From Mindset to Practice: How Employees’ Attitudes Impact Tourism Businesses’ Sustainability Practices

ABSTRACT

Recognizing that attitudes can drive positive behavioral intentions, the study examines the effects of tourism business employees’ attitudes toward sustainable tourism on their involvement in economic, socio-cultural, environmental, political, and technological sustainability practices. The results of the 389 questionnaires completed by the employees revealed that employees’ attitudes toward sustainable tourism significantly affect the involvement of tourism businesses in sustainable practices. Importantly, these insights suggest that tourism businesses should prioritize cultivating a pro-sustainable mind-set among employees, enhancing training that links sustainability and business viability, and continuously aligning their sustainability strategies with changing societal standards. This study contributes to the literature on tourism businesses and sustainable tourism development, offering actionable insights for new policy interventions.

KEYWORDS:

• Business sustainability practices
• employees’ attitudes toward sustainable tourism
• Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
• sustainable tourism
• tourism businesses, tourism destinations

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to extend their appreciation to the Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia to fund this paper under the Fundamental Research Grant Scheme (FRGS), 2019 and 2021 (Grant no. FRGS/1/2019/WAB12/TAYLOR/02/1 and FRGS/1/2021/SS02/TAYLOR/02/1) that makes this paper possible. This paper is partially funded by the Faculty of Social Sciences and Leisure Management, Taylor’s University, Malaysia.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia under the Fundamental Research Grant Scheme (FRGS), 2019 and 2021 (Grant no. FRGS/1/2019/WAB12/TAYLOR/02/1 and FRGS/1/2021/SS02/TAYLOR/02/1).