Professional Management of Housekeeping Operations

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Hospitality, Leisure, Sport and Tourism Network: Enhancing Series: Internationalisation, November 2008 1 The Enhancing Series Case Studies: International Learning Experience Developing Intercultural Skills for International Industries: The Role of Industry and Educators Dr. Judie Gannon Oxford Brookes University Introduction This case study reflects on two pieces of research, one undertaken amongst hospitality and tourism educators and the other across international hotel companies, on the requisite skills and abilities for managing the challenges of internationalisation. It identifies the absence of any rigorous understanding of intercultural awareness and communication skills amongst both sets of respondents despite evidence of the increasing cultural diversity of the customer and workforce profiles in the international hospitality and tourism industries. Keywords Intercultural awareness; intercultural communication skills; diverse workforces; educational institutions; international operators Abstract This case study explores intercultural awareness and communication skills as part of the essential skills set of managers operating in today’s international hospitality and tourism industry. The movement of labour across the world, encouraged by push and pull factors in different economies provides most managers in the hospitality and tourism industries with specific challenges of managing diversity within their workforces. However, the extent to which employers and educators have recognised these features has yet to be fully analysed. Using findings from a recent research thesis on the development of international hotel companies and their human resources, and a research project investigating the teaching of intercultural awareness and intercultural communication skills in international hospitality and tourism programmes, the chapter

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