Case 1: The Nordic Adventure Project

North Adventure Tours & Unique Resorts (NATURE) is a Swedish SME company with four employees and approximately ten seasonal workers (during summer and winter). NATURE started 2002 by four friends, with the mission to arrange adventure tours or trips, mainly in the Nordic mountain areas of Sweden, Norway and Finland.

Maria is the CEO and owner together with the other shareholders (Olivia, Oscar and Catherine), everyone acting as guides and expedition leaders when needed. NATURE mostly offers and arranges guiding theme tours, including for example walking, climbing, animal watching, and fishing. The length of the trips is usually a weekend (Friday to Sunday), or occasionally some more days. Tourists mainly come from Sweden, the other Nordic countries, and Europe.

During spring 2020, an American travel agency contacted NATURE, looking for a thematic adventure trip in Northern Sweden. More specifically, the agency’s request was a one-week trip for approximately 20 people, including accommodation. The agency also claimed that this kind of event had become more and more requested by tourists in the US. Hence, if NATURE were to do a good job, they could expect more orders in the future.

This was a great opportunity for NATURE to increase their liquidity, since many tourists had cancelled their planned trips during the previous winter seasons, due to unusually bad weather conditions. However, due to certain reasons NATURE had to specify an offer to the travel agency within one week.

Maria, Olivia and Oscar where all enthusiastic about the opportunity and the challenge to arrange such a big event. As they saw it, this could both improve company finances and make the firm grow by offering more comprehensive adventure tours. Catherine was more sceptical. She pointed out the risks of their lack of experiences arranging such a big event, as well as the short time for completing the offer. However, due to a majority decision, NATURE answered on the request arranging a thematic adventure trip, which they called “The Nordic Adventure” (Including Climbing Kebnekaise, visiting villages of Laplanders, rafting on one of the great rivers, overnight stay in the open air, and a safari looking for elks and bears).

However, based on Catharine’s considerations, they decided to plan and arrange the thematic adventure trip in the way of a project. The initiative came from Olivia who had some knowledge about project management from her time at the university. Oscar also had some experiences of project work from his time in the construction industry, before working at NATURE. Hence, further on they called the event “The Nordic Adventure Project”.