Enrollment Opportunities For Hospitality Management Courses

The hospitality industry is preferred by many because it offers endless job opportunities. The truth is that places such as hotels, bars, pubs, restaurants, cafeterias, coffee houses and other business establishments where food is prepared and served daily, are kept open throughout. This means that students with diplomas in hospitality management stand a better chance at finding employment immediately after they complete training. In addition to getting employment, the degree holders also have the option of starting their own businesses in this line.

The hospitality courses are numerous from those that train students in the art of efficient management to those that improve on cooking skills to create professional chefs and cooks. Depending on the course that has been chosen, the titles and job roles can vary. They can also differ depending on the industry setting or organizational setting within which the qualifier finds employment. This is one industry that holds great potential for all students who are passionate about the hospitality field.

Course Enrollment

There are lots of institutions offering hospitality management courses in almost all countries of the world. This means that the enrollment chances are good in number to accommodate local students as well as international students or overseas students. Depending on the institution that you select, you can enjoy part-time or full-time studying. However, many of the institutions have policies that the courses must be delivered on a full time basis. They do not offer any distance learning or part time classes. When enrolling as an overseas student, therefore, you must consider your budget. You will need to make sure that you are covered as far as health, tuition fees, airfare, emergency expenses, living expenses, accommodation costs and study materials and equipment are concerned.

Participants who enroll during their final semesters are usually required to repeat one unit of study. The commencement dates for the course vary from one institution to another. The academic year comprises 36 whole weeks of studying with each of the weeks having a total of 20 hours of class on the lowest. Considering that it is possible for some students to have vocational skills acquired through any other means or source apart from formal training, the institutions recognize them. Since they are valid, the students have the freedom to apply to have the knowledge and skills assessed. Depending on the level of skills and knowledge assessed where appropriate, the hospitality management courses can be reduced to favor the students.

The best thing about the courses is that they do not have any prerequisites of entry. This therefore means that anyone interested in the course can enroll and start studying in a preferred course. When looking at the course options and the training institutions, it is advisable to choose the one you feel is best suited for you. It is advisable to settle on CRICOS approved courses and certified institutions to make sure that your diploma is valid and valuable at the end of the course. It is the only way that you will manage to go higher.

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Taking Minutes Of Meetings Can Save Your Project And Your Neck

For a Project Management Professional, any day usually starts and ends with tireless meetings, especially for those who work on more than one project at a time. This can get all jumbled up into mush, and information can always slip into oblivion; people could die. OK, maybe not, but the consequences are still dire. If important jobs are not followed through, it could cost you your project. Here's how minutes of meetings can save it:

Makes It Official

Taking down the minutes makes decisions taken official. It is in writing, and can actually be used as a legal document in any number of scenarios. Since it contains all the decisions made and actions taken, any action that is not mentioned is thought to have never taken place, and can help get rid of law suits and internal disputes.

Gives Structure

Meetings are way more important than they are given credit for. Certain details such as time, place, company name, board member, managers and employees who were present and all matters discussed, decisions taken, problems solved and motions passed will all be on record.

Establishes Accountability

In case you have a team member with the habit of forgetting to do things and then deciding he was never told to, taking minutes can really help you out. When employees know all decisions and tasks to be done are being recorded, they will feel more accountable. Plus, all parties involved will know exactly who gave the orders, and to whom and why, so that the employees know who they should answer to and you as a project manager can keep track of who is responsible.

Drives Action

This kind of accountability drives your team members to action. Randomly telling your people to complete a job is not enough. When they know it is being recorded on an official legal document they are more likely to grasp the seriousness of a task. This will ensure your project runs smoothly, your employees remain productive and efficient, and meetings remain on track.

Evaluation Tool

When certain actions to be carried out are set out in the minutes, a project manager can always go back and refer to this list at the end of the day to check off all the items and see which ones have not been done. This will help you in keeping the project organized, set future goals, and do any necessary damage control.

A Record For Absentees

Sometimes team members or managers might not be able to attend a meeting. The minutes help keep a record of each meeting, so this can be referred to later if need be, by those who were not there. Even the ones that are there tend to zone out or flat out fall asleep at times, and while this isn't the best attitude these people should still get to know what went on, for the sake of the project, if nothing else.

Most times it might seem easier to talk through a meeting and concentrate on reaching important decisions instead of recording them. However, the minutes of a meeting will certainly prove their worth a ways down the road when they remind you of an important task, or save your neck when you haven't done a job you were never told to do in the first place.

Hospitality Management Courses - CRICOS Approved

Career opportunities are determined by the career path you choose. The best you can do is make sure that you are choosing a career you truly enjoy. It is the secret to job happiness for the rest of your life. When you take up something you love, you can be sure to be happy even when you decide to quit employment and go into self employment. The hospitality industry is one of the most lucrative career options in this regard. Apart from having endless employment opportunities, you can also set up your own business and start enjoying a fruitful career.

The hospitality management courses are very popular worldwide and students choose to move abroad to get high quality education and venture into the exciting world of hospitality. It is however very important to make sure that you are not only choosing the right the management courses but also those that are approved by CRICOS. The Commonwealth Register of Institutions and Courses for Overseas Students body lists all the approved and certified institutions where you can enroll for the course and be assured that you are indeed getting high quality education that will let you scale the heights of your career.

There is great significance in going for approved courses and institutions. This is because it means that your diploma will be valid at the end of the course and valued for that matter. Most employers keen on hiring well trained professionals will be on the lookout to see the institutions you studied at and the validity of your diploma before hiring you. The certificate or diploma that you have can determine how easy it is for you to find a good job. Hence, it is important to make sure that you choose only approved courses and from the right providers for that matter.

The Approved Courses

The hospitality management courses that are approved by CRICOS are:

    SIT30913 Certificate III in Hospitality (Asian cookery)
    SIT30813 Certificate III in Hospitality (commercial cookery)
    BSB50207 Diploma of Business
    SIT60313 Advanced Diploma of Hospitality
    BSB51107 Diploma of Management

The hospitality courses offer you the chance to be a professional cook, chef, manager or businessman or an event organizer among other titles and roles. It will all depend on the setting within which you get employment. The titles that you can enjoy will definitely depend on the course that you choose and the employment setting that you get to enjoy. When thinking about taking up any course, always consider what you wish to be at the end of it. Other important considerations that you must make when choosing a course and institution include:

    The annual tuition fees
    The course duration
    Overseas student health cover
    Airfare
    Living expenses (transport, telephone, electricity, gas and food)
    Emergency expenses
    Entertainment
    Text books, study equipment and study excursions
    Accommodation costs

When you have made all these important considerations, you will find it easy to choose the right course for you and the right institution as well.

Top 10 Skills for Web Project Management

If you work in web project management today, you are most likely dealing with digital content. Some project managers come from design or development backgrounds, but more often than not, they have little training in the world of digital. As someone who comes from a design and development background, here are some tips and must-have skills that will make your team love and respect you.

1. Content Management - Let me first start by defining content management as I see it. I consider content management the ability to direct, write, edit and organize content for stakeholders on the project. These stakeholders could be your internal team, the client (and their team), marketing/press outlets, and much more. With the understanding that time is limited you must quickly create content for the project. This could be a simple project brief, client brief, or a quick change order. At times we are also pushed to the front-line to provide the end user with quality content. Lastly, a good project manager should be able to transform the words of a designer or developer (which are usually NOT framed to business or client language) into something compelling and actionable.

2. HTML/CSS - Many times Project managers come from the large business/corporate side of business. Web project management in my opinion is a complete 180degree turn from normal (non-technical) projects. The quickest way to understand what developers and designers go through on a daily basis is to throw yourself into the mix. Take the time to learn. Yes, learn! If you can learn about HTML, CSS, PHP, JS, and PS your team will love you. It will be apparent very quickly that you took the time to learn about their hardships and understand their daily tasks. More importantly by researching and getting your hands dirty within a project (you can do a quick website on your own) you will be able to "talk the talk" when you have a 1 on 1 with your developer. In short, by learning technical details you will quickly go from a paper pusher to a knowledgeable member of the team.

3. FTP/SSH & Tools - You might be saying "What in the heck is FTP/SSH" and if you are, this is my exact point of why you need to do some research. In short, get to know some of the tools that you will be required to use on the job as a web project manager. FTP & SSH are entry ways to a website in which you can manipulate files, upload images, and access code. Take the time to research some of the top tools on the web to get a holistic view on what is out there. For coding try Sublime text, for FTP try Filezilla, for Testing try VMWare, for Mindmapping try Xmind. Get my drift? Google is your friend in finding great tools to make your job easier.

4. Analytics, Reporting, Auditing - One of the major parts of your job will be reviewing information and making actionable plans moving forward. To do this you will need a chest of analytics tools to capture data and allow you to digest them easily. Google Analytics is the holy grail of web analytics, so start there. If you are looking for more advanced tracking feel free to review Moz, CrazyEgg, Clicktale, and Clicky. The skills involves distilling down the important information from these tools. I can guarantee that if/when your clients look at big data or traffic analytics they feel like they are trying to drink water from a firehose so take the time to review the data WITH them and reveal actionables.

5. Client Relations - I am pretty sure that "Hold My Hand" by Hootie and the Blowfish was written for Project Managers and their relationship with their clients. Put yourself in the clients shoes at all times. Do they know what a static block, widget, or footer.php file is? Probably not. So walk them through it so they can learn through. Keep in mind that most clients that you will come into contact with have a laundry list of tasks they must complete internally before they can focus on the eCommerce website or web application. Their main job is not to interact with you, so make each interaction simple and pain free. Send agenda's before meetings, recap actionables after meetings, always set expectations (time/scope/budget), and follow up within 24 hours on current projects/tasks. When you can, ask "Can I help you take something off your plate to make your life easier?". I promise, you'll be their favorite PM soon.

6. Formal Project Management - So let me first preface this and say that typical project management training doesn't map 1 to 1 with web project management. by the very nature of digital/web PM it is iterative and fast changing. You must be able to pivot quickly and move quickly. With that said, you can bring the knowledge of project management methodologies. SCRUM, Agile, and Waterfall are the three more common methodologies within our industry. Your team will depend on you to be the go to for the process so buy a book or read a white paper on these methods and decide AS A TEAM what method works the best for you.

7. Search Engine Optimization - SEO is a buzzword, I know, but PM's must know the details surrounding this wave to protect your team, clients, and yourself from bad information. Everyone promises #1 ranking in Google and strong organic search for a fee. I encourage you to always ask one simple question, "HOW?" How will you do this for me or my client. Any large SEO firm will have documentation, use cases, and roadmaps, while the hacks and untrustworthy services will run and hide. As a PM take some time to review the high level details of SEO/SEM. Most likely you have someone on your team dedicated to SEO/SEM and you can even learn from them.

8. Marketing & Social Media - Digital marketing and social media is a fundamental part of web and eCommerce websites. Once you build a website, web application, or mobile app you MUST sell it. This isn't field of dreams. This isn't "If you build it, they will come", you must inform your customer base and potential customers of your new product. Try and focus on your value proposition. Schedule a meeting with your marketing team and client to review what makes you different than every other service or product on the market. As a PM you must have the skills to understand all the media outlets and what offers the most ROI for the investment.

9. Presentation Skills - Having presentation skills is a no-brainer but it has to be mentioned. Being a powerful orator involves many years of getting up in from of people and speaking and I strongly believe that it is something can be taught to people that struggle in this area. If you struggle with speaking or presenting you must attack that issue head on. Schedule some internal meetings or trainings, get out in the community to speak or even talk with strangers more often. Lastly, focus on enhancing your knowledge within the industry of the web, internet, and project management and you will feel confident to speak your mind.

10. Leadership & Culture Building - Skill #10 is leadership and culture building within your organization. Like it or not as a project manager you are a strong figure and leader in your organization and your team will be looking to you for a few details such as decision making, project details, and strategic goals. While many company cultures are moving to a more free flowing communication stream and a flexible workflow to get things done. PMs need to be the deciding vote at times when your office is split 50/50 on a decision. In this case, listen to both sides, review the details and make your decision. It is important to provide a clear decision and direction to remove any roadblocks for your team. Lastly, leadership is also about challenging the status quo (by you and your stakeholders). Don't be afraid allow people to speak their mind if they think there are better ways to do things. 10 people are ALWAYS smarter than one. Letting people have a say in their day to day work and their future is important to have a strong culture.

In my opinion these are the top 10 skills for a web project management.

If you have any comments or feedback on this post: "Top 10 Skills for Web Project Management", I would love to hear them. If you have questions, feel free to respond as well and I will try and respond to all your inquiries. Please review all The Digital PM posts by going to the homepage.

When Your Office Walls Put a Stop to Productivity

The biggest contributor to poor productivity and employee morale may be your workspace walls.

The childhood game, Telephone, teaches us a lesson about the difference between what was said and what was heard. I remember some of the silly results from a simple sentence repeated down the line of elementary students who could only repeat what they thought they heard.

In business, silly results can lead to disastrous outcomes. While your employees may not be playing telephone, thin walls or low cubicles, typical of many office layouts, contribute to a lot of assumptions and misunderstandings. It can be a recipe for disaster because people hear things that they shouldn't, information is heard in the wrong context, or they only hear part of the conversation. Rehashing and discussing the scenario eats up the time reserved for more productive activity and consumes employee's attention.

A client I'll call Betty had a small office staff and extremely thin office walls. Betty heard third-hand that a client reported overhearing a phone conversation in the next room. Without further evidence, Betty was ready to fire the office manager for disclosing proprietary information to a recently terminated employee. Rather than conducting due diligence to discover the facts regarding the incident, Betty reacted emotionally, feeling angry, betrayed, and bemoaning the loss of what she had thought was a dedicated and valuable employee.

As we talked through the situation, she was able to calm down and revisit the issue. By checking facts, she was able determine that the customer who initially called to report the incident was in a certain room during a time when the employee in question was not even in the building. Further fact checking gave Betty enough solid evidence to have a purposeful conversation with the employee that had given out the information and terminate her employment.

Brian Tracy said, "Incorrect assumptions lie at the root of every failure," and that nearly 99% of assumptions are incorrect. Reacting with emotion and making assumptions are dangerous actions that can derail productivity, employee morale and your bottom line. Betty was able to avoid firing the wrong person, (her dedicated and valuable office manager) and eliminate the snitch in her office.

Most leaders are working managers and often they react to situations quickly since they are faced with a laundry list of daily and weekly tasks just to keep things running. Taking the time to dig through the facts may seem like a luxury at best, at worse, an unnecessary time drain, yet the consequences of running a business based on assumptions are detrimental.

Whether you have physically thin walls, or those created by employees that don't respect company policies and protocol, it is worth your time and attention to investigate those Telephone games going on in your organization. Then, when you discover the disconnect, you can put things back on course by taking the time to check facts and make an informed decision, not an assumption.

Best Practice Process, Procedure and Methodology - Value Creation and Value Retention

Application of Best Practice process, procedures & methodology to project, manufacturing and service orientated organisations positively impacts profitability, stakeholder satisfaction and overall company performance. A very broad topic covering a myriad of functions and disciplines, we simply call it Value Creation and Value Retention.

Value Creation

Value Creation is maximised by applying best practice to pre-contract phases. Commencing with marketing and working through sales and handover to the companies delivery arm. Value is lost if a company does not utilise best practice. In truth, the company will not even appreciate the value they are losing.

Symptoms of not applying best practice will often include a poor order conversion rate. Unqualified prospects consume sales resource for which orders may never eventuate or which the company does not have adequate products or solutions to win. Unguided sales resource will always be busy, but not necessarily productive.

Optimal solutions or products will not be developed if appropriate resource and check points are not included. This may result in losing the business or worse still winning the business only to experience significant warranty issues or be subject to a legal case.

Project, manufacturing and service contract opportunities draw significant resource and bear a large opportunity cost. It is imperative that leads be qualified, appropriate sales strategies implemented and relevant resources applied to the opportunity. Efforts must follow a structured, methodical and proven process.

Suppliers and subcontractors play an important role in securing an optimal cost position and as such should be pre-qualified. Formal bid invitations must be concisely and accurately prepared including scope, schedule, T&C's etc. It is extremely important to carefully review subsequent tenders for completeness, accuracy and exclusions.

"Best Practices" should be adopted up to and including Proposal review and Bid / No Bid meetings. Whilst there are too many discrete examples to list in this article, the majority of companies can benefit by reviewing their processes and implementing best practice if they are to maximise value created during the pre-contract phase.

Value Retention

Value must be retained throughout delivery of the product / works. Additional value will be created if appropriate processes, practices and skilled resource is used.

Value Retention processes and procedures are normally specific and tailored to the industry and products / services / projects provided.

However, there are some generic procedures which should be rigidly followed. As an example, many companies make the mistake of accepting the customer's order without review or qualification. Often a grateful salesperson will thank the customer for their order and state that the company will get straight into delivery etc. This is a dangerous practice and should be avoided at all costs. There are ways to thank a customer without outright order acceptance. It is imperative that the order be formally accepted after careful review for completeness, correlation with the proposal, and identification of any unfavorable T&C's which supersede or replace the proposal T&C's. In the majority of instances, formal acceptance of a customer's order will require a number of qualifying statements.

There are too many examples of Value Retention best practice to list here. At least 65 examples leading up to Practical Completion immediately come to mind. If you experience profit erosion during the course of delivery / execution, you will undoubtedly benefit by implementing best practices to retain value.

Where to from here

Every company is different and opportunities vary within each company. If you are serious about increasing Value Creation and Value Retention we suggest you engage a professional firm to review your current practices, results and approaches and work with you to improve same. Up to 5% additional EBIT may be realised by companies adopting best practice.

Cost Reduction Programs - Why They Are Healthy and How They Can Be Successfully Implemented

Driving forces demanding cost reduction

Today's competitive business environment demands that ongoing cost reduction is a healthy and in many cases vital activity of any business. Market dynamics, low-cost country imports, regulatory changes, disruptive technologies, competitive pressure, production costs, inherent product design cost, labour costs, primary costs, life cycle maturity, and competitor pricing all put pressure on profitability. I recall a saying; "The difference between a mediocre and a good profit is often a cost reduction program".

Even if you are fortunate and your business doesn't suffer from the above external influences, it is highly probable that you would still want to optimise your profitability and implement a cost reduction program.

Benefits

Cost reduction plays a key role in improving a business's well-being, not only in terms of increased profit (typically 5%+ EBITDA) but also released cash and increased competitiveness. Strategic leaders quickly realise the potential to strengthen and position their organisation for growth.

Challenges & the way forward

The majority of business leaders want to reduce costs but experience difficulty realising their desires, engaging the organisation, and making cost savings stick. This is the crux of the problem faced by nearly every organisation.

Every department and division of a company is responsible for both cost reduction and staff engagement in the various programs. All too often it is seen as a management or finance department responsibility.

Staff should be encouraged to identify opportunities, conduct analysis, propose solutions and prepare business cases and project plans. A steering committee (including senior management) should review the opportunities and decide the order and priority in which initiatives are resourced and converted to cost savings.

A myriad of opportunities will be identified including organisational behavior, alternate designs, process enhancements, supplier improvements, purchasing initiatives, quality improvements, efficiency improvements, waste reduction etc. There are in fact too many examples to list here.

It should be appreciated that the majority of sustainable cost savings will require significant investment in terms of labour and cash. Leaders must be both committed and seen to be committed.

To ensure a sustainable and ongoing cost reduction program, it is important to engage the wider company and that all staff be involved in both identifying and implementing the savings program. To this end, open and regular communication of progress and achievements is extremely important.

Cost reduction must be an ongoing, living breathing part of any company. It should not be a short-lived, once off "top management" initiative.

Cost reduction initiatives frequently burden already stretched resources. Initiatives may be temporarily deferred due to resource availability but management should not continually defer or the overall program will lose momentum and grind to a halt. Short term additional resource or task reallocation is a preferable solution to permit the cost saving initiative to proceed.

Ensuring Success

To increase success and implementation pace it is advisable to adopt a tried and tested cost reduction program.

Success breeds success. Cost saving will become part of the way you do business.