On the 18th November 2021 the NTG Alliance hosted the online conference ‘Next Tourism Generation: Building a skilled workforce’. This conference was broken into four main modules, upskilling and reskilling in tourism and hospitality, addressing skills needs with innovative collaboration, integrating new skills into industry and education curricula and envisioning a skills partnership in the tourism sector.
Concetta D’Emma, (39 years old, born and living in Italy) is Founder of the Unconventional Hospitality project, and works also as an International Speaker, Author, Challenger & Business Coach, Food & Green Marketing Strategy Expert, and Press & Public Relationships for GWTO (Global Wine Tourism Organization).
After graduating in tourism sciences and -completing a Masters degree in tourism management, she realized that she needed to work – at a deeper level with people, not just to give them “technical” skills. This is the way she has found to improve the hospitality industry and this is why over the years she has also become a Mental Coach.
Travel and tourism have been among the sectors hardest hit by Covid-19. In Italy, the pandemic has impacted a sector that was already suffering from the effects of ineffective public management and decades of structural delays, despite tourism being one of the domestic economy’s strategic assets, representing 13% of GDP and the highest number of employees in Europe.
The post-Covid relaunch therefore constitutes a unique opportunity to – compensate for the losses of 2020 but also to overcome previous limits and delays, – creating a sector that could constitute the country’s “fuel” to be more efficient. All this could be achieved through public policies aimed at digitization and training.
Sandra Bertholet (43 years old, born and living in Luxembourg) has been working in tourism and hospitality since 2001. After graduating from the Hotel management school in Diekirch, Luxembourg (in 1997) with a diploma as “Hôtelier- Restaurateur” and several traineeships in Luxembourg, Switzerland and Austria she continued her studies in Krems / Donau in Austria at the International Management Center (IMC Krems) with a master degree in Tourism Management and Leisure Time economics; specialization topic: “Sustainable tourism development in rural areas”
Her global vision of the tourism planning, having worked at a senior level in the private and public sector, as well as -being closely involved with the associative network follows.
Covid-19 has had a profound impact on the tourism sector globally. The past year will – long be remembered for the far-reaching consequences of the pandemic and the detrimental affect it has had on individuals, health, lifestyles, organizations and economies to name but a few.
As businesses start to build back from the disruption caused by Covid-19, they will need to ensure their people have the skills needed to support safe reopening and to emerge stronger from the crisis.
In the week of 29th March 2021, local and international students from Cardiff Metropolitan University, Varna University, Bulgaria and City Unity College, Greece, studying for a MSc in Tourism and Hospitality Management, joined a 4-day virtual field study visit to Pembrokeshire in Wales. The Destination Pembrokeshire Partnership (DPP) made up of Pembrokeshire Tourism, Pembrokeshire County Council, PLANED & The Pembrokeshire Coast National Park Authority have worked closely together to launch Pembrokeshire’s new Destination Management Organization ‘Visit Pembrokeshire’ in November 2020. This new Destination Management Organization is the first of its type in Wales bringing together the public, private and third sector to help drive growth and development.
Sometimes, it is very inspiring to look for best practices and case studies from all over the world. How can we support tourism stakeholders that have been impacted by the pandemic and more importantly, what is needed for tourism to become more resilient in the future, taking account of the changes in our climate? The European Commission has shown once again how important skills are for the future of tourism. Now, we must consider what concepts and ideas we can adapt to develop skills further.
There has been a lot of disruption for the tourism industry because of the coronavirus pandemic. Before the first lockdowns many places were struggling with over-tourism, however, the opposite is now true. Other changes within the tourism industry shows that trends emerging before have accelerated drastically as a result of the consequences of COVID-19. From this, the Next Tourism Generation Alliance can see that a lot has changed and will continue to change. The industry must adapt to how people are now behaving in the market, which means that new digital, green and socio-cultural skills will become in demand as it becomes more obvious how destination management has changed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
According to the recent UNESCO report “Museums around the world in the face of COVID 19”, 90% of museums, globally, have been forced to close their doors during the corona crisis and more than 10% may never reopen. Most cultural professionals have been forced to work from home and many have adapted their traditional roles to support different departments and functional areas of expertise. Faced with extremely challenging times, the management and staff of cultural institutions have been able to respond in rapid and creative ways to the social and cultural needs of their societies, taxing their professional skills. Museums and heritage institutions have experienced several changes during this process, many of the trends and new practices will remain after the crisis and management and staff will need to be ready to welcome those changes. Through this thought-provoking and stimulating period, NTG digital and socio-cultural skills have become even more prominent for museum and heritage professionals. This piece presents some of the most interesting initiatives developed by museums around the world during the lockdown period and the way professionals have responded to the challenges. It also presents some of the trends that will probably continue after the crisis.