Skills and leadership development in Africa’s hotel sector have emerged as key themes on the first day of the 8th annual Hotel Investment Conference Africa (HICA). The conference, which started on Sunday is regarded as Africa’s premier hotel investment gathering.
HICA brings together regional and international hoteliers, investors, developers and senior public sector leaders to network, promote hotel projects and engage on matters pertaining to hotel development in the Sub Saharan Africa (SSA) region.
Setting the scene for the day’s programme was a plenary discussion reviewing the performance of the hotel sector at a global and regional level. On the whole, hotel development activity in the SSA region remains strong with many international hotel brands continuing to increase their footprint in the region’s hospitality market. In addition, the region is also attracting the attention of some of the lesser known hotel groups such as Mangalis, Swiss International and Louvre hotels.
However, skills development is still seen as a critical challenge for the sector and a threat to the sector’s overall future growth.
Developing future hospitality leaders
Commenting on the issue of skills, Dr. Diane Abrahams, Director for the School of Tourism and Hospitality (STH) at the University of Johannesburg, emphasised that the STH like many other similar institutions was in the process of reviewing their curriculum to ensure that it remained relevant to the current market needs.
“South Africa’s offering has a strong operational focus with management, and recently elements such as leadership and entrepreneurship have become important. However there is a need for a new kind of thinking and perhaps a more multi-disciplinary approach to which leans on other fields such as psychology, transport, diversity management and other key elements which can enrich our product offering. We are not quite there yet”. Other bottlenecks identified include:
– Negative perceptions about hospitality as a career option
– Government policy in supporting educational institutions offering hospitality courses
– Limited knowledge about the Continent and its vast product offerings from a hospitality point of view
– Gap between educational institutions and the hospitality industry
Delegates also emphasised the need to not only focus on the new market entrants coming from the educational institutions but also up-skilling current talent within the hospitality workforce.
Industry workplace psychologist and MD of US-based AETHOS Consulting Group, Dr James Houran echoed this call, quoting a study by McKinsey & Company in his presentation which found that talent was the most under-managed corporate asset over the past two decades. He said in order for the sector to capitalise on the growing domestic and regional tourism markets, the hotel industry needed to develop senior leaders who will effectively manage new businesses and develop multi-tier talent to execute strategies that will meet growing consumer service demands.
A key outcome from the day’s proceedings is the announcement of a new HICA initiative called the Hospitality Leadership Challenge. The initiative, to be officially launched in 2015, will involve the hospitality industry as well as local and international institutions of higher learning.
Visit www.hica.co.za for more details about the conference proceedings or follow @hica07 on Twitter using #hica2014
