On December 5th, 2024, Voyager’s World had the pleasure of meeting with Rohit Kapur, MD of Arthur D. Little and an outdoor enthusiast, at the 16th annual ATOAI convention in Tawang, Arunachal Pradesh. Rohit Kapur’s keynote session, titled “Adventure Tourism: The Broader Footprint,” addressed the challenges and opportunities in adventure tourism and provided a road map for sustainable development.
Rohit Kapur discusses today’s situation concerning outdoor adventure activities in an exclusive interview.
In your recent keynote address at the ATOAI convention in Tawang, 2024, you spoke about how outdoor adventure activities can be instrumental in addressing key challenges facing society today. Will you elaborate on that?
As a corporate executive for over three decades and a father of a college-going daughter, I had looked to share my personal experiences and how I used the outdoors and adventure as a common medium to scale challenges I faced in those roles.
While technology has dramatically changed our daily lives, and we speak more of the improved productivity, convenience, and connectedness it brings, there is a dark side as well. Our kids are getting their dopamine fix from a screen, not while out in nature—that is not a good thing. There is a greater incidence and more awareness of mental issues across all categories—it is classified as an epidemic—and the outdoors provides the perfect setting for us to recharge and reset to combat this phenomenon.
Our work environment has changed after Covid – working from home while it offers convenience, and some might argue increased productivity and flexibility, has resulted in corporates struggling with culture. Employees do not interact with each other as much, and there is little sense of belonging to any company. This has compelling organizational issues and can tear down the very fabric of a company if they are not addressed. Again, the outdoors can be a very effective medium to allow employees and cross-functional teams to set a base from where they can build their relationships.
How does social media influence travellers, and can it be used positively?
Social media brings outdoor experiences to our living room! allows us to curate trips to better match our interests. We possibly lose some adventure as it takes the uncertainty and spontaneity out of travel, but maybe that is relevant only for a small minority. It allows us to share our experiences with greater ease, and this flywheel effect is great for the initial economics of the destination. What we unfortunately face now is the challenge of overtourism. The outdoors is a resource and needs to be used judiciously; seeing people drive their cars recklessly over environmentally sensitive areas in Ladakh is shameful. We should use social media to shame such offenders and discourage such behaviour.
How essential do you consider outdoor training for the Indian corporate environment? What are the limitations?
The outdoors is the best leadership and problem-solving training ground there is. It provides for a level playing field and takes one out of their comfort zones, and some of the most effective programs that I have attended/conducted have been outside of the office environment. I remember a team offsite that we did in Rishikesh with a team of 75 people in 2007—15 years later I met an ex-colleague, and he still remembered how he had jumped off a ten-meter rock into the Ganga motivated by his other teammates. To me, that is a sustainable impact! This is how you build corporate culture and get people to have a sense of belonging.
Unfortunately, corporates can be very bottom-line driven, and the benefits from these trainings can take time to show impact. But India, which is a services-driven economy, needs to invest in its key assets (people), and outdoor training is the answer!
What do you expect in 2025?
The trend where people are looking for experiences over acquiring things is strong and will push travel further. Social media will continue to help it on this journey. Over-tourism is the biggest risk, and we should expect some more pushback from residents. Indians will travel more outbound, but inbound traffic will remain challenged because of geopolitics, our infrastructure, and the quality of experiences we can provide.