What will our tourism business students know after finishing Master’s Degree in Tourism Marketing and Management?

The second year of Tourism Marketing and Management programme is about to start soon. We had a successful first year, but that does not mean that we can stand down and relax. Our goal is to continuously develop our programme. Based on our Business School AACSB Accreditation membership, experiences from the first year, input from our advisory board and other stakeholders as well as our perceptions of what will be required from the experts of tourism business in the future, we have developed a new curriculum for the years 2018-2021.

We have two years with each of our students before they graduate and want to prepare them for the future as well as we can. Our mission is to make tourism better. We have about a dozen courses as well as our master’s thesis process to make sure our students are able to do all this. These are the skills and knowledge that we aim our students to have once they have graduated from our programme.

What kind of knowledge tourism business students have after graduation

Understand the role of research, data, and information when making decisions and plans in the tourism business
Understand the iterative nature of a research process
Understand the relevance of combining analytical and creative thinking throughout the research process
Identify and be aware of the good scientific practice
Understand theoretical perspectives on tourism, understand and evaluate the linkages of the central concepts related to tourism research (e.g. Theory, paradigm, model).
Understand the interdisciplinary nature of tourism research.
Understand and explain current issues and methods used in tourism research including a wide range of theories, approaches, and practices used in tourism research.
Analyze and identify potential research topics for future tourism studies based on current tourism literature.
Understand and explain the main theoretical concepts and theories of consumer behavior in the tourism context
Understand the powerful connection of customer insight and marketing activities in the context of tourism businesses
Analyze his/her own behavior as a tourist and develop his/her ability to behave in a responsible manner.
Understand, explain, criticize and develop destination strategies, missions, visions, and values.
Understand how the destination brand and image are built through communication, interaction and relationships in various marketing and communication channels.
Understand tourists’ destination choice process and frameworks and models connected to it.
Identify the central concepts in destination marketing research and apply them to practice.
Understand and explain the concepts of a tourist destination and destination competitiveness.
Distinguish the key stakeholders of a tourist destination and understand their role in destination development.
Distinguish between the concepts of destination governance, management, and leadership and understand the role of collaboration, competition, and coopetition in tourist destination context.
Understand the requirements of sustainability in the development of a tourist destination.
Understand the environmental, economic and socio-cultural impacts of tourism in a destination.
Understand and explain the main theoretical concepts regarding service experience, tourist experience, and design of experiences, including experience theory, consumer value, customer involvement and product/service development
Explain and criticize main experiential theories and apply them to analyzing and interpreting consumer experiences
Understand the practical adaptations of the theories including consumer involvement process in service development
Understand the different ways how diverse service design tools can be applied and utilized
Understand the role of information technology as part of the tourism industry both from the customer as well as business perspective.
Know how to market and manage a tourism business in a digital world and understand central concepts, models, and frameworks connected to digital technologies.
Familiarity with risks and possibilities digital technologies create for tourism businesses and destinations.
A vision of how technologies will develop in the future and can adapt in the constantly transforming marketplace.
Understanding what is tourism research in practice.
Using theory as the base of tourism research.
Choosing research questions based on various research approaches.
Evaluating suitable methodological approaches to solve the chosen research questions.
Utilizing various research approaches to solve academic and practitioner problems.
Conducting tourism research ethically.
Understand the concepts, functions, and skills required for establishing a new tourism business
Understand the basic concepts and procedures of financial accounting
Understand the economic principles behind tourism business operations
Explain the determinants of profitability in tourism businesses, and how operational profit is generated
Explain the role of budgets and performance reports in planning and control
Understand the requirements of different kinds of legislation in the hospitality and tourism industry
Know central theoretical frameworks, models, and tools of tourism business and how to apply them in practice to develop the field and businesses in a sustainable way
Understand and explain a procedure of a marketing project

Tourism services at Etelä-Konnevesi — A typical day for Tourism Marketing and Management students

What kind of skills tourism business students have after graduation

Conduct analytical, methodologically reliable and practically valuable research to support decision-making processes in tourism businesses and academia.
Comply with the good scientific practice
Write a topic analysis and research plan with a literature review
Present their research in public
Argue and comment in a constructive manner
Identify, compare and explain the most common, current and timely research topics and approaches in tourism
Apply the principles of good scientific practices
Organize, synthesize, structure and outline scientific information
Reflect their own research topic and interest to existing research
Utilize the basic theories of tourist behavior in analyzing the customer behavior of a tourist destination and/or a tourism company
Utilize the customer insight information in planning and implementing marketing activities in tourism companies and destinations
Can act in a responsible manner as a tourist, and promote responsible behavior to other tourists and within tourism businesses
Is able to acquire and apply knowledge about future trends on tourism behavior
Collaboratively design and create a distinguishable and creative destination marketing plan and evaluate how realistic and suitable it is and implement the plan to practice.
Carry out multichannel destination marketing campaigns and work with creative agencies to promote a destination.
Assess and measure the effectiveness of marketing campaigns and actions as well as utilize data in making destination marketing decisions.
Identify critical destination resources and how those can be utilized in contemporary marketing.
Create and manage collaborative marketing campaigns and actions with various partners to develop destination marketing to international customers.
In collaboration analyse the tourist destination competitiveness.
Analyze the meaning and impact of different kinds of governance structures on the role of DMO and other stakeholders in the leadership of a destination.
Utilize the basic tools for analyzing the destination competitiveness.
Develop skills in operating in the ethical and responsible manner in relationships with stakeholders in a tourist destination.
Develop skills in analyzing the impacts of tourism in a destination.
Acquire and apply knowledge about future trends on tourism in destination context.
Apply a customer-oriented approach to product/service development in experience industry
Use diverse tools for experience design and evaluation of the consumer experience, and evaluate the suitability of diverse tools in different practical development cases
Analyse and interpret customer insight gained from the practical cases and compare the information with theoretical knowledge
Create in collaboration with peer students a practical experience design case, and reflect his/her own learning during the process
Assess the current state of digital business in an organization and create a plan to creatively develop it from the customer value perspective.
Run online marketing campaigns in various online channels and create business models and multi-channel strategies for tourism businesses and destinations.
Content marketer practices to communicate with different stakeholders and customers via digital technologies.
Use various online tools to develop digital business and customer experience.
Utilizing customer information search processes and data to create long-lasting and influential relationships with tourists through content marketing.
Experimenting and trying out different approaches to develop digital marketing and tourism business.
Search for, summarizing, and applying information from academic and industry sources to develop research.
Designing a research process.
Evaluating various data collection and analysis methods for quantitative and qualitative data.
Using data analysis software.
Write scientific text.
Write and formulate research reports for the industry.
Understand the principles of how to generate operational profit
Analyze and interpret financial information for both managerial purposes and the needs of outside stakeholders
Make a realistic business plan
Adapt marketing related theories and tools into practice
Plan, schedule, implement, report and monitor a tourism marketing related research or development project
Adjust to challenges of strict schedules and collaborative problem solution
Take and share responsibilities
Work in collaboration and according to the instructions of the client or other principal
Creatively suggest new innovative solutions

Study Tourism Business

If these sound like the skills and knowledge you would like to have, you should consider joining our Master’s Degree programme. We are constantly looking for people to make tourism better with us. You can apply to our programme every year around Christmas. For more information see details at http://www.uef.fi/web/tmm/tmm-in-a-nutshell

TMM developing tourism business at Etelä-Konnevesi region

Our International Master’s Degree Programme in Tourism Marketing and Management (TMM) has started a collaboration with municipalities of Konnevesi and Rautalampi and tourism stakeholders in the region. The concrete first step in this collaboration was a two-day workshop on developing nature tourism in the Etelä-Konnevesi region, organized in Konnevesi research station 14.-15.3.2018. Together with Anne Hyvärinen, project manager at a regional tourism development project, two days full of tourism business content were designed and tailored for the region.

Tourism insights and knowledge

The idea of the first day was to bring in all the actors to the same level when it comes to tourism marketing and management in a nature tourism destination. The day started with introductions and three short group work presentations by our students. As a preliminary assignment, our students had examined how the region is represented on the Internet from the perspective of potential tourists, both domestic and international. They also gave a quick overview of the recent development of the region in combination with development possibilities.

Making tourism better — Nature tourism workshop at Etelä-Konnevesi region

From the student presentations, it became obvious that the region has a vast tourism potential, but the problem is that very few know about this hidden gem. Most tourists that come to the region just visit the Southern-Konnevesi National Park, even though the region is full of interesting, high-quality and distinctive tourism businesses. Thus we were able to pinpoint the tourism development problem to marketing and sales, as well as networking between the actors in the region.

Besides our students, there was a wide range of presentations from local entrepreneurs and tourism personnel, Jyväskylä UAS and Visit Jyväskylä, and Johku. The tourism in the region and development possibilities were discussed from many different viewpoints, providing a great overview of the topic.

Networking and collaboration

At the end of the first day, we had the chance to visit a local rural tourism business Suopirtti Highland and meet their “hairy cows” (ie. highland cattle). It was indeed an experience for all of us. Afterward, we had a chance to taste delicious locally produced dishes at restaurant Mierontie. The restaurant also had a unique, wooden interior design made by local Jukola Industries. At the end of the second day, we had the chance to visit the National Park and experience KalajaRetkeily hospitality from Markku Utriainen. These visits only reinforced our view that there are many great and original tourism products and services in the region, but very few have ever heard of them.

Professor Raija Komppula emphasized at the workshop how important collaboration and networking are for tourism businesses. Not that much can be achieved by doing things alone. Tourists seldom choose a destination based on one tourism business. Tourists are looking for an amalgam of experience that they can enjoy during their trip and only by working together a region can provide tourists what they want.

Tourism business development

Our students are now working with individual tourism businesses as their second assignment. Each student was assigned with a tourism business with their own development possibilities. The businesses gave our students practice-oriented tasks connected to topics such as marketing mix development, service packaging, experience design, technology adoption and new-service development. Our students will provide each involved business a short report that guides the businesses to take the next steps.

Students in a nature trail — TMM students and staff at the Etelä-Konnevesi National Park

Collaboration with TMM

We have built our programme so that this kind of destination and business collaborations are possible. Our students performed really well during the workshop and have clearly learned a lot during this past year they have been studying with us. We will continue our collaboration with Etelä-Konnevesi region and are also open to new possibilities to make tourism better. If you are interested in collaboration, please contact me at juho.pesonen[at]uef.fi.

Complexity of academic research

To understand the world

I’ve started my university (academic research) studies this autumn. I´m 32 years old, and I like my age. At least for me, the somewhat life experience gives a better feeling in this rather complex overall feeling that I am having at the moment. I will get back to this later.

I’ve realized the complexity of dealing with academic research and creating my personal content into it, in this world of “no- black and white, “no- single wrong or right”- dilemmas of academic studies in general. This is not totally new founding for me – but now I am really in this in practice, because of my master degree studies in Tourism marketing and management programme.

Accepting, and using common sense

Recently I asked from my professor during one lectures discussion – How I can know whether it is fine or correct to use some “basic” theory as a background of some subject from what I’m trying to write about, or not? She answered (looking at me first with the facial expression of “exactly- good question, but…” and then she gave me and the group the answer of her that there is no clear answer for this, you need to use your common sense in these cases for making your decisions and choices.

I´m little surprised that it feels so disturbing for me, (or whoever involved in the academic research), that it is, at least usually, very hard to find the one and only truth or theory for some subject or theme that we are studying. I happen to be quite flexible and highly spontaneous personality myself. So it makes it even weirder. I come back to my age-thing. Because of it, and maybe other reasons too, I’m still very happy not to be stressing this issue too much. I’m fine with it, I understand that I’m not alone with it, – I’m just reflecting it.

Dreaming about getting that absolute truth out…

Though I’m very curious to know, whether I’m actually capable at some point during my studies to get use of the theory or truth which I can use as an “absolute” for some subjects research findings or as a suggestion of my own for some topic.

My teacher said that “the only constant thing in this world is change”, as a starting point for further discussion. I agree mostly with this statement, however, I cannot say it is an absolute truth to everything. It is somehow easy, comfortable and kind of highly secured for me to realize and feel, that example the most important theories for researchers to use, apply and form formulate something new (!) already exists.

Hong Kong, 2011 (Jenni Kaitila)

Or not…

This gives me huge importance when dealing with the almost absolute complexity and no- single truth experiences while I’m studying the life of academic research. I remember also, that this same teacher stated the truth about also agreeing that in fact, the main theories and typologies in general already have been founded before. And the timeless value of sources which exists in those. He said this during the information technology- courses discussion session, and I absolutely liked the moment and the fascinating, yet somehow secured feeling of having the experience of learning same time about the new world and information technology – and somewhat it’s relying on still in the theories presented and founded already from decades ago.

Hong Kong (Macao), 2011 (Jenni Kaitila)

Tourism Marketing and Management programme takes novel approach to business studies

A business degree that specialises in tourism business is now available for the first time in Finland. Running at the University of Eastern Finland Business School, the international Master’s Degree Programme in Tourism Marketing and Management has got off to a good start, as 20 new students started at the Joensuu Campus this September.

Their studies began with an orientation week focusing on the programme’s four main themes: technology, well-being, nature and sustainability. Visits to the Puukarin Pysäkki guest house and the Murtovaara Forest Farm Museum, both located in a small town in eastern Finland, were particularly enlightening experiences. These destinations summarise well the potential and challenges of tourism in places like the eastern part of Finland.

The programme brings together academic studies and real-life links with working life in many different ways.

“It has been nice to notice how interested companies have been in our programme and students right from the start. Already in early September, our students did a Sales Race event in collaboration with the North Karelia Cooperative,” Programme Director Juho Pesonen says.

Co-operation with tourism businesses — Sales Race teaching practical selling skills

The Master’s degree programme has a unique advisory board consisting of representatives of business and industry, and the task of this advisory board is to make sure that the content of the programme and its courses are in line with working life requirements. Students also learn practical marketing skills by participating in the programme’s marketing.

Collaboration is the key to successful tourism marketing

The significance of collaboration is highlighted in the programme in many ways.

“We focus on collaboration rather than competition, and collaborative learning and problem-solving is encouraged in many different ways. We do plenty of group work on our courses and make use of collaborative learning methods that are independent of time and place,” Pesonen says.

The programme’s novel approach also applies to teaching, as the number of traditional lectures has reduced thanks to the introduction of flipped classroom. Students are largely responsible for their own learning process, and this process is supported by different kinds of assignments given during contact sessions as well as by in-depth discussion of the most difficult content.

The programme’s smooth start has also been aided by Professor James Murphy from Australia, who was recently appointed as a docent of the University of Eastern Finland. He brings an international angle to the first course, and visiting scholars and teachers from all over the world will be contributing to the programme.

The goal of the programme is to train experts who are valued by employers and the scientific community alike. The programme places emphasis not only on content learning, but also on important working life skills such as critical thinking, taking initiative, can-do attitude, independent and lifelong learning, and team work.

“A good example of this is a campaign our students designed and implemented at the university on World Tourism Day on 27 September to raise awareness of sustainable tourism.”

Tourism Master's Degree in Business — Study Tourism Marketing and Management at UEF.

Admissions to the international Master’s degree programmes of the University of Eastern Finland will be open between 1 November 2017 and 31 January 2018.

For further information, please contact:

Programme Director Juho Pesonen, tel. +358 40 184 2698, juho.pesonen(at)uef.fi

For more information on the Master’s Degree Programme in Tourism Marketing and Management, please see http://www.uef.fi/web/tmm.

Study tourism business at UEF: Master’s Degree Programme in Tourism Marketing and Management

There are dozens of reasons why you should study Tourism Marketing and Management at University of Eastern Finland. Here are 16 top reasons to study with us:

High quality studies

We aim to keep the quality of our studies high. Our studies are not the easiest; there are no free credits but a lot to learn. You will have to work hard, but when you work, you can be sure that the things you learn really matter after your graduation. We are using innovative teaching methods that inspire and motivate you to give 100 % to the programme and to develop your skills and career.

Focus on students

We value every student who applies for our programme. This degree programme would not exist without you students. We constantly listen to what you have to say, have a large number of feedback channels and methods and act accordingly to the feedback we receive. We take good care of our students, keep track of how their studies are progressing and help them to learn what is required and get their degree.

Travel and tourism studies — Studying tourism

Co-operation with destinations and tourism companies

We are networked with various destinations and tourism businesses in Finland. Our network makes it possible for us to knit our courses to real-life business goals. All our courses programme courses have business partners and actual business case studies that we use to test what you have learned and deepen your knowledge on what is required after you have received your degree. Our programme is supervised by an industry advisory board that ensures that the skills and knowledge in our programme is up to date and relevant.

See our advisory board and partners.

Academic research

Our programme has a strong research focus. Right from the start, you will start to familiarize yourself with academic research and prepare for writing a master’s thesis. Thinking that is required to do academic research is similar to the line of thinking that businesses value. We need to be critical of information we receive, understand the meaning of it for business practices and try to find new approaches to marketing and management.

See our research here.

Unique focus topics

Wellbeing, nature tourism, sustainable tourism and technologies are all globally trending topics and form a strong and unique focus for our programme. This profiling should also be reflected on our students who are interested in the outdoors, wellbeing of people and planet and enthusiastic about new technologies. We do not train hotel managers or hospitality professionals but focus on developing tourism business in destination management organizations, tourism businesses and in public sector.

High ranking university, internationally recognized

UEF is among top 50 of World’s Top Young Universities and within the top 500 of all world’s universities. We are internationally recognized research university that aims to solve global problems. See our rankings at http://www.uef.fi/en/web/guest/uef/international-rankings and university strategy at http://www.uef.fi/en/web/guest/uef/strategy

Finland and Finnish education system

Finnish education system is world-renowned and our national higher education system is the 6th best in the world (http://www.universitas21.com/article/projects/details/152/u21-ranking-of-national-higher-education-systems-2017). Finland is one of the best countries in the world to live in (rank 21 http://hdr.undp.org/sites/default/files/2016_human_development_report.pdf) and safest country on the planet. Finland is also rapidly increasing in popularity among international tourists. With its four seasons, living in Finland can be an exotic experience. For more information about Finnish education system visit http://minedu.fi/en/education-system

Student satisfaction

Finland and UEF are not world leaders when it comes to the number of international students we receive. However, the students who do come to Finland, tend to be extremely satisfied with their choice: https://www.studyportals.com/intelligence/international-student-satisfaction/international-student-satisfaction-awards-2016/.

Flipped learning

One of the innovative teaching methods we use is Flipped learning. We do not believe that centuries old method of lecturing in front of the class when students listen is the most efficient way of teaching things. Most of our courses are utilizing flipped learning methodology where the traditional roles of lectures and homework are reversed. This means that learning is flexible and happens mostly online with material prepared by the teacher. We focus on learning, not just that you have to get credits and pass through courses. We do not have many exams but learning is measured with various tasks and team works. You will not submit essays and assignments only for the lecturer to read but will be producing valuable social media content right from the beginning to benefit the whole industry as well as the programme.

Learn more about flipped learning.

Small, tight knit and relaxed group

We have a common goal, to make our programme better known. The TMM staff and students are more like colleagues than students and professors. There are only four people working in the programme so you will get to know them well before you get your degree. We encourage our students to co-create learning and do things together. We only accept around 15 new students each year; finishing our programme is a team effort. Teams and networks are increasingly important in modern work life and we provide our students tools and skills to be a productive team member.

City of Joensuu

Our programme is based in a small city in Eastern Finland called Joensuu. We think that Joensuu is a perfectly sized city; it has everything you need but is surrounded by nature from all sides. It has good train and air connections to Helsinki from where you can continue anywhere in the world.

Visit Joensuu and Karelia Expert websites for more information.

Career for the future

Work life is changing. Technological development in artificial intelligence and robotics are affecting how we work in the future. Many of the jobs people will work in in 2030 do not exist yet. Still at least for some time creativity and innovativeness will be the strengths of the human mind. We will train your mind to be useful for various development tasks in the tourism industry and provide insights how you can keep your skills relevant in the decades to come.

Learning environment

UEF aims to provide its students the best academic learning environment in Finland. We have identified the development of our learning environments as one of our most important goals. The best academic learning environment in Finland is built around innovative teaching methods, research-based education, diverse use of facilities, and transparency.

Under the lead of our motivated teachers, we are creating a new culture of teaching. The teaching we offer is of a high standard and based on the latest research findings, enabling us to train professionals for the needs of the rapidly changing working life. We support this process by renewing our campus facilities with flexibility, inspiration and technology in mind.

At UEF, we want to create a culture of open science and technology that enables seamless collaboration between our students’ own devices and the devices and technology provided by the university.

From day one, we want to make our students feel welcome as new members of the scientific community. We invest in supporting flexible study paths, and to this end, we have created a new digital environment, Kamu, for our students. Our work to develop our learning environments is rooted in student-centeredness. Together, we are building a university of tomorrow.

https://www.uef.fi/en/learning-environments

Doctoral studies

For successful students we provide opportunities to continue their education with doctoral studies. Our doctoral students have opportunities to work in the department in various research and development projects and have wide selections of courses available for their studies. Doctoral studies are free for those accepted for the programme and we even have a few paid positions available.

Costs and scholarship

Our programme is free for European and Finnish students. For students coming from outside EU/ETA region the annual study fee is 8000 €. We provide the best international applicant’s 80 % to 100 % scholarships for our programme. Studying in Joensuu is also cheaper than in metropolitan cities as living costs are lower.

We make tourism better

We are not only educating tourism professionals of the future but we aim to have a wider impact on tourism. Our goal is to make tourism better through our actions and through our students who will work in the industry. Better for local people, better for tourists better for planet and better for tourism research and tourism industry.

Click here to see how to apply for the programme.

Apply now for International Master’s Degree Programme in Tourism Marketing and Management

Are you interested in studying tourism? Do you want a career in tourism business? Apply now for Master’s Degree in Tourism Marketing and Management. Application period is open until January 13th 2017.

Picture by Karelia Expert

Application period for the programme at University of Eastern Finland is now open and you can apply for the programme through our website at www.uef.fi/tmm or directly from StudyInfo website https://studyinfo.fi/app/#!/korkeakoulu/1.2.246.562.17.58832491748 (Fill in application button is on the right hand side of the screen).

This is our application process:

1. All available study programmes in Finland can be found on the Studyinfo portal (www.studyinfo.fi) where you can search for suitable programmes and start the application. The online application is only open during the application period, so make sure you know when the application period starts. Once you have found a programme you wish to apply to, find out what the admissions requirements are.
2. Collect the required application documents. Information concerning the documents you need for admissions is provided by the university/programme you are applying to and the Studyinfo portal. The list of required documents is also on the online application. Please note that each application must have its own set of requested application documents.
3. Please send all of your documents to the University Admissions Finland’s office by mail. Your application documents have to arrive by the given deadline. E-mail attachments will not be accepted. UAF does not process application documents that have arrived after the deadline.
4. University Admissions Finland processes all documents according to the same processing procedures. Documents are processed in two steps, both of which your application documents must pass:
a. We will verify your language skills and check that they meet the requirements set by the university.
b. We will check that all of your required educational documents have arrived and then we will verify your credentials.

For more information see our university application page at http://www.uef.fi/en/web/admissions/how-to-apply- and detailed process at University Admissions website HERE.

We have now been intensively planning the programme and it will be absolutely fantastic. We have a huge number of industry partners lined up for the programme, so many interesting topics to discuss and study, innovative teaching methods, and all the tools you need to build yourself a career in evergrowing tourism business.

Let us know if there is anything we can help you with and good luck with your application!
Juho Pesonen (juho.pesonen[at]uef.fi)
Raija Komppula
Henna Konu