Pride and passion evaluation

The Pride and Passion (P&P) initiative was designed to improve the customer experience in the Scottish tourism sector through Community Challenges (community collaborations to set up local projects), visitor experience workshops, discovery tours, a website, an e-newsletter and input to other events and initiatives. It aimed to help businesses improve the service they offer to visitors, spread the message across the industry, share good practice and encourage joint working. The evaluation aimed to evaluate the project to date, both in meeting the project objectives and in generating impacts, focusing on the period of delivery since July 2006.

The methodology consisted of a review of P&P’s activities, consultations with the P&P Team and Management Group, consultations with external partners (Scottish Enterprise, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Scottish Tourism Forum, Community Challenges and Perth and Kinross Council), and consultations and surveys with industry participants. An online survey was conducted with 91 individuals involved in P&P events (a response rate of 25%).

The evaluation finds that P&P activities are helping to address market failure, usually at the individual company or regional level. Suggests that it has performed well in terms of reaching targets for Visitor Experience Workshops and Discovery Tours. Shows that other benefits of P&P included developing new business activities, more referrals between local businesses and greater staff satisfaction. Concludes that the tourism industry has a key role in the initiative and P&P activities have provided good networking opportunities. The aim of improving the visitor experience is aspirational but there is a limited level of resources in comparison to the task. Finds a lack of ongoing communication between P&P and other agencies.

The report recommends that P&P needs to be assessed against its operational aims. There is a need to progress the Community Challenges at a much quicker pace. Action Plans should be established early in the process and the communication should be improved between the different groups providing support with the tourist sector in local areas. Suggests it will be important to establish a monitoring and evaluation framework for future delivery of this support. If Community Challenges are not progressing, resources could be diverted to supporting a different area. There is a need for more clarity on the type of support and roles and responsibilities for providing support to local groups. Changes could be made in terms of data capture, storage and reporting to demonstrate and help inform progress with the initiative. Recommends that a wider tourism review will need to be concluded before a decision about the future role of P&P can be determined.