Navigating the early stages of a large sustainability-oriented rural tourism development project : lessons from Træna, Norway

Abstract

This paper draws on data collected through multiple approaches and presents an exploration of the early stages of a large sustainability-oriented rural tourism development project. Through a streamlined qualitative analysis, the study revealed four tactical moves deployed in the early stages of the project. The moves include instilling project legitimacy, forging a support network, anchoring the project, and mobilising resources and capabilities. Further analysis revealed that these moves tend to reinforce each other, and thus they require concurrent implementation. Subsequently, the study develops a framework delineating drivers, enablers, challenges, and key success factors for navigating the early stages of a large sustainability-oriented rural tourism development project. Intriguingly, the study contradicts the path dependence perspective, which is often used in project management research. Instead, it suggests that the early stages of such projects require tactical path creation involving well-calculated actions that serve as a breeding ground for valuable random incidents. Keywords: rural tourism, destination development, sustainable tourism, sustainability-oriented project, project management, project early stages