The Tour Operating Model

If you’re anything like me, you’re constantly looking for ways to improve your operations. Whether that’s through automation, new tools, or better workflows. It’s easy to get caught up in the constant pursuit of the latest tactics and innovations. Plus, there’s always a new tool promising to revolutionise your business (including Fieldbook)! While tactical changes can help, they won’t drive long-term improvements, unless they’re part of a broader plan.

This article introduces you to the Tour Operating Model Canvas. This is a framework that helps you map out your operating model so you can see how different parts of your operations work together so you gain a clear understanding of how your operations function as a whole. This allows you to pinpoint the areas of your operations that truly need attention and prioritize the initiatives that will yield the highest return on investment.

The Tour Operating Model Canvas was designed to complement our new course, Mastering Tour Operations: Your Guide to Building a World-Class Tour Business, created in partnership with WeTravel. The course will be available for free on the WeTravel Academy. It’s designed to equip tour operators with practical tools, frameworks, and strategies to build a customised operations system—one that is scalable, efficient, and built to endure.

Before we dive in, I want to assure you that I’ll keep the language as simple and straightforward as possible. Before starting Fieldbook, I spent years as a consultant with Deloitte, helping large corporations streamline their operations. My role involved analysing their operating models, identifying areas for improvement, and building roadmaps to implement those changes. It meant countless hours in stuffy office rooms, wearing a suit, and speaking corporate jargon (e.g. synergies). The good news? The lessons I learned from that time directly inform what I’ll be sharing with you today.

What is an Operating Model?

An Operating Model describes how a business delivers value to its customers and stakeholders. In the case of a tour operator, the operating model simply describes how a tour company creates and delivers unforgettable tours to its guests. It’s a framework that helps answer questions like:

• What are the suppliers that are used to help deliver the experience?
• What staff and guides are responsible for arranging and leading the tour?
• What processes need to be followed to ensure the tour is delivered as expected?
• What tools and management systems are relied on?

Tours are complex with many moving parts, long planning cycles and many parties that need to be co-ordinated with. Having a clear understanding of how all these parts come together helps you see the big picture. This is the value of an operating model: think of it as mapping the blueprint of your business.

Operating Models vs. Business Models

It’s worth touching on the difference between an operating model and a business model. They are related, but describe different things. You can think of the business model as an outward facing description of the business (e.g. we target this market by providing these products and services) while an operating model is an inward facing description of the business (e.g. we create our products and services by following these processes and using these resources).

An operating model and business model are ways to describe an organisation but focus on different areas:

• A business model focuses on the strategic choices a company makes to create value and capture market opportunities. It covers aspects like go-to-market, customer segments, competitive position and the product and services it offers. For a tour operator, this may be the destinations it specialises in, the travellers it focuses on, and its point of difference.
• An operating model is focused on execution of the strategy to deliver the value. It describes how the company operates day in and day out to achieve the goals of the business model. It covers things like processes, technology and people.

Why Mapping Out Your Tour Operating Model Matters

You can think of the Tour Operating Model as shining a floodlight across your entire business. This broad illumination allows you to see everything in its entirety, providing general visibility without focusing on any single point. This is the perspective you need to understand operations as a whole.

Now, consider automations, process improvement, new tools and technology as lasers. They focus light into a concentrated beam, allowing you to zero in on specific areas, and see that point in great detail. Lasers are helpful, but relying solely on these can cause you to miss the broader context if used in isolation.

It’s easy to get caught up trying and testing the latest tool. If you rely only on lasers, you risk missing the bigger picture. Using a floodlight first allows you to see everything clearly, identify opportunities, and then use lasers to target specific improvements with precision.

So what’s the floodlight for your operations?

Introducing the Tour Operating Model Canvas

The Tour Operating Model Canvas is a tool that helps you visualize your operating model. It is a visual representation to help map out an operating model, specifically for tour operators. It’s the floodlight, illuminating every part of operations—from suppliers to processes—so you can identify what’s working well and where there’s room for improvement. Taking the time to map your Tour Operating Model allows you to step back, uncover inefficiencies, and lay the foundation for strategic growth.

The Tour Operating Model Canvas is, quite literally, a blank canvas for you to start mapping out your operations. It is intended to be visual and high level so that you can consider your operations as a whole, without getting bogged down in too granular details. In future blog posts we will introduce the Target Tour Operating model, which is where you map out your target, or desired, operating model based on looking at opportunities in your current operating model for improvement.

The Six Operational Elements of the Canvas

To fully understand tour operations, we need to break them down into their core components. These six essential elements form the framework of the Tour Operating Model and provide a clear structure for assessing and improving your business. Let’s explore each one:

Mapping Your Current Tour Operating Model

Before you can improve anything, you need a clear picture of the current state of things. By mapping out your operating model, you’ll gain a clear understanding of where your operations currently stand and lay the groundwork for identifying improvement opportunities, which we’ll dive into in a future article.

Here are steps to mapping out your operating model:

• Set Up Your Canvas: Download the Tour Operating Model Canvas from our resource section and either print it out to stick on a wall, or upload it to your favourite virtual whiteboard app, like Miro.
• Map Out Your Current Operating Model: Start filling in your operating model by working through the six operational elements on the canvas. Use post-it notes (virtual or digital) to represent each item.
• Rate Your Overall Effectiveness: Assign a performance score to your current operating model. This score will help you gauge how satisfied you are with your existing operations and provide an early indication of how much change might be required.

Here are a few Tips for Success:

• Use post-it notes: Post-its (virtual or physical) are ideal for mapping out your operating model because they’re easy to move around, adjust, and refine. Using large, clear handwriting helps you focus on big-picture items without getting bogged down in details. This flexibility is perfect for brainstorming and adjusting ideas on the fly.
• Collaboration is crucial: If you have a team, involve 3-5 people to gather diverse perspectives. Keeping the group size odd helps avoid deadlocks when decisions need to be made. If you’re on your own, consider bouncing ideas off a trusted colleague or advisor for additional insights.
• Aim for completion not perfection: Focus on capturing the big picture rather than obsessing over details. The goal here is to get a broad overview that you can refine later. Remember, this exercise is about understanding your current state, not creating a flawless map.

Illustrative Example: Amazing Tours

To bring this concept to life, let’s explore a fictional example designed to illustrate how the Tour Operating Model Canvas works in practice and provide a clearer understanding of its application. Amazing Tours is a one-person company specialising in public multi-day tours. Jenny, the owner, has grown her business from running just three tours annually to nine tours a year.

However, as she approaches her 10th tour, Jenny feels her operations are becoming increasingly unmanageable. While she has ideas for improvement, she needs a systematic approach to pinpoint exactly where changes are needed, what to focus on first, and how to implement them effectively. Jenny has taken the time to map out her operations on the Tour Operating Model Canvas.

Let’s go through each of the 6 components:

• Suppliers: Amazing Tours primarily relies on transactional relationships with suppliers, reserving services on an as-needed basis, often through online travel agencies (OTAs). They rent vehicles for each tour and have established a strategic partnership with one hotel to secure better rates and consistent availability. Additionally, they book flights for passengers, but this process is time-consuming and offers low margins.
• Resources: The company’s resources are minimal, consisting mainly of merchandise and basic equipment. Most services, such as guiding and transportation, are outsourced to external providers.
• People: Jenny manages the business independently with part-time support for reservations and administrative tasks from a virtual assistant.
• Processes:
  Amazing Tours follows a structured but straightforward sequence for managing tours:
  • First, Jenny plans tour dates, deciding when tours will take place.
  • Next, she secures reservations from suppliers with limited availability, such as hotels.
  • Then, Jenny focuses on promotion and sales, marketing the tours through various channels and managing customer bookings.
  • As the tour dates approach, she reviews bookings, monitoring reservations and releasing any unused accommodations.
  • Afterward, she moves to preparation, coordinating with suppliers and guides to ensure everything is ready for the tour.
  • Finally, Jenny conducts a post-tour review, gathering feedback and insights to improve future tours.
• Technology:
  Jenny has a simple tech stack that hasn’t evolved much over the last 3 years
  • Jenny uses Squarespace to host her website and provide an online presence for Amazing Tours.
  • She relies on G-Suite for email, document creation, and cloud storage to keep her business organised.
  • An enquiry form helps Jenny collect customer information and manage initial inquiries efficiently.
  • For logistics and operational details, she uses spreadsheets, which allow her to track bookings and schedules manually.
  • Jenny creates tour documents and marketing materials using Canva, ensuring they are professional and engaging.
  • To handle accounting and cash flow, she uses Xero, keeping her finances organised.
  • Finally, Jenny sends marketing emails to her customers using Mailchimp, helping her promote tours and stay connected with her audience.
• Management Systems: Jenny relies on a shared calendar to manage her schedule and that of her virtual assistant. She tracks her tasks on a to-do list in G-Suite, and Financial tracking is handled in Xero, providing a high-level view of cash flow and profitability.

Up Next: Creating Your Target Operating Model

Once you have a clear understanding of your current operating model, spotting opportunities for improvement becomes much simpler. Some of these opportunities might stand out right away, while others may emerge through team discussions. Mapping your operating model helps you visualise and plan these changes with greater clarity. In our next article, we’ll explore how to pinpoint these opportunities and use them to create a Target Operating Model—a strategic blueprint for achieving operational excellence.