Faculty in focus: Lidija Lalicic, Department of Tourism and Service Management

A Passionate Researcher

Lidija Lalicic is Assistant Professor at the Department of Tourism and Service Management at Modul University Vienna. As a lecturer, she appreciates efficient small teams, and, as a scientist, the freedom of research and internationality.

Lidija Lalicic was born into a lively and colorful household. Her father, who immigrated from Montenegro to the Netherlands in the 1970s and married her Dutch mother, ran a Balkan restaurant near Maastricht for many decades. There Lidija grew up together with her three sisters. Even as a child, she was drawn to the idea of traveling and discovering as many other countries as possible. Therefore, the decision to study in the field of tourism was an obvious one. She received her Bachelor of Business Administration with a major in Tourism and Event Management from the Zuyd University of Applied Sciences in Maastricht and studied at four different universities in Denmark, Spain, Slovenia and the Netherlands for her European Master of Science in International Tourism Management. In between, she gained practical experience in sales and event management in Brussels and Maastricht. In 2012, the young scholar arrived in Vienna. ‘’I came across the offer of a PhD position at Modul University Vienna on the Internet, applied for it and was accepted,’’ says Lidija about her journey to the MUV campus on Kahlenberg. In her dissertation, she dealt with innovation opportunities for the tourism industry enhanced by social media. In 2015, Lidija was the first graduate of the PhD program at Modul University Vienna, and in 2017 she received the ITB Science Award. In 2016 she also received the Dr. Ing. Maria Schaumayer Certificate of Recognition as well as various research awards from the Vienna Economic Chamber. She is currently an Assistant Professor at the Department of Tourism and Service Management and an active member of the Board of Directors of the International Federation of Technology Travel and Tourism (IFITT) and the European Cities Marketing (ECM) Research Statistics & Knowledge Group. In addition, she is in charge of the Gender & Diversity Party at Modul University Vienna, which aims to provide equal study and work opportunities.

Smart Destination Management

Lidija Lalicic sees destination management as a challenging task. She is convinced that "the current paradigm shift and increasing ‘overtourism’ demands new, innovative approaches and codetermination techniques to create a sustainable future’’. For three years she worked on a highly complex research project in cooperation with various universities and companies, where smart tourism destination management was analyzed with an innovative method called ‘’serious gaming’’. Serious gaming is a tool for playing games, similar to Monopoly, which allows you to put yourself in the shoes of different stakeholders and then draw conclusions for better planning,’’ says Lidija. She is currently researching in the areas of tourism experience design with regard to social media, branding and storytelling, and innovation management in tourism, also in cooperation with private groups. She attaches particular importance to the creation of innovative tools to involve as many stakeholders as possible, participatory planning, and the involvement of local people in the dialogue.

Freedom and Efficiency

As a lecturer, Lidija Lalicic teaches in the Bachelor and MBA programs in the areas of entrepreneurship, storytelling and destination management. ‘’I want to inspire my students to think critically about the challenges of the future while being creative and innovative,’’ she says. She appreciates that the small team structure of Modul University Vienna makes it possible to work efficiently and opens up many opportunities for both students and lecturers. This also applies to the integration into regional and international networks as well as the contacts to industry and tourism organizations. For her professional future, she plans to become an associate professor at Modul University Vienna within the next five years and further expand her research interests.