surprise!

3. In between two stories

This is where we are as a species

Decaying Old System

Emerging New System

Disruptive Questions: Who am I?How do I see my world?How do I relate to other life forms?Why am I here?

Signs of Distress

Dying OLD “INDUSTRY” • Utterly dependent on MORE• Exclusive, benefitting the few• Gross revenues• Tourist – wallet, $• Financial Transaction• Hierarchical, “top down”

leadership• Silo’d, separate• Disempowering communities

Signs of Distress

Dying OLD “INDUSTRY” • More• Exclusive, benefitting the few• Gross revenues• Tourist – wallet, $• Financial Transaction• Hierarchical, “top down”

leadership• Silo’d, separate• Disempowering

“It’s all a question of story. We are in trouble now because we do not have a good story. We’re in between stories. The old story, the account of how we fit into it, is no longer effective. Yet we have not learned the new story” Thomas Berry

The Nature of the New Story

What’s the New Story that’s Emerging?

One that:

• Shows we are part of nature and not separate from it.

• Properly situates humans in the world – neither above it by virtue of our superior intellect, nor dwarfed by the universe into cosmic insignificance.

• That we are equal partners with all that exists, co-creators with trees and galaxies and microbes in a materially and spiritually evolving universe

Source: Richard Schiffman

HOW DO YOU SEE PLANET EARTH?

OLD

Floating real

estate to be:

• Exploited

• Developed

• Fixed

• Scarce

• Worth

competing for

NEW

Living organism

Community of

self-organising

elements to be:

• Revered

• Life Support

• Teacher

• Mother

• Capacity for

abundance

• Collaborative

The tree which moves some to tears of joy is, in the eyes of others, only a green thing which stands in the way,

Some see Nature all ridicule and deformity, and some scarce see Nature at all.

But to the eyes of the man of imagination, Nature is Imagination itself. As a man is, so he sees

William Blake

Change the way we see & relate to

Nature

What’s an Economy For?You don’t start with the corporation and ask how to redesign it.You start with life, with human life of the planet and ask…How do we generate the conditions for life’s flourishing?Marjorie Kelly

The only valid purpose of an economy is to serve life. To align the human economy with this purpose, we must learn to live as nature lives, organises as nature organises, and learn as nature learns, guided by a reality-based, life centred, intellectually sound economics. David Korten

So what is life?

• Life is a system that regenerates itself from within

• It is in a constant state of becoming, evolving

• Life emerges from the relationships of its parts

• Life is matter that chooses

Systemic Change

The Visitor Economy is a living system embedded in a larger living system

• With Hosts (human beings) • Encountering and serving • Guests (other human beings)• In a community of other human beings

and life forms• That takes place in a unique space• Embedded in a larger ecosystem

Humanity in transition!

4. How do we cross over?

4. How do we cross over?

How do you change a system?

Source: Donella Meadows

5 curve leaping moves!

1. Practice a new way of SEEING & BEING together

2. Change Your PURPOSE from Volume Growth to Flourishing

3. Grow Profit by Growing your PEOPLE

4. Unleash the Power of PLACE

6. Become recognised as a PEAK destination

“The leaders we need today are not heroes who command but hosts who convene”

5. Step up and LEAD as HOSTS

1. Practice a new way of SEEING, together

old new

Industry – machine- separate parts – hierarchy – command & control - me –scarcity -competition

Living ecosystem – community –interdependent relationships –self organizing network - we –collaborate

Change the filters

Traditional Approach (Philip Kotler)

Conscious Travel Approach

2. Change your PURPOSE

Increased GROWTH as in MORE volume

IncreasedNET BENEFIT as in

BETTER value

Aim for People and Places to FLOURISH

Hosts – Guests – Host Businesses – Residents – Host Community – Your Descendants

Indicators from Positive Psychology (People) & Ecology (systems, enterprises & places) to trackLong-term NET BENEFIT – HEALTH/VITALITY – RESILIENCE - PASSIONATE/ENGAGED – BALANCE –

SELF ORGANZING – SELF GENERATING

3. Grow Profit by Growing Your PEOPLE

4. Grow Profit by being a PLACE that CARES

about THE NEEDS OF THEIR EMPLOYEES, AND …

Suppliers Community

AND THE NEEDS

OF ALL THEIR STAKEHOLDERS

5. Unleash the Power of Place

We cannot know who we are, until we know where we are.Wendell Berry

“We cannot know who we are until we know where we are” Wendell Berry

5. Re-imagine, Re-member our Relationship with

Nature“Nature” is NOT a market

segment Nor a problem to be solved

The clearest way into the

Universe is through a forest (John

Muir)

Nor even a set of services

to be paid for

“I only went out for short walk but

stayed till dark, for going out I

found I was really going in”

There is no wifi in the forest but I

promise you will find a better

connection there.

4. Unleash the Power of Place

There are no unsacred placesThere are only sacred places

And desecrated placesWendell Berry

When we see land as a communityto which we belong, we may begin

to use it with love and respectAldo Leopold

This is NOT about BRANDING! It IS about becoming INDIGENOUS.

6. Step Up to Lead as Hosts

“The leaders we need today are not heroes who command but hosts who convene” Margaret Wheatley

New and exciting forms of leadership and collaboration thatEnable innovation to emerge will need to be learned and practiced.

5. My dream

Create PEAK PLACES where • All life flourishes; tourism is the means not the end• There’s a distinct, feeling, character, “spirit” and personality• Hosts are IN LOVE with their home and CARE for it with a shared

passion• Guests experience an authentic welcome that inspires and

transforms• Hosts CARE for each other and collaborate to create sustained

livelihoods• Visitors generate sustained net benefits to the community as a whole• Where the community determines direction, pace and type of

tourism that is right for them.

5. Your role as educators, hosts and guides

Shared Leadership

It’s time for all the old heroes to go home. It’s time to face the truth of the situation –that we’re all in this together, that we all have a voice – and to figure out how to mobilisethe hearts and minds of everyone in our communities. Margaret Wheatley & Deborah Frieze. Leading in the Age of Complexity

Help your students and guests make this

journey

An inner adventure

A journey of becoming

An outer adventure

A journey of exploration

Help your students and guests make this

journey

HOSTING GUIDING

My Reasons Why Hosts can Lead

• Hospitality will drive tomorrow’s economy - hosts are the leaders

• You act locally but are part of a global network, a community

• Collectively and in local communities you have power and influence

• You are closest to the people – you are first to sense the pulse

• You understand and love your “place” – it’s home

• Your caring leads to protection, revitalisation, flourishing

• You can pull the community together behind a shared vision

The REAL Purpose of Travel and Hosting

• Tourism as a “wholesome” healing agent• Tourism as a Connecting Agent –

transformative• Tourism as an Agent of Regeneration and

Revitalisation• Tourism as a source of positive social impact• Tourism as an Agent of Inspiration – instilling

wonder and awe

Our Higher Purpose – The Revolution that Matters

There is a revolution that needs to

happen and it starts from inside each

one of us.

We need to wake up and fall in love with

Earth. We've been homo sapiens for a

long time. Now it's time to become

homo conscious.

From Falling in Love with the Earth byZen Master Thich Nhat Hanh

can “read the love letters sent by the wind and the rain, the snow and the moon”

Your Higher Purpose – to help your guests fall in love with life and Mother Earth and so that they too

Through Experiencing Wonder & Awe

“it’s the wild that preserves humanity”

You’ll move your guests from numbness to

aliveness

from indifference to empathy

Thank you and there’s more on my blog

Anna Pollock, Founder, Conscious Travel

For more, please ask!theconscioushost@gmail.com

www.conscious.travel