Abstract
Global tourism leaders are faced with a challenging world where uncertainty and disruption, including political instability, health and safety threats, natural disasters, and economic instability, contribute to leadership challenges inherent within tourism. These challenges stood out for countries within the Americas Region as reported in the World Economic Forum’s 2024 Travel and Tourism Development Index, as the region saw a decline in projected growth. Tourism leaders rely on resilience to help them respond to the complexities of today’s demanding global landscape. Resilience research in the post-pandemic era within the tourism realm is robust, yet empirical data about resilience and adaptability as applied to global tourism leaders remains underexplored. An empirical study, grounded in resiliency theory, examined the relationship between self-perceived resilience and self-perceived adaptability as demonstrated by tourism leaders in the United States and Ecuador, using the Brief Resilience Scale and the Adaptability Scale. Using a quasi-experimental quantitative design, this study shares empirical findings from a 2025 study revealing that United States tourism leaders reported higher self-perceived resilience than those in Ecuador, yet tourism leaders in both countries reported equally high adaptability. The study also indicated that adaptability significantly predicted resilience in both countries. These results contribute to expanding existing research on resilience and adaptability and add depth to tourism leadership research, providing data about the perceptions of global tourism leaders’ resilience. The findings offer a foundation for future research within global leadership and tourism fields to investigate how resilience and adaptability shape resilient, sustainable pathways in global tourism leadership.
Presenters
Karen DyerExecutive Director, Terre Haute Convention and Visitors Bureau, Indiana, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
2026 Special Focus—Pathways to Resilience; Sustainable Practices in Tourism and Leisure
KEYWORDS
Resilience, Adaptability, Resiliency Theory, Global Tourism, Global Leadership, TTDI
