Walking along the main street and taking the second right, you enter a quieter alley — charming, almost mysterious. It’s hard to find unless you know that behind a small shop window there is a goldsmith’s workshop, with the workbench visible just as in the Renaissance, where unique handcrafted pieces are created using pitch and traditional engraving tools. Nothing touristy. Everything authentic.

Thank You, Thomas Cook. And Now?

Thank you, Thomas Cook, for inventing modern tourism and for being the first to organize travel packages accessible to a wider public. Travel agencies and tour operators have simplified many lives by providing services that made traveling easier.

Over recent decades, tourism has grown into one of the most flourishing sectors of the global economy. Today, however, we are experiencing a transformation shaped by new digital communication tools that have changed access to information, and by transportation systems that increasingly allow people to travel quickly at differentiated prices. Large online platforms filled with content now guide “do-it-yourself” travelers, who more and more frequently plan their journeys and adventures through the web.

To offer high-quality tourism attentive to the diverse needs of travelers, professions in the sector must also evolve. Operators need to acquire new skills capable of filtering authentic, place-specific information.

The development of the Destination Manager curriculum — a professional capable of mapping authentic experiences and promoting them to visitors — is currently being carried out by the Department of Economics and Business Sciences at the University of Florence together with the Fondazione per la Ricerca e l’Innovazione through the European Erasmus+ project Vector – A Vocational and Educational Curriculum Design on Tourism.

The idea emerged in autumn 2014, based on previous research and on the observation of Tuscany’s vibrant cultural heritage, local knowledge, and distinctive experiences. The project aims to create and validate a professional profile that can be recognized at both national and international levels and certified across Europe through the ECVET system (European Credit System for Vocational Education and Training).

Project partners include Italy, Spain, and Portugal — three countries sharing similar Mediterranean tourism characteristics.

The Tourism Specialist

The Destination Manager is a tourism specialist — a professional with deep knowledge of the territory in which they operate, playing a key role in the promotion and development of tourist destinations.

Alongside skills in marketing and communication, social media, interpersonal relations, economics, budgeting, IT, and foreign languages, the ability to create authentic experiences and the curiosity to uncover cultural aspects that leave a lasting impression are essential competencies for becoming a Destination Manager.

Thanks to this expertise, the Destination Manager will be able to strategically coordinate and integrate all the elements that make up a destination. They will propose the most authentic local experiences and combine information in original and meaningful ways. Rather than competing with established web portals, they will offer significant content communicated through social networks.

Currently, this professional profile exists in an informal way both nationally and internationally.

The Vector project aims to create a modular training pathway for the Destination Manager’s curriculum, improving employment opportunities by enhancing the skills and professional quality of future tourism workers. Graduates may find employment within networks of tour operators, travel agencies, public institutions, or work as freelancers.

The project seeks to promote authentic, high-quality territorial experiences and improve the match between supply and demand. The Destination Manager contributes to sustainable tourism — defined by the World Tourism Organization (1988) as “a form of development that meets economic, social and aesthetic needs while maintaining cultural integrity, essential ecological processes, biological diversity, and life-support systems.”

In the Shoes of a Tourist: Experiencing Tourism or Tourism of Experiences?

Nothing touristy. Everything authentic.

Along another narrow street, you reach a small square with wide steps where you can sit. You enter through a tight passage; it is not crowded. Here stands one of the churches that has preserved much of its early medieval interior. Or think of that line of people emerging from a bakery — workers and students waiting with a numbered ticket for a special sandwich.

These experiences cannot be found online. They are local flavors that only someone with deep knowledge of the city can reveal, guiding visitors through a truly meaningful experience.

The European project will last three years, at the end of which the Destination Manager training pathway will be fully implemented.

We will keep you informed.

Contacts for Information About the Project

• Department of Economics and Business Sciences (DISEI), scientific coordinators of the Vector project
• Fondazione per la Ricerca e l’Innovazione, lead partner of the Vector project

To stay updated on the Vector project, visit the website.

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