Professional Identity and Practice: Front Office Manager Report

This report delves into the realm of professional identity and practice, specifically within the context of a Front Office Manager role at Four Seasons London. It begins by elucidating the significance of ongoing professional development for both employers and employees in the hospitality sector, highlighting its impact on employee retention, attracting talent, and ensuring legal compliance through certifications. The report then assesses the essential skills expected of a Front Office Manager, encompassing personality, coordination, professional demeanor, leadership, communication, and listening abilities. It further evaluates the individual's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, providing a self-assessment of key skills and areas needing improvement. The report explores hard skills like food and beverage safety, commercial acumen, and sales/advertising, along with soft skills such as emotional intelligence, teamwork, time management, stress management, problem-solving, and innovation. Various learning theories and approaches are examined, including reinforcement, goal, adult learning, expectancy, and social learning theories. The report concludes with a development plan setting targets and strategies for enhancing skills, along with an explanation of the job interview process and skills required for a General Manager role in the hospitality industry.

PROFESSIONAL IDENTITY AND
PRACTICE

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION.................................................................................................................................3
TASK 1.................................................................................................................................................3
Evaluate the various importance and benefits of ongoing professional development and its impact
upon working as a Front office Manager Job role at Four Seasons London......................................3
Evaluate upon the various skills that an employer expects from the job role of Front Office
manager.............................................................................................................................................4
Assess the various individual skills, competencies and abilities for the job role of Front Office
Manager at Four Seasons...................................................................................................................4
Evaluate the various hard and soft skills that are required for the job role of front office manager at
Four Seasons......................................................................................................................................5
Evaluate the various learning theories and approaches that are required for the personal and
professional development..................................................................................................................6
Explain the various developmental approaches that are required in order to enhance the skills for
the job role of front office manager...................................................................................................7
TASK 2.................................................................................................................................................8
Prepare a development plan that sets various targets, strategies and impact of various learning and
training..............................................................................................................................................8
TASK 3.................................................................................................................................................9
Explain the job interview process along with challenges and the ways to overcome it......................9
Evaluate the various skills that are required for applying for the Job role of General Manager in
hospitality Industry............................................................................................................................9
CONCLUSION.....................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
A professional identity can be referred to a combination of beliefs, attitude and
knowledge about a person or the individual’s professional role. It is a result of various
activities performed by an individual in aspect of their professional life. The professional
identity can be a theoretical concept which is of dynamic and contextual nature. Professional
identity can be perceived as the perception and conception of an individual’s professional that
they have chosen. There are various professional fields that can be referred to develop in
identity in. The various professional skills vary on the basis of the skills, knowledge and
attitude of an individual (Capulong, King-Ries and Mills, 2021).
Four Seasons is a hospitality sector organization situated in London, UK. The hotel
was established in the year 1970 near the Hyde Park Corner. The hotel comprises of 196
rooms and has 11 floored building that facilitates a luxurious stays for the customers. The
report revolves around the study of career advancing opportunities in the hospitality sector
(Eslamdoost, King and Tajeddin, 2020).
TASK 1
Evaluate the various importance and benefits of ongoing professional development and its
impact upon working as a Front office Manager Job role at Four Seasons London.
A professional development plan has its significance for the employer as well as an
employee. An ongoing professional development is important for the various job roles in a
hospitality organization (Fitzgerald, 2020). The benefits of a professional development plan
are as follows-
Benefits of professional development plan for employer-
 Professional development in organization increases the chances of employee retention
in the organization. The reason behind this is that the employees will look for an
organization that provides opportunities with growth. The ongoing professional
development tends to attract more individuals for the job vacancies in the organization
(Flores, 2020).
 There are certain job areas where the individuals are required to hold a professional
certificate regarding the job roles. These certifications are important in order to avoid
the consequences of law suits or legal obligations for the organization. Hence the
professional development plan is important in order to have the certifications.
Benefits for the employees of the professional development plan-
 The professional development plan helps in enhancing the skills of the employees
that can be proved fruitful for their professional career. This increases the chances of
increase in productivity and efficiency.

 A professional development plan increases the employee morale and the confidence
level among the employees. This is possible due to the trust that an individual possess
in the skills and certifications held by them.
Evaluate upon the various skills that an employer expects from the job role of Front Office
manager.
The various skills that an employer expects from the individual who applies or the job
role of Front office manager at Four Seasons are discussed below-
 The job role of front office manager requires the person to have an attractive
personality as the front office manager is the first person that a visitor interacts with
for the first time. The front office manager is required to greet the visitors and
welcome them whole heartedly (Glucina and et.al., 2020).
 The person deployed as front office manager is expected to coordinate between
various activities like attending calls and customer services along with reservations.
 The front office manager must follow a professional attitude from the behavior to the
attire.
 The front office manager is expected to have leadership skills in order to lead and
monitor the various employees that report to the front office manager.
 The front office manager must have accurate communication skills that help the
personnel to convey the information in an effective and efficient manner to the
various employees and the customers as well.
 The personnel for the front office manager must have efficient listening skills along
with patience in order to deal with the various feedbacks they receive from the clients
at the organization.
Assess the various individual skills, competencies and abilities for the job role of Front
Office Manager at Four Seasons.
There are various individual skills and abilities that can be possessed by an individual
for the job role of Front office Manager. The assessment of the various skills is as follows-
Strength-
 An enthusiastic and inspirational
personality
 Academic and educational skills
 Good listener
 Creative strategy skills
 Multi-tasking skills
 Have excellent communication skills.
 Ability to be calm and work under
pressure
 Teamwork
 Work experience
Weakness-
 Lack planning skills as well as
controlling skills
 Work experience
Opportunities
 A new career direction
 Changes in the industry that favor my
skills
Threats-
 Work experience
 Downfall in the hospitality industry
 Lacking training qualifications

 Challenges in the industry
 Flexibility in the career
 Fields offering better earning
opportunities (Heidari, Salimi and
Mehrvarz, 2020)
 Long leaves
A critical evaluation of the person skills is as follows-
Serial
no.
Skills Self-evaluation Evaluation Deviations
1 Academic skills 8 8 0
2 Communication skills 9 7 -2
3 Time management skills 8 8 0
4 Listening skills 9 8 -1
5 Leadership skills 8 9 1
6 Problem solving skills 9 7 -2
7 Presentation skills 9 8 -1
8 Decision making skills 8 7 -1
9 Technical skills 7 8 1
10 Team work 8 9 1
From the above analysis it can be derived that I need to work upon my
communication skills and problem solving skills in order to enhance my personal growth.
The rest other skills can be referred as satisfactory or above satisfactory in my personal
aspect. But learning is the key to growth hence it is very important to upgrade my skills
during the course of my career.
Evaluate the various hard and soft skills that are required for the job role of front office
manager at Four Seasons.
The various hard and soft skills that are required for the job role of the front office
manager at Four Seasons Hotel are as follows-
The Hard skills required for the personnel of Front Office Manager are as follows-
 Food and beverage safety standards- The managers are responsible for the
maintaining the safety standards of the food and beverages in a hospitality
organization. The manger is expected have skills regarding awareness of the meals
protection. Managers can be penalized for not maintaining the meals as per the health
and safety laws (Kunrath, Cash and Kleinsmann, 2020).
 Commercial skills- The managers must possess the commercial skills that involve the
financial knowledge as well as commercial knowledge regarding the hospitality
organization. These skills are helpful in developing and following a budget in order to
avoid the wastage of the funds of the organization. These skills help in planning and
managing the budgets while deciding the menu and procuring of the products by
recognizing the margin of sales in the organization.
 Sales and Advertising skills- The sales and advertising skills are very important in
order to have efficient marketing skills of the organization. The sales and advertising

of the organization help in attracting customers towards the organization. These skills
help in measuring the success of the various advertising channels for the organization.
The various soft skills for the job role are discussed below-
 Emotional intelligence- The hospitality sector has experienced a lot of digital
transformation but it doesn’t mean that it should overlook the human efforts in the
organization. It is very important for the organization to invest in the human capital in
order to address people or the customers with an appropriate answers and feedback
(O’Doherty and et.al., 2021).
 Team work- Team work facilitates achievement of the group goals with common
efforts in order to accomplish the organization objectives. Team can be referred to a
group of people who make combined efforts in order to fulfill the common objectives.
 Time management- The hospitality industry requires to accomplish or to carry out
various tasks at the same time. Hence it is important for the individuals to have time
management skills so that they can perform the tasks in a specified time limit before
the deadline.
 Stress management- The stress management skill is required in order to cope up with
hectic tasks that may lead to various stress levels in the organization. The stress
management helps in having a positive environment at workplace among the
employees.
 Problem solving- The skills of problem solving is very effective in order to tackle
with the various problems or challenges that may occur at any point of time in an
organizations. The problem solving skills help discovering feasible solutions to tackle
with the issues of the organization.
 Innovation skills and strategy- The individual working as the front office manager
must have creativity skills in order to deal with the dynamics in the industry. The
creativity or the changes in the traditional practices help in enhancement of the
strategies of the organization.
Evaluate the various learning theories and approaches that are required for the personal and
professional development.
The various learning theories and approaches that can prove helpful in the personal
and professional development plan of an individual are as follows-
 Reinforcement theory- Reinforcement theory can be referred to a theory that
emphasizes upon the motivational process of the employees. This theory is applied in
order to get rid of some specific behavior that has been happening in the past or has
happened in the past. There are two types of reinforcement theory namely positive
reinforcement and negative reinforcement. Though positive reinforcement is preferred
in an organization (Park and Schallert, 2020).
 Goal theory- The goals, objectives and aims define a person’s behavior and abilities to
act in a situation. The personal goals of an individual can affect the way a person
behaves. Also the person who is under training is expected to remain highly motivated
as they are aware of the impacts that might take place.

 Adult learning theory- Adult learning theory is a theory applied or focused mainly
upon the professional individuals where they are provided with the various set of
instructions that help them pass through the various professional stages.
 Expectancy theory- The expectancy theory is referred to theory wherein the person’s
behaviour is dependent upon the valence, instrumentality and expectancy. Valence
can be referred to the value of the4 individual in a specific situation whereas
instrumentality is referred to a certain behavior of the individual. Expectancy is
referred to the link between the efforts of a person to perform a task and the
performance of the task in actual situation (Rothenburger, 2020).
 Social learning theory- Social learning theory is referred to a type of theory which
states that an individual can learn and develop skills through the process of observing
and monitoring. This type of theory is the one where an individual treats a person as
idealistic so that they can connect and the individual can learn something new from
the ideal.
 Humanist approach- The humanistic approach has the focus upon planning well for
everyone. The main objective of the approach is to maintain harmony and peace
among the individuals as this way it would be more beneficial and easier for the
individuals to grab the information and they tend to have better results.
 Cognitive approach- The cognitive approach has a focus upon the comprehensive
learning process that focuses on learning. The learning emphasizes upon the
understanding process rather than the cramming process. It has a motive to develop
long term memory of the individuals.
 Behavioral approach- The behavioral approach is as the name suggests that it focuses
upon the behavior of the individuals. These have an impact upon the behavior of the
individual which is brought in through the mode of practical environment. The
approach follows the strategies of reinforcement and repetition. Problem solving and
motor chain learning are a part of behavioral approach.
Explain the various developmental approaches that are required in order to enhance the skills
for the job role of front office manager.
The various developmental approaches that is required for the individual working as a front
office manager at Four Season, London to enhance the productivity and career in the
hospitality industry are as follows-
 Workshops- The workshops are a mode of providing developmental trainings that
help in enhancing the career of the individuals that also help them in gaining various
knowledge and scope of the hospitality industry. This approach helps in having a lead
in the career (Sawatsky and et.al., 2020).
 Job rotations- Job rotation is referred to changing of the job roles after every fixed
duration so as to provide the experience of every task to the individuals. The job
rotation helps in having a development in the experience level of the employees in the
practical essence.

 On the job training- The on the job training is given to the employees while working
as the employee in the same organization. These are provided in order to allow the
employee to cope up with the changes in the environment of hospitality industry.
 Formal training- The formal training is referred to a preliminary training that is
provided to the new joiners in the initial days to make them thorough with the tasks
that need to done by the employee (Sternszus and et.al., 2020).
TASK 2
Prepare a development plan that sets various targets, strategies and impact of various learning
and training.
The personal development plan of an individual who is working as a front office
manager at Four Seasons London is drafted below-
Current skills Goals Progress Evaluation
Customer Service The goal is to be
successful in
identifying the needs
and wants of the
customers. This will
help in customer
satisfaction.
Working as a front
office manager will
help in handling
customer grievances
that will help in
discovering the key
areas that need to be
worked upon in an
organization.
The skill of
customer services
will help in
evaluation of
customer needs and
thus they could be
treated with proper
requirements that
will help them have
the satisfaction.
Time management My goal is to become
a multi-tasker which
means an ability to
perform several tasks
at a time and that
also within a time
limit.
Performing various
roles as a front office
manager could help
in developing the
quality of
multitasking (Wyatt
and et.al., 2020).
Multi tasking will
help in time wastage
and managing
various tasks that can
be done
simultaneously and
helps in reducing the
burden upon the
individual.
Leadership and
Management
My goal is to have a
skill in order to
identify the various
strengths and
weaknesses of people
and assign them the
tasks accordingly and
motivate them to
perform in a better
way.
The various roles
performed by the
front office manager
will help in develop
the leadership skills
and managerial skills
in the long term as
this requires the
individual to spend
time and have in
depth knowledge of
the managerial
Leadership and
management skills
will help in
motivating people
and maintain a
positive environment
at the workplace.
This will promote
better
communication and
help develop
supervision and

terminologies. motivational skills as
well.
TASK 3
Explain the job interview process along with challenges and the ways to overcome it.
Interview is referred to a communication process that usually takes place between two
people in order to exchanges their views and knowledge. The job interview takes place with
an objective of placement for the job. The job interview process that can be applied in order
to improve the interview is described below-
 Call screening- Call screening is a preliminary step in order to develop an assumption
about skills and capabilities of the individual. This is basically a call interview where
the short and quick questions are asked by the interviewer to the interviewee to make
sure if the person deserves more investment in terms of time (Wang and et.al., 2020).
 Skills tests- The next step to improve the job interview process is to conduct a skill
test that will help in analyzing the creativity level and productivity of the individual.
The people with unsatisfied results will be eliminated in the round.
 Personal interview- By the time the process comes to personal interview stage, the
unwanted people or the applicants might have been eliminated already and then it will
save the cost of personal interview. Personal interview is referred to the face to face
interview. Various questions might be asked to know the qualities and the
motivational level of the applicants.
 Panel interview- The panel interview is where the group of people conducts the
interview and asks questions regarding the specific job function and job role of the
person.
 Presentation- The presentation round helps in identifying the skills and caliber of the
individual in front of the potential team members. This will help in having a better
feedback about analysis of the applicant’s skills.
Evaluate the various skills that are required for applying for the Job role of General Manager
in hospitality Industry.
The various skills that are required to expand the business opportunities as a general
manager in the hospitality organization are discussed below-
 The individual for the job role of general manager must possess leadership qualities
and technical skills.
 The general manager must high skills in innovation.
 Must possess skills of identifying the consumer needs (Zhu and et.al., 2020).
 Awareness of market trends
 Communication skills
 Decision making skills
 Succession planning and development

 Leadership skills
CONCLUSION
It can be concluded from the above study that professional identity plays a crucial role
in the career of an in individual. A professional identity can be referred to a combination of
beliefs, attitude and knowledge about a person or the individual’s professional role. It is a
result of various activities performed by an individual in aspect of their professional life. The
professional identity can be a theoretical concept which is of dynamic and contextual nature.
The report highlights the various benefits of a professional on-going development plan. The
report focuses upon the expansion of career in the hospitality sector and applying for the job
role of general manager after working as a front office manager at Four Seasons. The report
consists of various skills required by the individual and personal assessment and evaluation
of the skills.

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