Tourism Business Environment and Experience Economy (5cr)

Objectives (course unit)

The course introduces the nature of tourism industry and its key actors. The focus is on the tourism demand and supply and the external tourism environment. The students familiarize themselves with the concept of experience economy and its’ principles within tourism business. Contemporary trends in tourism are introduced and discussed.

After completing the course, the students will be able to:

Understand the nature and the role of different sectors and actors within the tourism industry.
Become familiar with the tourism system and its external environment.
Know the concept and principles of experience economy within tourism business.
Take aspects of experience economy and trends in tourism into consideration when analyzing, developing and planning tourism.
Understand the importance of tourism planning and development.

Content (course unit)

What does the tourism industry consist of?
Why are both the private and public sector important in developing tourism?
What are the principles of experience economy?
What kinds of trends are visible in contemporary tourism?
What kinds of impacts do they have on tourism planning and development?

Exam schedules

Exam: on 16th November 2015

Assessment methods and criteria

Experience Economy: Team working, field work, report and essay writing, Tabula discussion, exam. Understanding experience economy, identifying characteristics and nature of it, applying academic material and reflecting it with experience enterprise -case selected.

Assessment scale

0-5

Teaching methods

Experience economy: Lectures, team working, Tabula, report and essay writing, practical examples and experimental cases, "learning by doing"

Learning materials

Experience Economy:
Welcome to the Experience Economy. Pine&Gilmore, 1998
Handbook on the Experience economy. Sundbo&Sorensen, 2013
Experience Economy as an Instrument to Create Economic Profitability. Lyck, 2010
Experience Economy Strategies: Adding Value to Small Rural Businessess, Fiore et al., 2007
Web sites are presented in Tabula course.

Student workload

Course is of 5 credits, it is 135h of work
Lectures and meetings: 18h
Team working: 70h
report writing: 47h

Content scheduling

Experience Economy: Introduction lecture + team&task setting, team working (analysis, report writing, Tabula conversation), meetings and reflectionary discussion. Time table will be released later.

Completion alternatives

Experience Economy: Must be discussed with teacher beforehand

Practical training and working life cooperation

Experience Economy: Voluntary contacting the enterprises

International connections

Experience Economy: Possibility to select an international enterprise for the task, international student teams

Further information

There will be two teachers in the course. Tourism Business environment part is of 2 cr, teacher Ms Liisa Tyllilä (Hiking Travel Hit). Experience Economy:Introduction lecture (first meeting)is very important in order to pass the course.

Assessment criteria - fail (0) (Not in use, Look at the Assessment criteria above)

Experience Economy: no participation in team working. Student does not understand the concept of experience economy and can not reflect nature of it in discussions. Student is not able to understand and apply material presented.

Assessment criteria - satisfactory (1-2) (Not in use, Look at the Assessment criteria above)

Experience Economy: Student is partly understanding the concept of experience economy. Student is able to discuss and consider only few characteristics of it in conducting the tasks. Material presented for the tasks is only partly applied and understood.

Assessment criteria - good (3-4) (Not in use, Look at the Assessment criteria above)

Experience Economy: Student understands the concept of experience economy. Student is able to consider and discuss most of the significant characteristics of experience economy and presents examples. Material presented for the tasks is well applied.

Assessment criteria - excellent (5) (Not in use, Look at the Assessment criteria above)

Experience Economy: Student implements thorough understanding of the experience economy by applying, discussing and reflecting the ideas and characteristics of it by various examples and own, new ideas or perspectives. Material presented for the tasks is carefully applied.