Hospitality Management Education- Issues and Challenges:

This research note was Presented at the National Conference on Hospitality Education- Issues and Challanges at Durgapur Society of Management Sciences, Durgapur, West Bengal. The Seminar was organized in association with INDIAN HOSPITALITY CONGRESS
Abstract

In this study efforts have been made to analyze hospitality education scenario in the current perspective of students and industry expectations and problems associated with it along with the role being played by the Institutions, Industry and regulatory authorities. The observations and analysis, feedback and experience have been put to understand the current situation in true perspective. The aim was to study the issues and challenges in true perspective considering the perception and practices being observed by all stakeholders. From a practitioner’s perspective this study provides opportunity to identify the issues and challenges before Hospitality Management Education in current scenario ranging from requirement of hospitality employers, quality out put, placement scenario, status of trained manpower, hospitality curriculum, turnover, role of Industry, recommendations to employers, expectations from regulatory council, Hospitality Education practices in India with respect to developed nations and timely measure to enhance quality of Hospitality Education.

Rational of the study
Performance of growth in Indian Tourism and Hospitality sector is no where in comparison to many other Countries and in this uncertain period of economic turbulences and sorry phase of terror stricken Tourism Industry, strategic focus on this industry can bring respite to the future problems of the Nation’s Economy to a certain extent as impact of recession on hotels tend to be some what late in terms of registering the impact of economy. Focusing on Hospitality Education is the right approach to address the current and future problems.
Hospitality is a business having International flavour. Institutions should have enough approaches and resources to evaluate International scenario and interrelatedness to the current trends with futuristic approaches. Ultimately only this is going to affect our existence into the business as well as better opportunities to the Tourism sector. More of the content about productivity improvement and cost saving with incorporation of ever changing nature of today’s and tomorrow’s hospitality technology with progress towards Dynamic Hospitality Education in Global perspective should be the objective of Hospitality Educators in India. Cohesiveness is to be brought in the curricula. A serious effort into this direction is to be initiated by all concerned authorities and well wishers of future Hospitality Generations.




Need of Strategic vision
Hospitality stakeholders should come forward with a new strategy for constructive and productive cooperation for the future to develop new generation of hospitality professionals having strategic vision, who are not only going to be manager but more of a visionary and strategist. Strategy to create and develop market for the product. Strategy to sustain and achieve desired target and strategy for growth. It needs widening of the vision- scope to develop interest to grow with faster pace in the competitive and potential market.

Only an effective Hospitality Education System can develop such hospitality professionals. Who can create demand for business as per the planned profit and by running the business the way they want to run it (Mission and Objectives) rather than wait for demand and opportunities. Education system should be capable to highlight scope of Hospitality and can clearly look into future.

Requirement of Hospitality Employers:
Focus for customer service skills
The prime focus and concept of Hospitality revolves around the fundamentals of Hospitality where Customer service skills are valued. Due to intangibility of Hospitality service, parameter for measuring service standard is not there. It is only service standard which helps in Branding of the organization. The hotel employees must then sustain that image through their commitment to service. An architecturally perfect hotel building doesn't form a part of fond memories of a guest as does a memorable direct experience he had involving a hotel employee.

One of the prime requirement of Hospitality Industry is the consistent delivery of quality services which is the result of Programme of quality assurance, it is the key to quality service. Customer Centric Education system will develop this culture and has to be conditioned in hospitality aspirants during his/her education period beside proper emphasis on knowledge, skills and attitude. I am sure this will also help in reducing turnover among hospitality professionals.

Service Quality should be the focus of Education in Hospitality:

The service quality is perhaps be the single most important competitive element in the hotel industry. To produce an effective manager one has to emphasize on:
Continuous reinforcement of this philosophy in both words & deeds during the training.
Guest service training should continue beyond Lecture and Orientation.
Opportunities for empowering, role playing can be adopted with greater thrust
More of the case study method assignments, projects and research than the traditional and formal style to be followed
Emphasizing more on entrepreneurship development
Futuristic approach has to be followed
Education should be Customer Centric We should concentrate more on this factor as this industry involves relationship & provides so much contact between employees and customers which is not in any other industry.
Managerial and supervisory techniques along with expertization in operational skill are prime requirement of the Employer other than customer centric skills.

Various issues which are being observed in current scenario are
Mismatch in quality output
As the Hospitality industry has grown many fold, huge numbers of Hotel Management Institutions are coming in the hospitality education sector. With the growth in the tourism and travel due to many factors country is witnessing sea changes in the demand in all areas of hospitality trade. As the industry is going to witness further expansion as international brands are exploring Indian markets, there is observation and feedback that in spite of large number of fresh hotel management graduates passing out every year Hotel Industry is facing talent crunch. There is mismatch in the quality out put as well shortage of qualified staff is also being felt. This indicate all is not well with the Present Hospitality Education System.

Before going into analysis let us focus on these issues?
Are our Institution producing Real Manager
Age old Curriculum and Methodology along with lack of Higher education are biggest hindrance in producing real manager. Higher Education increases scope for better learning in an analytical way and simultaneously better career by developed vision thus improving overall education scenario and standard. Which transfers to the generations and bench marks are created. Lack of this has developed challenge free education system and career opportunity. Career that too is not what is expected. Which are distracting students very soon thus increasing the turn over rate.

To make them real manager of present time change in curriculum and methodology is a focus area where we have to take initiative. Research programme is to be introduced casting new light on industry operating practices and future trends. At the same time Industrial Training and Project Training needs to be supervised properly by the Institutions to achieve desired objectives. Progress should be forged as to work on making Hospitality Education more dynamic. The aim is to produce Global Hotel Managers with competitive qualities.

Need to changes in the curriculum to meet the expectations of the international travelers and World class Hotels?

Considering the international scope of hospitality, flexibility with advancement and futuristic amalgamation along with the research input has to be the priority of curriculum. Modern approaches are to be incorporated in the curriculum. Methodology need to be readjusted in the age of globalization and Hi Tech. Value addition should be continuous focus and objective of curriculum.

Time has come when we can also focus on Indianization of Hospitality Education. Curriculum should be matching with international industry operating practices and efforts should be made towards uniformity, standardization and advancement of curriculum.



Are they getting proper placement and remuneration after doing Hotel Management?

Hardly students are getting the same what they have dreamt or learnt or what they should have got after graduating in Hospitality Management. What they are getting is nothing but situational exploitation which is due to non uniform education standards and inefficient HR policies of some of the organizations.

It is one of the challenge before the Management Institution to analyze why in spite of Hotel Management Degree majority of students are landing at entry level? Why not on supervisory or managerial positions ? this is a major issue.

In absence of set uniformed quality standards and parameters for said courses there is lot of variations in performance level of the students. Which Leads to imbalance in supply position and thus giving opportunities to hotels to follow different yard stick for different student and programme. Lack of Institutional coordination is also responsible for the plight of Hospitality aspirants.

Variations in performance level due to variety of curriculum, course designing and many facet of Hospitality Courses, is leading Hotels to follow different yard sticks and adjust there demand as per the availability of manpower which is a serious concern for all Hotel Management Institutions. This starts distracting students from the attraction of Hotel Management despite having good objective & usefulness to students.

Are our manpower properly trained?
More numbers of colleges leading to scarcity of the qualified faculties thus thinning down the existing quality of faculty.

Slow and lesser scope for career growth, thus no motivation left for faculty for contributing towards academic excellence.

Lack of scope for advance study in Hospitality field, setting up no parameter for comparison and lack of competition among the existing faculties due to poor career progression and remuneration are some of the challenges need to be addressed. Also this is one of the major reason for the shortage of committed scholarly faculties, who can develop interest among students towards deeper analysis and research and produce a competent hospitality professional. Teaching in absence of formal training requirement as well as availability of such training programmes for faculties is like either ‘Swim or Sink” Instructions to them.

Most of the Faculties joining by compulsion than interest for teaching. Thus creating a temporary mindset which is going to be disastrous for Hospitality Education.



Career Progression for faculties
Dynamic policies for the faculty career growth is need of the hour. Faculty contributing academically must be rewarded, which is hardly there. This will set new benchmark and shall motivate others to contribute accordingly. Impact of this will be always reflected from the performance and ultimately benefit of this will help in developing students. Training should be never ending exercise. More and more developmental in- service training programmes are needed to upgrade them.

Why the turnover rate is so high among new entrants?
Problems and reasons associated with turnover rate in industry are some what also correlated to Institutional Training System and Culture. As Institution only has produced future managers. Better standard of training, infrastructure and resources will produce better managers, who in return will give professionally best to the new entrants in industry reducing these problems.

Mismatch between expectation and reality is one of the cause of this diversion. Organizational Objectives and employees aspirations should go hand in hand. Only effective HR System implementation can bring these changes.

Aspiration for better pay, better work life and faster career growth becomes priority in comparison to liking for hospitality job and desire to excel as a hotelier. Inefficient hiring system and quality of leadership are some of the common causes.
Liking for the job, adoptability and suitability to fit in the culture of a particular property as a professional is not insured during hiring process. We shall not do justice if we don’t mention the feed back of majority of the students. It is always not monitory but other hygiene factors also e.g. the way they are treated every day, lack of appreciation, lack of team work and the perception that the company doesn’t care about employees are consistently the highest-rated reasons for low job satisfaction.
This un professionalism of the industry is being filtered to future hoteliers thus affecting their motivation, interest and seriousness. By the time they pass out their genuine love for hospitality and desire to excel as a hotelier, are slowly giving away.

High attrition rate is also attributed to unprofessional training programme both by the Institution as well as by the Industries which further aggravate this by non productive planning and exploitation.



Role of Industry
It is unfortunate to see that hardly any constructive support and encouragement to Institution come from industry. Which reflects poor status of Institutions. Industry Institution interface helps to get instant feedback as well as the need for training which helps in a big way to design Effective Training. Industry must play a constructive role. Learning atmosphere should be created by Hospitality Industry –Institution. Support for advance research should come from the industry.
Training and HR department should be manned with sufficient / required number of responsible professionals.

HR department shouldn’t be neglected or treated as record keeping and payroll maintaining department. Productivity and Efficiency depends upon quality of people we have. While quality in all aspects of business is important, improving service quality is cheaper than improving product quality. Training cost should be looked upon as an investment and not cost. The investment in turn will generate higher sales margins and profitability in the future with guest satisfaction.

In this present scenario of economic melt down and terror stricken Tourism industry following guidelines for HR and Training can be savior of the organization as well as can be helpful to solve many problems associated with the Hospitality aspirants

· Better training programme to improve service quality as high quality service gives sales growth.
· Training for professionalism and multiskilling will help in productivity which needs to be evaluated. Also it will lead to effective utilization of manpower thus reducing employee requirement per room.
· Higher employee satisfaction & pride. This improves employees productivity & retention and reduce both recruitment and manufacturing cost.
· Better service standards indirectly encourages better corporate behaviour and promote better relations.
· Establishing service quality parameters with accountability with its linking to performance.
· All these factors will lead to a satisfied and motivated employees.

This communication of professionalism will travel down the line developing interest and seriousness among future hospitality aspirants.


Recommendation to Employers

Implementing effective hiring system
Clarity in Job Description
Systematic orientation and induction
Formal well designed training programmes during various training e.g. Industrial training as well as during job training
Emphasis on building team culture
Career progression and succession planning for employees along with in- service training programme
Application of scientific approaches in Human Resources Management
On the job training – many hotels prefer to give on the job training rather than special coaching classes/ tutorial by training cell. It is cheapest but most traumatic for employees.
Avoid giving inappropriate/inadequate training which leads to mistakes resulting in discouragement & demotivation. Thus leaving the job. In many of the cases this is also among the major cause of developing disinterest towards the Hotel job as students are not having any formal training schedule.

Training and HR department should be manned with sufficient / required number of staff so that right training environment with objectivity is created which will automatically increase productivity of organization by effective utilization of trained man power.

More industry-institution interface; which will help in increase retention in future as well as learning of the student.

Assisting and encouraging institution in research application and recognizing their contribution which will pave way for others to follow.

More involvement in instituting award will bring Industry closer to Institutions.


Expectations from Regulatory/ Statutory Bodies/ councils
Similar regulatory council and regulatory body controlling curriculum for Hospitality Education is need of the hour.

Variety of curriculum which is not structured and standardized and in most of the cases even not regularized. Mushrooming growth of Hotel Management Institution in country without any controlling authority and proper curriculum has worsened the situation.

Proper Regulatory Authority for Hotel Management for all colleges in Country to bring uniformity and to standardize the scheme & curriculum and to look after standardizing the system at par with International curriculum is suggested.
Compulsory exposure for faculties to undergo through Hospitality Training programme, Standardized lesson plans, study materials, training manuals & teaching methodologies along with guidelines for examinations and evaluation system will help in bringing uniformity in Indian hospitality education sector, which will improve the standard of Hospitality Education & check degradation. Thus reducing the gap between demand and supply of quality man power in Hotel & Hospitality Industry.

Hospitality Education Authorities are required to sit together and formulate guidelines to bring uniformity & cohesiveness to avoid these anomalies.

Flexible approaches to be adopted in giving clearances and approvals to Institutions who are keen to start Post Graduation Programme in Hospitality Management. As we have scarcity of PG Courses in this field and delay will have serious repercussions.


Hospitality Management Practices in India with respect to developed Nations
Things have changed a lot from the day when Hospitality Education started in India with modest beginning with short programme in late fiftees. National Council for Hotel Management and Catering Technology was setup in 1982 to which most of the IHM’S under Government were affiliated. AICTE Act of parliament in 1987, with a view to insure the proper planning and coordinated development of technical education system throughout the country came in to existence. Despite all of this Hospitality Education in India is not Uniformed, Standardized, Structured and Regulated properly. At least AICTE & NCHMCT are contributing towards this but considering the mushrooming of Institutions, regulations needs to be more effective and in totality with wider application.

Colleges are giving 3 Year Diploma, 3 year Degree, 4 Year Degree with regular & Distance mode, with variety of the subjects as they feel convenient and non uniformed curriculum. Shortage of Course specific designed books are main constraints. Whatever is available that too is not as per the requirement and practice being followed in operations. It is surprising when we see curriculum of many colleges where subsidiary subjects are being taught in general, not organization specific.

I had privileges to teach International Curriculum. Which follow more of directed self learning style focusing on non formal education approach, that makes a student more analytical and focused to objectives. More time for students activity, case study, presentation, discussions and queries than for the lecture only, which helps in learning and broadening of vision of the students.

Role of faculties in these classes are of a facilitator, to initiate discussion about the topic, develop interest towards the topic and make it more interactive. Most of the time is for the students- be it discussion and presentation.

The success of this methodology is well designed subject specific course materials and books giving more opportunity for interactive learning contrast to our formal education system, which is following one way communication most of the time.

Hardly in India Hospitality Organization approaches any Institution for assistance in research and consultancy. What ever scope was there earlier it is vanished now? Efforts to contribute towards Industry in the form of specialized research work should be followed from developed nations. Scarcity of research in Hospitality Institution is leading Hotels to Professional Research consultants in contrast to developed nations who utilize expertise of Hospitality Institutions. This has to be taken as a challenge by the Institutions. So that system can be revolutionized.





Timely measures to enhance the quality of Hospitality Education in India
Uniform and standard curriculum considering future needs is to be designed by committed and experienced people.
Universities, Institutions and councils should have cohesiveness as far as structuring and designing of curriculum is concerned.

Professional should design Hospitality Specific course materials and books.

Guidelines to be framed for industry - institution interface on regular intervals.

Emphasis on non formal education system with emphasis on entrepreneurship development.

Professional practices are to be followed by employers to increase productivity.

Competency level to be increased to the global standard.

Even the standards of hotel management institution run by The Oberoi Hotels, Taj Group Hotels and ITC Group can be set as standards for the time being.

Formation of consortium and core group from institutions to put forward their views before industry and continuous coordination and interrelationship among institutions. Encouraging interactive sessions with Industry and accordingly passing feedback to the institutions for implementation of changes.

Frequent interactions between Institutions to form strategies to resolve issues and challenges on regular intervals to consider issues related to Hospitality Education Sector.

Urgent need for designing Uniform Course Structure and Degree controlled by proper Council or regularity authority.

At present I see AICTE as light in the dark and feel that this council should work with objectivity to Standardized, Regulate, Monitor and Promote various courses of Hospitality Education to bring uniformity in the Hospitality Education System, and it should work seriously towards development of Hospitality Education in India and keep control over mushrooming number of non qualified Institutions.

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