Personal Development Project - Stage 2: Developing People in Tourism

This essay is a reflective account on the skills required for developing people in the tourism sector. It begins with an introduction highlighting the importance of skill development and self-reflection within the industry. The main body utilizes the Gibbs reflective model to analyze a skill development workshop experience, detailing the author's feelings, evaluations, and analysis of strengths and weaknesses. The author reflects on the gap between theoretical knowledge and practical application of skills, emphasizing networking, customer service, and cultural awareness. The conclusion summarizes key learnings and proposes an action plan for future development, including setting personal development goals and maintaining a positive attitude. References to relevant books and journals support the analysis.

DEVELOPING PEOPLE IN
TOURISM

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................3
Reflection.....................................................................................................................................3
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
Development of people in the tourism industry is a very comprehensive topic that covers the
different strategist that can be adopted in order to make people skilled as well reflective (Ezzat,
2017). In this report, a reflective account will be prepared on the skills that are required to be
developed necessarily in the tourism sector and the overall experience that took place while
understanding what the skills are required in tourism sector. Lastly, a conclusion will also be
presented in the report prepared.
MAIN BODY
Reflection
The activity of reflection is critical in ascertaining the major learning that I was able to
develop form the entire experience which I went through. This is critical in identifying the
positive and negative aspects related to the entire experience and can also help me in identifying
what was the major learning that I have developed by engaging in this experience. For this
purpose, I can use the Gibbs reflective model that will help me in analysing my entire experience
in a systematic manner where I will be able to critically segregate the negative experience from
the positive ones and make proper conclusion and action plan for future reference as well (Gibbs
and Slevitch, 2019). There are six major stages in the Gibbs reflective cycle and this can be done
in following manner:
Description: I the first stage I am expected to detail the actual description of the experience on
which I have to reflect. Here I will illustrate the details of what the experience was, when did it
happen, what did I do etc. and reflect only on the description of all the things that I did
(Mössenlechner, 2017). I can effectively state that I recently undertook the skill development
workshop that are necessarily required in an individual they illustrated that if an individual wants
to establish a career in the tourism sector there are some basic skills that every individual must
have. I learnt about a variety of skills that I didn’t have as an individual and since I have to
develop a career in the tourism industry only this was very revealing for me. I realized that there
are much more talented people around me who have immense knowledge and skills in this field
and I am comparatively much naïve and untalented. I left the workshop feeling that there are a
huge number of skills that I have not really developed and I will have to work much harder in
order to establish myself successfully here in this industry.
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Feelings: Thee feelings are the second stage where I have to illustrate the feelings that I had
during the entire experience. I am expected to simply illustrate them describing that what was I
feeling at the start of the experience, in the middle of the experience and ultimately at the last of
the experience. I can adequately state that when the workshop initially began I was very nervous
that whether I will find myself adequately talented and ready for the entrance into this industry or
not and how much would I have t develop myself. However initially when the class started I was
relieved to find that i had some of the major skills and there were only one or two skills such as
people management and time management that I could easily develop in the short time period
(Wales, 2018). However as and when the class progressed there were an even greater set of skills
that I did not possess and then the panic and nervousness became settling in. I did not knew that
this sector was so much diverse and would require development of so many skills collectively.
Ultimately at the end of the workshop I left feeling disoriented and unhappy and even a tiny bit
unsure of whether I could actually succeed I this career or not because the skills are too many
and the time and resources are limited only through which I can develop some limited skills
only.
Evaluation: This is the third stage and at this stage I have to evaluate how the things did go
overall. I have to identify and evaluate what was my reaction and how other people did reacts
well. I have to basically segregate that what was good in my experience and what was bad in my
experience. I can adequately state that overall the things were not every well as I became aware
of the multiple skills that are to be developed and earlier I did not know in detail that there are
too many subcategories of skills that are to be developed (Paulson and Laverty, 2018). For
instance I did not know that people management skill further involved the sub categories of
communication, interaction, multitasking and yet being effective in the communication that was
taking place. In the similar manner I felt that there as too much to be learnt. However, I can say
that the entire experience was not bad and at the end I was able to ascertain that I still had some
other skills such as the ICT skills, the empathy and emotional intelligence that is expected for the
people of tourism industry, the teamwork capabilities and also the innovative level was
comparatively well developed. I can therefore state that I was comparatively skilled in contrast to
other people who were underdeveloped even badly then me.
Analysis: this is the fourth stage and here I have to analyse the entire event where I am expected
to identify what could have possibly hindered or contrastingly fostered the entire experience that
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I had. I will make a comparison between the theory and the practical thus critically analysing the
gap that exists. I can adequately say that the gap is huge in the perceived skills set of people
working in tourism industry and the actual skill set that they must necessarily possess. I can
effectively stated that in the theory it has been taught that there are only six o seven major skills
that are to be developed i.e. communication, innovation and creativity, time management,
empathy, communication and people management skills etc. (Sambell and et.al., 2020). However
after the practical workshop that took place, I can say that these are only the core layers and
names and that too not a comprehensive list of major skills. I realised that there are networking
skills, the customer service skills, the organisational capabilities, the positive attitude, the
commitment level, the multitasking abilities, cultural awareness and knowledge skills etc. that
are actually required to be developed (Sekarwinahyu and et.al., 2019). And these are just the core
skills that have multiple sub layers of skills underneath each of them. Therefore I can say that the
theoretical illustration of major skills required in the tourism sector is not very comprehensive
and the gap that exists is also much wider.
Conclusion: In this stage I have to conclude that what are the major conclusions that I was able
to draw form the entire experience which I lived through and whether I could have adopted a
different approach or attitude that would have helped me in living through the entire experience
in a better manner. I can adequately conclude that if I had avoided getting panicked and rather
adopted a logical thinking and mind while I was in the workshop, I could have focused more n
the development of skills that I actually had and generate more practical results about how I had
develop the skills that I lacked. In future if I attend any workshop and I find that the skills are not
very well developed in me I will not panic and rather concentrate towards the development of
those skills. I can also adequately conclude that the existing theoretical and practical difference
between the skills set is the reason which was what initially disoriented me in the first place
while I was in the workshop for tourisms skills development.
Action Plan: On the basis of the conclusion that I drew, in this stage I have to illustrate what
would be my future course of action if I was to engage in the similar kind of experience again.
How I would improve myself for the future and what would be the course of action will also be
illustrated under this (Tanaka, kamoto and Koide, 2018). I can adequately say that first of all, I
would always remain positive and calm in the future when I realise that I do not have certain
skills or knowledge and rather focus on the development of those skills. Further, since I have to
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develop those skills I would set up a personal development plan for the development for those
skills in a proper and planned manner.
Therefore, in this manner the different aspects of the entire experience of identifying the
skills that are to be developed in the tourism sector can be finished effectively with a well
developed action plan.
CONCLUSION
The reflective cycle presented above helps in concluding that the skills required in tourism
sector are much wider and has greater depth than the available theoretical knowledge. The
reflection also concluded that the outlook of the person is very important in a having a positive
experience in their life.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Ezzat, M., 2017. The Role of Tourism and Hotels Faculties in Developing Soft Skills for
Undergraduate Students in Egypt. International Journal of Heritage, Tourism and
Hospitality, 11(2). pp.286-301.
Gibbs, L. and Slevitch, L., 2019. Integrating technical and emotional competences in hospitality
education. Journal of Hospitality & Tourism Education, 31(2., pp.99-110.
Mössenlechner, C., 2017. ePortfolio task design: a high-impact tool for higher education
teaching in tourism. In Handbook of Teaching and Learning in Tourism. Edward Elgar
Publishing.
Paulson, E. and Laverty, C., 2018. Leveraging Learning Outcomes to Build an Online
Information Literacy Tool. Journal of Library & Information Services in Distance
Learning, 12(1-2). pp.35-48.
Sambell, R., and et.al., 2020. Work-Integrated Learning Builds Student Identification of
Employability Skills: Utilizing a Food Literacy Education Strategy. International Journal
of Work-Integrated Learning, 21(1). pp.63-87.
Sekarwinahyu, M., and et.al., 2019, February. Development of problem based learning for online
tutorial program in plant development using Gibbs’ reflective cycle and e-portfolio to
enhance reflective thinking skills. In Journal of Physics: Conference Series (Vol. 1157,
No. 2, p. 022099). IOP Publishing.
Tanaka, M., Okamoto, R. and Koide, K., 2018. Relationship between Reflective Practice Skills
and Volume of Writing in a Reflective Journal. Health. 10(3). pp.283-288.
Wales, T., 2018. The View From Within: A Personal Reflection on Library Strategy
Development in Three Academic Libraries. New Review of Academic
Librarianship, 24(3-4). pp.442-456.
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