Communication and sustainable development. The emergence of innovation in tourism design

Sustainable development and social responsibility have become necessities to serve the overall policy of the company to preserve the environment, including the tourism sector. This development implies major changes in attitudes and behavior of firms. Innovation is a key to satisfy customers who are in increasingly globalized markets and are, at the same time segmented. In many previous studies it has been emphasized the influence onto innovation of several factors, including the introduction of ICTs. However, until now, few works have addressed the analysis of the role of communication dimension in the emergence of innovation in the design process of tourism. Using as an antecedent an investigation conducted over several years, in which it has been used a method of Naturalistic Decision Making situation, we present a theoretical reflection of whose arguments it follows the need to include the communication dimension in the innovative processes of tourist design. The first part of the article focuses on the emergence of innovation within project structures and tries to capture the place of communication in the design process. The second part is concerned with decision making in those processes. The conclusion suggests that the consideration of the communication dimension is guarantee of success in the process of innovation in the tourism field, given the complex interactions over time between the actors involved in the design.