Table of Contents
The purpose to write this report is to improve the five soft skills I was lacking earlier and to analyse those in a correct and systematic manner. To work upon them within three months of time to see where I stand now and how much have I improved.
Scope
Soft skills play a major role in the hospitality industry as it builds quick problem solving skills. It allows you to understand the customer’s problems and is very important. Soft skills trains and polishes the existing skills in one person. And it also helps in finding new angles to a situation as well as exceptional solutions to them.
Method
To improve the weak spots which I lack, I have done some online test, spoken to my peers and my module tutors to provide me a feedbacks for these three months. Along with this I have even completed the sheets given by our module tutor for this subject.
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Limitations
The only limitation which I faced while I was doing my report was that I didn’t have many opportunities to come across those situation where I could really apply them.
Literature Review
Background
Those days are gone when customers were happy just by receiving a “please” or a “thank you” or getting services with a smile. These manners do go in the recipe of proper etiquettes to talk to different types of customers, but it’s not just enough. They need more care and good services so that they are willing to come again to get served. The fundamental truth for any hotel industry is to recognise that customers are the life blood for any hotel. The benefits of good service is retaining and winning the customers. The way of success for such guest interactions always depends upon how those an employee adjust himself according to the personality of the guest. This is where soft skills plays a major role in hospitality industry. (Kimanuka, 2014)
Employees continuously deals with customer’s face to face and strong interpersonal skills are necessary for creating positive guest experience soft skills make people more employable and more likely to have successful careers. Soft skills are never passed on, these skills can only be learnt under a proper training, preparations, teaching and reading and by other sources. Soft skills are not connected with one’s external appearances. People who have a balanced emotional intelligences display maturity in managing emotions and are good at people’s skills. (Bhal, 2015)
The hospitality industry demands skills such as maintaining professional and ethical standards, problem solving, emotional intelligence, critical thinking and leadership. Soft skills are very important for any hotel industry to work. For example: why will a person spend money at a café A , where he doesn’t gets the feeling of warmth while he is served coffee , while on the same street a little far away he can get that same coffee with more warm and personal feeling while being served. This only shows that which café will survive over the course of the years. (McKay, 2017)
Research Methodology
Soft skills are immensely used in the professional hospitality world. Without having soft skills in a particular company its reputation can get lowered and maybe people will not be willing to come to that particular hotel for their services. I also used to be weak in some of the soft skills and realised that it was time for me to work on them as they are important in my future career.
APA6 Referencing
Referencing is widely used by students and professionals to rightfully give credits to the particular author or a source from where a person has taken the matter from. APA6 Referencing was my weak point due to which I thought I should take it up seriously and improve it with the help of my tutors and peers. I learnt APA6 referencing from the start by the help of power point presentations, class activities and class notes which was given to us earlier. To improve it even further I have even given some class test and as well as some online test to polish them perfectly.
Time Management
Time management is very important aspect for the hotel industry because while working in a hotel everything should be done on time and according to time, to achieve a task assigned on that particular day or the week. Time management is the most important soft skills which should always be kept in mind. Time management is difficult for me due to which I was not able to finish my work on time this led to late submissions and being late. To improve my time management skills I started making a time table for myself in order to finish all my task on time and within a limited period. I also did some online test which showed that how efficiently I used to manage my time and where I am missing out. And I also solved some self-assessment sheets.
Goal Setting
In hotel industry it is very important to set goal which will be there for improvement. I was very bad at setting goals and even though if I do I would had eventually break it. So over the period of time I started making a to do list , a set time table for myself and I even started setting up goals for myself and ensured that I would complete them in that given my period. While I was doing this I realised that I should always set up goals for myself that makes me feel occupied and this also made my work even better and on time as well. I felt a reduced burden as all my work is complete beforehand.
Communication Skills
Communication is the key component of any type of business, be it the hotel industry or a normal factory. Communication is the basis of taking and giving orders. Without communication everything could go wrong. I also had a lot of problems while communicating with different people and even to a crowd but I tried to improve it a lot and I am still trying to improve them. I took part in class presentations, where I had to stand in front of a huge crowd and speak to them for at least five to ten minutes. I also did some online test and some of the self-assessment sheets to know that where I am lacking.
Leadership Skills
Leadership is one of the most important skills which is used in the hotel industry because, there can be times when an employee has to take a lead to an unappropriated situation. At that time he has to take action and not think that someone else would take instead of him. At this point of time he should be quick and smart while taking a decision for everyone. As I am was lacking in this skills I took up different assessment sheets to improve them. I went through a lot of online website that they told the best way to increase the leader ship qualities in a person.
Findings and Discussion
APA6 Referencing
When I was first introduced to referencing skills I thought it is an impossible job to learn them and even to apply them. I thought it is the most difficult job on earth, like where exactly the correct comma, correct use of the authors and websites will be there and if it went wrong the whole content would go wrong and then I started learning more about referencing skills, I felt that it was very simple. Yes all things are difficult at the beginning, but it slowly gets easier. Once I started using the APA style of referencing into my assignments I got a good hang of it. As I got used of it I slowly improved in them. This happened with a good amount of practice. I also improved in my paraphrasing skills a lot. Yes there are still some places where I get stuck and I am not able to cite it correctly or add them into the referencing skills. But I think I will be able to polish them a lot within the course of time.
Time Management
We say there is only 24 hours in a day, what all things we will be able to cover up and half of the time we don’t even utilise that time, but if we think positively there are 1,440 minutes in a single day doesn’t it seems that we have a lot of time to do our work. By using my time very effectively for doing my work I was able to complete all my task on time and I could keep a track of how much time I spend on a single thing which made me do that task even more faster and in a better way. This made me on track with everything which made me comfortable that I do not have any burden on my head in the end.
Goal Setting
The reason I started completing all of my task on time was because I was setting up goals for myself which should be completed in certain period of time. I made myself some very realistic goals which I had to complete in certain timeframe. I also kept myself motivated by giving myself a reward after every goal would get over. Sometimes I still feel that I may not be able to complete my goals due to lack of time or material used in that type goal but I think it is still better than the past.
Communication Skills
The ability to speak clearly and in a thoughtful manner that it doesn’t hurts the feeling of the person in front of us should always be kept in mind while communicating to others. I started communicating to different people from our class so that I would not be shy any more. I would practice as well as communicate clearly with my partner.
Leadership Skills
The ability to lead a team or a person to a better way and taking them into a right direction is the key feature of leadership skills. Leaders are made, they are not born. While we were doing our practical in bakery, my partner and I sometimes get confused that which ingredient should we add first or when the dough is ready to make its shapes. So I take the lead and think over the whole process to know whether what we are doing is right or wrong and recollect the past practical’s and let him know that which ingredient should be added first
Conclusion and Recommendation
Soft skills are very important part of the hotel industry. It goes hand in hand, without soft skills people wouldn’t get that kind of satisfaction which they get while entering the hotel. In future when we will become successful chefs in life it will help us in all aspects. Like how to behave with the guest, how to talk to them in appropriate manner.
There are some improvements which I have seen within myself but those were very minute improvements which was only seen by me and not others. As they were not huge improvement which could be recognised by a lot of people. I would like to say that this time was not wasted but well utilised. Not big improvements were made but the small ones were also worth it. And these small improvements will lead to huge improvement. And I never knew that these improvements were much need to be improved upon.
Referencing and Bibliography
- Bhal, R. S. (2015). Training in Soft Skills and Its Importance. International Journal of Management and Social Sciences Research (IJMSSR) ISSN: 2319-4421 Vol 4(5), 76-81.
- Kimanuka, O. (2014, December 12). Why customer service in hospitality industry is everything. Retrieved from The New Times: https://www.newtimes.co.rw/section/read/183956
- McKay, M. (2017, May 18). Why soft skills training is vital in the hospitality industry. Retrieved from typsy: http://blog.typsy.com/the-importance-of-training-in-the-hospitality-industry
