Creating welcoming spaces where people feel like they belong is critical to community vitality and sustained economic growth, and we must complement metrics with a compelling narrative that appeals to emotions and core values. 

The Social Inclusion Lexicon highlights 25 words used to articulate the significance of creating welcoming spaces, weaving together the tangible benefits of inclusion with its profound impact on individuals and communities. In doing so, we engage political leaders and community stakeholders in a dialogue that goes beyond numbers, to the very essence of why it is important to welcome and treat people with respect and dignity. 

The Lexicon aims to help provide framing for destinations on the rules of effective language:

1. Keep it simple.

Unless you speak the language of your intended audience, you won’t be heard by the people you want to reach. When it comes to effective communication, small beats large, short beats long, and plain beats complex.

2. Say It. Repeat it. Say it again. 

Finding a good message and then sticking with it takes extraordinary discipline, but it pays. Remember, you may tire of saying the same exact same thing again and again, but many in your audience will be hearing it for the first time.

3. Provide context.

Without context, you cannot establish a message’s value, its impact or, most importantly, its relevance. Far too often, leaders in our industry tout the benefits of tourism and destination promotion without providing a broader context. We provide “solutions” without attaching them to an identifiable “problem,” and, in such instances, those solutions come across as meaningless.

4. Credibility is as important as philosophy.

The words you use become you, and you become the words you use. If your words lack sincerity, if they contradict accepted facts, circumstances, or perceptions, they will lack impact.