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Currently shaping the scene, the top emerging trends within the industry include the increased use of technology in tourism and demand for greater service excellence.
While Singapore's tourism sector is poised for growth following recovery from the pandemic, challenges still remain.
According to industry leaders surveyed, top challenges faced within the sector were:
- changes in travel behaviour/spending (63%),
- existing employees lacking the depth of skills required to cater to the changing trends (57%), and
- a shortage of tourism professionals (53%).
In contrast, only less than half of leaders in the tourism sector (48%) have sent their employees for tourism-related training. Of the remaining, almost three in ten (29%) express the intention to do so in the foreseeable future while over one in five (23%) does not intend to at all.
To better understand emerging trends and challenges, NTUC LearningHub’s Industry Insights Report 2024 on Tourism explores the sentiments towards hiring, training, and in-demand skills among leaders within the tourism sector. The report surveyed 167 business leaders in the sector.
Currently taking over the scene, the top emerging trends were identified as:
- the increased use of technology in tourism (76%),
- demand for greater service excellence (66%),
- the growing importance of holistic wellness travel and regenerative tourism (40%), and
- increased demand for the practice of sustainability in tourism (37%).
In response to this, nearly all tourism leaders (51% strongly agree, 43% somewhat agree) perceive that these trends create more job opportunities in the market. Reflecting this sentiment, almost four in five (77%) of them are keen to hire talent to fill tourism job roles.
The top job roles according to tourism leaders are marketing communications officers (32%), administrative staff (30%), and event managers/executives/specialists (28%).
Looking at upskilling, 79% of leaders are keen to send their employees for training in areas of digital/technology — unsurprising given that various organisations are currently employing technologies such as contactless payment options (69%), AI chatbots (38%), cybersecurity (31%), big data (27%), and IoT management (14%).
This is followed by other training areas such as:
- service engagement (77%),
- sustainability (41%), and
- holistic wellness travel and regenerative tourism (26%).
In the area of service excellence, 70% of leaders strongly agree on the need to upskill to enhance service experience amongst tourism professionals, as only 3% of leaders consider the quality of service in Singapore’s tourism sector as excellent. On the other hand, more than half of tourism leaders (52%) consider it to be only average or below.
Lastly, 75% of tourism leaders reveal that their organisation intends to incorporate sustainability in their tourism offerings. Currently, the top sustainability measures employed by organisations were energy conversion (63%), sustainable waste management (58%), sustainable sourcing and procurement (56%), carbon footprint management (53%), and water conservation (50%).
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Lead image / Industry Insights Report 2024 on Tourism
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