Waterford Institute of Technology: Office of Research and Innovation

Researcher's Biography

Name: Roseline Dalton

Qualifications:

1. Diploma in Hotel Management in Dublin Institute of Technology

2. BA (Honours) Hospitality Management in Waterford Institute of Technology

Biography

Since graduating from DIT in 1987, with a Diploma in Hotel Management, Roseline has gained experience in the fields of hospitality, tourism and services, in which she has worked at the cutting edge of new product and service development on several occasions. She has seen the hospitality and tourism business evolving and has witnessed many trends and challenges in the fields of both domestic and international hospitality, travel and tourism products. Roseline has set up and operated her own hospitality and retail businesses and operated them successfully, and has a good understanding of the issues and tough challenges facing many SME’s and business in general. Roseline’s time spent running her own business has led her to develop a strong appreciation of the business challenges and the need for continuous innovation many SME’s face in their day-to-day business activities. Roseline says she was lucky to have the opportunity to return fulltime to third level education in 2007 and graduated in 2008 with a first class honours degree in hospitality management from WIT.

Returning to third level education had been highly stimulating for her and she was amazed at how being able to draw upon my previous professional experience allowed me to build a more complete understanding of the subjects being studied. It was the enjoyment and immersion of completing her research dissertation that led her to the decision to continue her studies in a research capacity to postgraduate level. Under the supervisor of Ms Anne Marie Lally from the WIT School of Languages, Tourism and Hospitality and Dr Patrick Lynch WIT Business School, Roseline submitted a proposal to Fáilte Ireland in 2008 for a research scholarship, which was subsequently granted, and provides substantial funding for the two year period of her studies. The title of her postgr aduate research masters is ‘Designing Tourism Experiences: A Conceptual Framework for the Process of Experience Concept Development’.

Research Interests:

Roseline’s research interests lie mainly in the field of tourism, and cover the areas of new product and service development, the understanding of the nature of tourism experiences and the design of tourism experiences specifically for culture and heritage organisations. She actively partakes and contributes to the research groups of which she is a member at WIT, the RIKON Research group, The Centre for Research, Creativity and Innovation in Tourism (CRCIT), and the WIT Graduate Business Society. Roseline regularly attends industry gatherings in particular Failte Ireland South East Information sessions, MERGO training workshops and national conferences.

Research Project:

The title of Roseline’s research project is: ‘Designing Tourism Experiences: A ConceptualFramework for the Process of Experience Concept Development’

Other Works:

Dalton, R Lynch, P & Lally, AM. (2009) 'Towards a Model of New Service Development for Differentiated Tourism services' Proceedings of the 5th Annual Tourism and Hospitslity Research in Ireland Conference (THRIC)

Dalton, Roseline and Lynch, Patrick and Lally, Anne Marie (2009) TOWARDS AN UNDERSTANDING OF EXPERIENCE CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT IN TOURISM SERVICE DESIGN (RIKON Group). In: EuroCHRie, 22 - 24th October, 2009, Helsinki