The Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) has officially launched the Hospitality Assured (HA) pilot programme for the Caribbean with the first of three workshops aimed at persons who will assist the hospitality sector attain the required standards of service excellence.

Ten HA advisors from five CTO member countries – Barbados, the Bahamas, Dominica, Grenada, and Trinidad and Tobago – participated in the first workshop held recently at CTO headquarters in Barbados. Two other similar workshops are being planned this year for advisors from the remaining interested member countries.

“The workshops provide participants with an in-depth understanding of the Hospitality Assured standard, its purpose and what is required to achieve these standards,” said Bonita Morgan, the CTO’s director of human resources. “At the end of each workshop we expect that advisors will be able to offer guidance to ensure that organisations have a clear understanding of what needs to be done to meet the required standards of Hospitality Assured.”

Some of the areas covered during the workshop include the roles and responsibilities within Hospitality Assured; strategic models and their application within the programme; recognition of organisational cultures and their influence on organisational activities; and coaching behaviors and techniques.

The CTO has partnered with the U.K-based company, Institute of Hospitality, formerly the Hotel and Catering International Management Association (HCIMA), to introduce the “Hospitality Assured” programme to the region. CTO is using the services of Mrs. Linda martin, programme director at the Institute of Hospitality, to deliver the training for the HA advisors.

So far, eight Caribbean countries – Antigua & Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica and Trinidad & Tobago – are involved in the pilot programme, part sponsored through the CTO’s Human Resource Department’s component of the Caribbean Regional Sustainable Tourism Development programme (CRSTDP), which is financed by the European Union (EU).

Hospitality Assured is seen as The Standard for Service and Business Excellence in the hospitality industry. The Programme provides a series of performance indicators against which an organisation can continually evaluate and measure its performance with respect to service quality and promotes an organisational climate of continuous improvement.

Additional features include the gathering and sharing of benchmarking data among the companies involved in the programme and the use of the Hospitality Assured mark in recognition of world class performance in service delivery.

Over the next three years the Institute of Hospitality will guide the process of piloting Hospitality Assured in the Caribbean, by providing the required training for programme Advisors and Assessors, and advising the CTO on marketing and delivery strategies.

The Barbados workshop was financed by the Organization of American States (OAS) Department of Trad, Tourism and Competitiveness, and the European Union (EU).