Develop sustainable tourism through the business model framework

Your social and environmental impact

The business model framework is a widely used tool, especially in innovation management. It makes it possible to conceptualize the main facets of an organization's activities. Since its creation, it has been taken up and enriched by Joyce and Paquin, professors at the John Molson School of Business at Concordia University, to make it possible to analyze activities from different perspectives of sustainable development.

Thus, the framework of the environmental business model makes it possible to reflect and present in an organized way the negative and positive impacts of activities, according to the perspective of the life cycle of products. This framework can also be adapted to analyze your social impacts, from the perspective of stakeholders.

In order to facilitate their use by managers, the canvases presented in The white paper contain examples of questions adapted to the tourism industry.

Concretely, how to use it?

1- Do a preliminary search

First, we recommend doing some preliminary research in order to acquire a certain knowledge of the issues, standards, best practices and opportunities in terms of sustainable tourism for your sector of activity. Otherwise, the templates will be difficult to use since they do not contain answers — rather, ways to explore — as to the actions to be implemented in order to make your activities more sustainable.

The strength of frameworks is that they allow you to approach corporate social responsibility in a strategic rather than generic way, going beyond, for example, the lists of environmental standards that you will find when doing your research. Careful thinking is more likely to lead to real competitive advantage.

2- Use canvases to visualize diagnostic highlights

First, download the PDF document containing the two canvases at the end of this article. You can enter your information directly into the document.

Use them for the first time with a descriptive approach to your activities as they currently are, based on the knowledge acquired during your preliminary research. Follow the order of the numbers in the cells. The result should be a global portrait of your environmental and social impacts.

Tip: Given the limited space, you will probably have to make choices about what information to present. We suggest using a large board and post-its, or creating a virtual one with Microsoft Power Point or Jamboard included with G Suite. We recommend that you write an idea per post-it note (see below for the outline of the environmental business model).

3- Define a vision and goals

Thus, the completed canvases represent your initial situation. From this, define a vision, that is, a description of the desired future. Then break it down into goals. Where possible, these should be SMART (specific, measurable, measurable, acceptable, realistic, and time-bound). For example, “achieve carbon neutrality by 2030.”

The vision, like the goals, must be consistent with your organizational mission and be well integrated into your overall strategy. They must also respond to the issues identified in your preliminary research and diagnosis.

4- Use canvases to innovate

The business model canvases can then be used as a tool during an ideation exercise (brainstorm). We suggest placing the vision and goals you have just defined there and then adding ideas for actions that will make it possible to achieve them.

And then?

The use of the frameworks of the environmental and social business model should be part of a more global approach to thinking about the transition of your organization to a greener and equitable economy. This is what our white paper offers: 10 steps to integrate sustainability into your strategy.

This article has covered 4 of the 10 steps in the process:

Step 1 - Understand what sustainable tourism is

Step 2 - Consider the benefits for your organization

Step 3 - Create an engagement team

Step 4 - Learn about the challenges, best practices and opportunities in your sector

Step 5 - Evaluate your environmental and social performance

Step 6 - Involve your stakeholders

Step 7 - Define vision and goals

Step 8 - Define actions to be taken to achieve the objectives

Step 9 - Integrate actions into your plans and strategies

Step 10 - Communicate continuously

Free to download (click on the image below). Remember, you can edit your information directly in the documents!

The Touriscope team wishes you good luck and do not hesitate to contact us to help you in your process or simply to share your successes with us!