Introduction to Tourism – Chapter 1 (Soft Skills-II) Notes provides a basic understanding of the tourism industry, its types, importance, and scope. This chapter explains how tourism contributes to the economy, creates employment opportunities, and promotes cultural exchange.
Introduction to Tourism Chapter 1 Notes
Soft skills are important for success in the field of tourism and travel industry. This skills helps the person to enhance the personal, social and professional life.
Defining Personality
Personality in general terms means the unique set of qualities like physical, mental and emotional attitudes, values, interest that make you different from others. Personality is actually how you present yourself to others and how people define you. Your personality is everthing about you.
Oxford Dictionary defines personality as a combination of characteristics or qualities that form an individual’s distinctive character
Determinants of Personality
Everyone have a unique personality. There are some factors which helps to shape personality of individual called determinants of personality. The key determinants are:
- Heredity
- Culture
- Family Background
- Experiences in Life
- The People we interact with
1. Heredity: Heredity also known as inheritance, heredity is a process where the traits are passed from parents to child. We inherit certain traits such as the color of our eyes, the shape or our body from our father, gradfather great grad father.
2. Culture: Culture can be defined as the ideas, customs and social behaviour of a particular people or society. If the people born in different cultures tend to develop different types of personlaites. India have a dicersity in the cultural and you can find the difference in the people.
3. Family Background: Family is the smallest unit of society: Family is a group of people related by blood or marriage. Many aspects of family like background and education or parents, socio-economic status, the number of children in the family can be helpful for shaping the personality.
4. Experiences in Life: The famous quotes by Julio Caesar “Experience is the teacher of all things”, Suppose you have kindness but due to repeated cheating with you due to kindness can influence your personality trait for future.
5. People We Interact With: We interact with many poeple in our life like neighbours, classmates, teachers, schoolmates, cusin, friends, colleagues, boss and even strangers etc. Many time we change our behaviours to get accepted and associated with them whom we like. For example, When we are working with team then we are more cooperative to work successfully.
Personality Development
There are long debate regardin personality, some beliefe that personality inborn (natural) or shaped by environment (nartured). But most psychologists agree that we are born with a basic personality but we develop and refine it throught life to meet challaenges and goals.
Personality development is a continuous and multi-faceted process which required a set of skills that need to be learned and at times unlearned. Personality develpment helps the person to align with personal and professional needs.
Nowaday, A wide range of soft skills are required in the industry to meet the changing demands. Now industries requed more than just technical knowledge to full fill the requirement. Tourism is a people-to-people industry. In toruism industry service is an important to satisfy the customers, even luxurious hotels can’t satisfy customers if staff doens have a:
- Professional attitude
- Good Manners
- Effective communication
- Hygiene awareness
To succeed in tourism, you must fine-tune your personality to meet industry expectations.
Positive Work Attitude
Attitude and personality has a deep relationship as attitudes play a major part in determining a person’s personality. Attitude as defined by Oxford Dictionary is a settled way of thinking or feeling or evaluation (positive/ negative) about some person, object or issue.
We can focus it on whatever we want- either on good or bad, positive or negative, problem or opportunity. On what an individual chooses to focus can become a habit, habit forms our behaviour, behaviour becomes part of our psyche, then it is reflected in our activities and finally it becomes the personality.
Power of Positive Attitude
Researchers have proved that a person who focuses on positive side of anything, be a person, event or object are happier, live longer and become successful in their life as compared to those who have negative attitude. The statement of the most influential American Philosopher William James furthe strengthens this fact. He said that “Pessimism leads to weakness, optimism to power.”
The following strategies can help us to have a positive work attitude irrespective of any circumstances at work place:
- Examine Your attitude Regularly
- Balance Work with Personal Life
- Focus on the Positive
- Communicate with others
- Turn Unexpected Changes into Opportunity
- Educate Yourself
- Maintain Your Interest
- Maintain a Sense of Humour
- Take Care of Your Health
- Dress for Success
Creating First Impression & Grooming
The first impression becomes very important. In fact a study by Harvard Business School social psychologist, Amy Cuddy, says that if in first few seconds of meeting we are able to show trustworthiness and confidence as leading trait of our personality then we earn a long lasting relationship. And these two traits are conveyed not on the basis of one’s intelligence or experience, rather than on basis of one’s attire and grooming level. Thus one has to work on these two aspects of one’s personality to make first impression extraordinary.
Attire / Clothing
Attire means the way we dress up. As we judge books by their covers similarly we judge people by their clothes. Also the way we dress up show our attitude towards life. It is very important to wear clothes which convery positive about us. In tourism industry it is very important because the way we carry ourselves convey the image of the company as well as the quality of service. This is the reason why airline employees wear high quality formal clothes to reassure high quality of services.
Grooming
The second important area which helps you to create a first good impression is grooming. The Oxford dictionary defines grooming as a noun (derived from ‘groom’) which means to have a neat and tidy appearance. It is imperative to take care of your overall appearance which includes neatness and cleanliness of body and hair.
The following general grooming tips help you to be professionally groomed.
- Hair: Clean and neatly styled, no wet hair, no over the top colours or hairstyles. For Men go for a shorter haircut, and trim chest hair (no hair visible at the neckline!).
- Shoes: Polished and in good condition.
- Nails: Clean, trimmed, neatly manicured. For women no extreme colors or length.
- Cosmetics: Makeup should be conservative, aim for a natural, polished look.
- Perfume/Cologne: Use very little or not at all, clothes should be odour free (no smoke smell!)
- Facial Hair: Clean shaven or trimmed very short and neat.
- Tattoos: Cover all tattoos if possible. No Tattoo should be visible.
- Piercings: Remove all facial and body piercings. For women one earring per ear and for Men no earrings allowed.
- Back-packs: Do not take a back-pack to an on-site interview.
- Purse: A small, conservative handbag or business tote bag is acceptable. Bag should
Basic Social Etiquettes
Etiquette means respect, good manners and good behaviour we project in our social settings be it office, friends or family. Oxford dictionary defines it as ‘the customary code of polite behaviour in society or among members of a particular profession or group. The major areas of business atiquette are: Work and telephone.
1. Work/ Office Etiquette
The following principles given by Myrna Hoover in her work Using Proper Etiquette can be utilized by office employees to show proper etiquette; they include all aspects of the work environment.
- Be timely: To be punctual at work and meetings.
- Be polite, pleasant and courteous: Treat others the way you want to be treated.
- Learn office politics: One should understand the role of different employees. Pay attention to the way things are done.
- Understand the four unwritten rules of business:
- The Boss is the Boss: right or wrong, the boss always has the last word.
- Keep the boss informed. Good or bad, you don’t want the boss to listen informtion mentioned from an inappropriate source.
- Never go over the boss’ head without telling him or her first.
- Make your boss look good. Promotion and opportunities arise when you help the organization reach its goals.
- Adopt a can-do attitude: This highlights the positivity of your personality. Those who accept challenges as opportunity can display creativity and become valuable.
- Be flexible: Not necessary that everything that happens in the office is liked and accepted by you. Sometimes you can have a difference of opinion about a change but at that time it should have flexibility. By remaining flexible and implementing change, you gain a reputation as a cooperative employee.
- Give credit to everyone who made a contribution to a project or event. In this way you earn good reputation and at the same time you will also enjoy credit by others.
- Do not differentiate people by position or standing in a company
2. Business Telephone Etiquette
In the tourism industry, the telephone is the most used as a way of communication with customers and suppliers as well as within the office. The telephone call is answered, creating the image of the company. One can enhance their professional reputation through polite and effective telephone manners.
Answering the Telephone
- A quick telephone response says a lot about you and promotes good public relations.
- A cheerful voice begets a happy caller or listener, and a favourable impression is created.
- Speaking in a warm, audible, clear voice at a moderate pace so that the caller can follow the conversation.
- Not eating, drinking, smoking, or coughing while talking into the mouthpiece.
- Always sound professional, pleased to hear from someone, and ready to deal with their concerns.
Making Telephone Calls
- Try to phone when you know it is convenient for the other person and confirm that they are able to speak.
- Try to phone when you know it is convenient for the other person and confirm that they are able to speak.
- If you make a long-distance call and the other person is not available, you should try again. Do not leave a message that the person should phone you.
When leaving a message
- Give full details so that the person who returns your call can get in touch with you.
- The first name and surname are important, as is the reason for the call.
- Ask when it will be convenient to speak to the person and call back at that time.
When taking a message
- Keep the following at hand at all times: a pen, a message book, a calendar, and a diary (in case appointments have to be made).
- Take messages carefully and write down all the details in your message book for possible future reference.
- Note for whom the message is intended plus the full name and title of the person who called. Ensure that you have the correct spellings of all names and surnames. Record the date and time of the call.
- Obtain their telephone number and code as well as the extension, and ask until what time their call can be returned.
- Note the name of the organisation or business they represent, as well as the purpose of the call.
- In the case of an urgent message, take the caller’s home or cell phone number.
- For safety’s sake, leave the handwritten message on the person’s desk.
Positive Body Language
The study of movements of our body parts like eyes, head, hands, legs, sitting style, walking style, etc. Which is called body language. It is also called gestural communication or kinesics. We have to work on the following areas of the body:
- Eye contact: Eye contact is the first thing that people look for when they meet us. Lack of eye contact signifies inattention and lack of interest.
- Posture: Getting your posture right will automatically make you feel more confident.
- Head position: With our head position we convey many things.
- Arms: One of the most interpreted body parts in body language is arms. It gives away clues as to how open and receptive we are to everyone.
- Legs: Legs again convey a lot about our inner feelings, as these are the farthest point from the brain and difficult to control consciously. The way our legs move conveys our state of mind.
- Hand gestures: With hands we make numerous gestures, and each conveys definitive meaning. Some are:
- Palms slightly up and outward is seen as open and friendly.
- Palm-down gestures are generally seen as dominant, emphasising, and possibly aggressive.
- Mouth movements: Our mouth movements can give away all sorts of clues about us.
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