Post-pandemic tourism resiliency: Lesson from Bali leadership capacities

Abstract

It has been two years since the COVID-19 pandemic hit the world. Tourism practitioners have noted that besides the past incidents like the Bali bombing and Mount Agung eruption that historically impacted the Bali tourism sector, the pandemic also proved to influence the tourism sector. Scholars and policymakers in Indonesia know much less about the importance of resilience in encountering this situation. Therefore, strong leadership should navigate the recovery of this sector. This research investigated a series of FGD (focus group discussions) conducted from mid-2019 to 2021 and analyzed them using a narrative methodology involving five big tourism associations in Bali. The findings reveal that to survive in the uncertain situation, strong leadership in guiding the recovery of tourism business should be navigated by predictive accuracy behavior. Along with a detailed plan, the tourism sector managers should place a higher initiating structure than before the pandemic and act as role models to allow the business to survive. This research also identified several innovative leadership capacities to be considered by the tourism practitioners in enhancing Bali tourism's “bounce back”