What It Takes To Make A Successful Career In Hospitality?

Offering great exposure, luxurious lifestyle, and remuneration, Hospitality is now amongst the most sought after career in the country.

Youngsters are blithely perusing travel and tourism courses as it not only serves as a stable and secure career option but also guarantees to satisfy the hunger of adventure enthusiasts. The Indian government is readily investing in new strategies to help students obtain a high level of education in this field

As easy it may sound, it takes a lot of hard work and determination to build a successful career in this field. Here are some few advice nuggets to carve a successful career in hospitality.   

Effective communication skills and confidence is the key

Hospitality career is typically characterized by flashing suits, extravagant décor, and international delicacies. You need to have some key skills to survive in this field. An ideal hospitality candidate is patient and has the ability to handle tricky situations with ease. The communication skills should be fairly good and there should be a readiness to work under odd working hours. Hospitality management courses teach the working of the hospitality industry in great detail to students.

Financial management

Besides having a pleasing personality, the candidate should also have good financial skills. They should have a good understanding of tax liability and cash flow. Students learn Mathematics and accounts during the management and finance classes to have a basic understanding of handling finances.

A good cultural awareness

Since you will be attending international guests and people from varied backgrounds, you must have the cultural know-how of almost every country. It would be great if you know how to speak some foreign languages like French, Spanish, and Chinese to specifically attend such guests.

Most importantly, the candidate should have an open mind towards everything. He should have the ability to resolve any misunderstanding that rises between the staff and guests. 

Job Prospects After a Tourism Course

Employment potential in travel and tourism sector is huge and largely untapped. Job and career opportunities are many, both in private as well as public sector. Career prospects increase further for qualified tourism professionals who have a degree in hand. It helps them develop strong communication and business management skills, thus broadening their job prospects. After successfully completing course from a reputed college, one can work with tour operators, travel agencies, transport companies, airlines and government departments of tourism as information assistants, tourist guides, officers and managers. Here are the job prospects for students who join the industry after pursuing a course in travel and tourism: 

Airlines: jobs in airlines offer a number of travel opportunities to exciting destinations. For all those who wish to work in airlines, a course in travel and tourism can be of great help. It gives them a chance to learn ways to maintain clientele base and build networking and customer service skills. After completing a course from a reputed college/institute one can work as sales and marketing officer, traffic assistance and flight attendant.

Travel agencies: travel agencies need agents who can assess the needs of tourists and suggest them the best travel and accommodation options. Those with a degree or diploma course in travel and ticketing have better chances to work as travel agents, travel escorts, tour operators and counter staff in top travel agencies.

Hotel management: hotel industry requires a large amount of skilled manpower to serve needs of the visitors. There are a number of career opportunities in departments like housekeeping, accounting, operations, front office, maintenance and public relations, and these opportunities are expected to increase in the years to come. Those who have completed a degree course from one of the top 10 hotel management colleges of India have better chances of being recruited by the top employers of the industry.

Top 4 Challenges Facing Hospitality Sector Of India

Hospitality sector is one of the fastest growing sectors in India today. The primary reason for it is the immense potential of the industries related to it. The industries such as infrastructure, airlines and transport are closely related to the hospitality industry and therefore, these sectors promote the hospitality business even more.

The hotel industry which plays a central role in the hospitality sector makes the most of the potential resources who contribute to the growing name of Indian hospitality on the international platform. The never ending demand of the skilled professionals and the growth opportunities in the hospitality career have encouraged a major population of the students to go for hotel management courses. But opportunities and challenges go hand in hand. Although the career prospects of the hospitality sectors are numerous, the challenges associated with it are no less. Check this list out.

Service: Service is the bread and butter of the hospitality sector and no matter how much an establishment tries to cater to the needs and expectations on the customers the truth is that you just can’t please everyone. Although hospitality management courses and tourism courses work on preparing the students to deal with all kinds of customers, service remains the primary challenge of this sector.

Marketing: Our nation lacks adequate budgetary for marketing, promotion and advertisements. As a result of this, uplifting the image of India as a top most tourist destination has become a slow-paced process. Even with such a high potential and numerous tourist destinations, India lags behind its competing countries. We require more and more advertising campaigns to work on the position of India in the list of most hospitable destinations.

Taxation: The hospitality sector is very high taxed sector in our country. From service taxes and luxury taxes to transportation charges and aviation charges, a number of taxes are levied on all the fragments of the industry. As a result, hotel operators and transporters charge the incoming travellers heavily, and this makes India unreasonably expensive for some of the travellers.

Security: This has always been one of the major challenges of India, irrespective of the sector and industry. Terrorist attacks and political pressures have always been in the highlights of the news. Issues like these have raised concerns of safety among the people living abroad and hence, it serves as an ongoing barrier in the hospitality sector.

Although there are several major challenges facing the hospitality sector, the opportunities related to it are still not outnumbered and there’s no denying that the institute of hotel management sees a constant rise in the number of applicants every year.

Why Pursue Travel and Tourism Course?

“I don’t know where am I going, but I am on my way”

This quote has a doting magic that casts a spell on my mind and creates an urge to travel more and explore places that are rotting in box of whims and fancies. Apart from me, I have met tons of youngsters these days that are passionate about travelling. Packing up rucksacks, picking the sturdiest shoes and setting out of the house to touch new horizons; these are redefined goals of this generation. The cherry on the cake is that most of the newbies take this passion seriously and push it to make travelling as a profession. There are various reasons why you should think about pursuing travel and tourism courses:-

 

1.There are endless opportunities and possibilities of job occupations for travellers. If you are good with writing become a travel journalist, blogger, and author – whatever suits and pacifies your passion for both writing and travelling. Similarly there are other occupations like travel agent, nature photographer, tour operator, cruising, language expert and more. All are equally interesting and challenging that keeps one on toes!

2.The field of tourism is challenging, but ideal for people who do not want to be enchained in a desk job of 9 to 5. Travelling demands a person to be enthusiastic and infused with numerous ideas in order to survive and stand out in the cut throat competition. And if you think you are made of the same stuff, then tourism courses in India should be on the top of your list.

3.Travelling has its own charm – you get to meet thousands of people, local tribes, explore areas that you have only viewed on Google, interact with local communities, buy things that the particular place is famous for, but most importantly embrace nature and appreciate it for what it is.

4.For some people travelling is just another vacation – a break from the monotony of life, but for some it is life. And those who have the zeal to cover every nook and corner of the world should hook up to their dream and make it happen by pursuing travel and tourism course. Trust me, it will add to your knowledge, and will be highly beneficial.

5.Exposure in this sector is not limited to state or regions, rather it spreads all across the world. It depends on you how you take this forward. You can join travel houses, journals, media channels, or agencies within country or outside and make a living out of your passion.

Tips for Great Hotel Service

One of the perks of traveling a lot is being able to stay at amazing and interesting hotels. The days of hotels being just one building with a lot of rooms and a conference room here and there have long gone. These days the trend is to make one’s hotels more unique and creative than the other. Though that does not mean that the traditional setting of a hotel has gone away, but nowadays companies are putting in more effort in how a hotel looks and what it offers, instead of just being a place where people can stay for the duration of their trip.

But, just making the interiors and the building look nice is not the end of the job. Sure, all these work towards enticing a visitor to give the particular hotel a chance, but what really makes the difference is the service one receives. If one is doing a doing a hotel management degree from one of the many hotel management institutes in India, then giving the best service to the guests is the one rule of any employee.

The level of service can dictate the guest’s impression of the hotel ranging from a good and memorable hotel to a bad and inconsiderate hotel. The hotel trade is considered to one of the ultimate people business. This means that this industry is all for the people and keeping them happy. How the public perceives a hotel can affect its success or demise. Though there are certain tips and tricks that almost every successful luxury hotel uses, which allows them to uphold that reputation of being a good hotel. Here are some of them:

1.Personality:

One can take any hotel management institute or even if one wants to get into the travel business then any college like the Indian Institute of Tourism and Travel Management will teach that having a good personality can make all the difference. Since the entire work day will mostly revolve around interacting with people, an employee in this industry should have excellent people skills and an approachable personality. So that people are not intimidated in asking something.

2.Knowing the Surroundings:

This is another mark of an employee of a good hotel. No guest likes to hear the words ‘I don’t know’ from an employee in regards to places one should visit around. One should have an extensive knowledge of all the places around the hotel that one should visit.

3.Teamwork:

All the knowledge and public speaking skills can be useless if one cannot work efficiently as part of a team. At the end of the day, a hotel is like a machine and each department must be able to work with the other in a seamless manner.