WE ❤️ HOSPITALITY - Lisa Venter

The last year has been terrible for the hospitality sector. Most businesses have seen extreme financial challenges and its reputation as an employer has been severely affected. We are now hearing from many, many of our clients about their fears for the future from staff shortages to skills gaps and top mid-senior talent moving to other sectors.

Krishnan Doyle is sharing his conversations with service industry leaders and operators on all that is good about hospitality & catering with the purpose to improve the sector's reputation as one of the largest employer worldwide but also as a great place to develop your career. 

How did you get into hospitality?

I started as a team member, I was only going to do a season, in between ‘regular’ jobs, as something different to do. But I loved it so much, I’m still working for the same company (different role now though!) 23 years later!

Do you think it is important to have studied a related topic to be a success in the sector? 

I don’t think it’s essential – I think it’s far less important than it used to be, the days of only allowing people with a degree to get to the top jobs have (hopefully) gone now. Experience is more important, but even more important than that is the right attitude, we can teach most things, but a can-do positive attitude really makes a massive difference. That said, I think training / qualifications that are directly related to the role you do can be useful.

Which leader / figure inspired you and why?

One of the earliest people to really inspire me in my career was the author and motivational speaker Marcus Buckingham. His whole approach is based on playing to your strengths – work out what they are and then do something that allows you to make the most of them. I’d always thought you had to work on your weaknesses until that point, but that really taught me that when you find the right role, you naturally excel at it – likewise when you find yourself in the wrong role, it’s a nonstop hard slog!

What keeps you in the sector and why to you enjoy working in it?

The people are amazing, I work with some incredibly diverse and talented individuals. And what we do is make people happier, they come to us looking for a fantastic experience in a great location and we make that happen. It’s just very inspiring and makes you excited to get out of bed and out to work each day. 😊

Tell us about the development / training that you give to your teams and management? 

We give our teams a full induction on arrival, which will vary a bit depending on what role they’re going to be doing. Everyone has a personal development review twice a year to talk about the right development and training for them and where they want to get to, so it varies from individual to individual but there’s a lot of opportunities for development – we have apprenticeships and through our training partner, HIT training, we offer a variety of courses and qualifications.

What advice would you give to those starting out in the sector?

It’s a brilliant sector to work in, there’s loads of opportunity. Always work at the level of your next career move. So, if you’re a team member and you really want to be a manager, firstly, be a brilliant team member, but also start acting and having a work ethic like that of the management role you want to move into. That way, people will naturally think of you when a role comes up.

If you could go back and tell yourself one piece of advice as you started your career, what would it be? 

Believe in yourself more, you’re actually very good at what you do but confidence for me only came a bit later in life – I wish I’d had the confidence to believe I was good at what I did and that I was capable of a lot more back then when I first started out.

If you would like to take part as a leader in this thriving sector, get in touch with Krishnan (krishnan@corecruitment.com)