INNOVATION IN SLOVENIAN TOURISM ORGANISATIONS

The purpose – Slovenian tourism organisations must constantly focus on developing variety innovations for organisations. In this paper, we present a study conducted on innovation practices in Slovenian tourism organisations. Design/methodology – In a survey conducted on Slovenia tourism organisations, we obtained data and identified their innovation performance and the innovation climate in their area of business. There are three main hypothesis tested. Findings – The research sample of 41 organisations found that most innovation in tourism organisations came through the introduction of new services (90%), followed by innovation through new organisational methods (73%), and found a high-level climate for innovation. Worse was its assessment of research activity within organisations and cooperation with external institutions (eg. universities and research institutes) and investment in innovation activities within their research and development. Results obtained from the research showed a mean value for the innovation climate-instrument of 3.83 indicating a high innovation climate for the Slovenian tourism companies included in the sample survey. Mostly, (publicly known as) more innovative active organisations responded to our survey. From such results, we find that tourism organisations included in the survey are aware of the importance of innovation, teaching organisations to communicate well and network with other organisations, are adaptable to change and engaged with their own ideas in support of the organisation's management. Originality of the research – The contribution of the research is that it has applied the generic instrument for measuring innovation climate on tourism and the first time climate is measured in Slovenia