Case studies

The next three sub-chapters present two case studies chosen among the best-evaluated online training courses of tourism destinations at the national level. The development strategies, involving pedagogical, technical and content development, motivations of the destinations on having such a training activity and the success stories of the online training courses about tourism destinations will be discussed.

Each case will be presented along the next structure. The description of the respective countries tourism product will initiate the case, followed by the management structure of the involved NTO, the discussion of the online presence of the destination and strategies used in order to support trade partnerships globally. Further, the history of the platform, its budget, and success in terms of the eLearning usages will be discussed in order to generate an overall context and understanding.

Online training options will be presented alongside ADDIE model. Each case will be concluded with the discussions of the findings and an overall evaluation, taking into consideration both strengths and weaknesses. It will conclude with a summary of the results and research limitations.

3.2.1. Research objectives and research questions

In order to identify best practices in the field of eLearning courses created by Destination Management Organizations at the national level, as well as to answer below stated research questions, the next research objectives were defined:

i) describe strategies, that were used in two cases for pedagogical, technical, content and testing activities development;

ii) present integrated approaches for online training promotion and positioning;

iii) evaluate the history of the courses, their management structure, budget involved, and statistical data;

iv) understand the main motivations of the respective destinations on having such a training activity.

The next research questions were defined for the case study research step:

Research Question 3: How eLearning courses are structured in terms of the used pedagogical strategies, online training content delivery and testing activities design?

Research Question 4: How eLearning courses are structured in terms of the employees’ involved, promotional strategies undertaken and performed in terms of the usages and budget spent?

Research Question 5: What motivates DMOs to develop eLearning courses for their travel trade partners?

3.2.2. Research design and limitations

From the preliminary online questionnaire that has been undertaken in summer 2010, and presented in detail in the sub-chapter 4.1., the list of 15 best-evaluated online training courses about tourism destinations were received. All 14 providers of the national eLearning courses about tourism destinations were contacted with the proposal on undertaking interviews in order to evaluate their experience and present in the form of best case studies. Two course providers agreed on participating in current research, one representing a European destination and another one representing a destination situated in Asia-Pacific region. Those courses are the next ones:

- Switzerland Travel Academy created by Switzerland Tourism (Zurich, Switzerland);

- Kiwi Specialist Program delivered by New Zealand Tourism Board (Wellington, New Zealand).

Both destinations provide multilingual eLearning practices with highly evaluated content and structure. Both online training courses also offer localized training offers for different markets.

The best practices in the field will be analysed and presented based on semi-structured interviews, analysis of the usages of eLearning courses, internal communication reports, historical records on the courses development, promotion and delivery, and other available data.

The first step of the research study was designed in a form of semi-structured interviews with the representatives of two NTOs, that were involved in the production and delivery of the eLearning offer. The next employees of NTOs were interviewed: responsible for online communication and marketing; responsible for trade partnership, product manager, and market managers in several offshore offices. While several variations did occur in the questions, which were asked to different involved employees of the ministries of tourism, the overall structure of the questions was comparable. The topics that were covered during semi-structured interviews are presented in Appendix 19.

For the first case study, two semi-structured interviews were undertaken. The first one with Ms. Monika Müller, who at the time when the interviews were undertaken held the position of Project Manager Market Services at Switzerland Tourism. The interview was carried out in February 2012 in the headquarter of Switzerland Tourism in Zurich (Switzerland). The interview lasted two hours. The second interview was completed

through the VoIP service – Skype with Ms. Seema Kadam, Market manager Western India, who is also responsible for education and training in India within Switzerland Tourism. Ms. Seema Kadam is based in Mumbai (India). The interview took place in March 2012 and lasted 55 minutes.

For the second case study, three semi-structured interviews were done in February 2013 in Wellington, New Zealand, at the headquarter of TNZ. The first interview was with Belinda Chu, who currently holds the position of Online Manager Trade. The interview lasted three hours.

Two further interviews were done and recorded through a video conference with Carolyn Pope, Trade Development Consultant for North America, based in Los Angeles (USA) and Cindy Chen, Trade Training Manager from Greater China, based in Shanghai (China). Those interviews lasted one hour and one hour and a half accordingly.

Two versions of the eLearning modules provided by Tourism New Zealand will be presented further. The first one, which has been online during the interviews with the representatives of the NTOs in February 2013, will be presented in the sub-chapter 3.4.5.

Additionally to that, the adjustments to the new version of the online training courses, which went online in June 2013 are documented and presented in the sub-chapter 3.4.7.

The second step of the analysis involved the exploration of the usages of the eLearning courses; internal reports on the online training platform development and delivery;

historical documents and other available data.

Although present study identifies and provides successful case studies and generates best practices in the field, the results and conclusions should be discussed under the next limitations. The interviews were conducted with the employees, who are currently working with online training. Those who have started and left the company meanwhile could have a different perspective on the platform development, history, success strategies or failures. Additionally, the interviews were carried out in conjunction with the destinations that possess successful eLearning courses, while in the future the interviews could be done also with the NTOs that are not undertaking such a training activity or those that were doing but suspended online training courses. Their motivation and lack of motivations can be analysed in order to provide an overall picture of the studied issue.