The Tribune

By KEILE CAMPBELL

Tribune Staff Reporter

kcampbell@tribunemedia.net

COMBINING the former Bahamas Hotel Training College with what is now the University of The Bahamas was “the worst decision I ever made in my tourism career,” according to immediate past Bahamas Hotel and Tourism Association (BHTA) president Robert Sands.

Mr Sands made the remark during a panel discussion on workforce development at Thursday’s Bahamas Out Islands Promotion Board Annual General Meeting. He said he was among the industry representatives who supported the merger at the time, but now believed the decision removed an important pathway for practical, skills-based training in the sector.

He said that although some tourism professionals were academically inclined, most workers were “more practically endowed”.

Mr Sands added that combining the institutions “eliminated an opportunity for persons to matriculate in their passions”, noting that renewed efforts were being made to reintroduce vocational and skills-based training.

Mr Sands, who serves as chair of the University of The Bahamas Tourism Programme Academic Committee, acknowledged the wider challenge of workforce development for the Family Islands. Panel moderator and BOIPB executive director Kerry Fountain described the issue as a “shallow workforce pool”, particularly affecting smaller islands.

Mr Sands said the problem was “very complex”, and more pronounced in the Family Islands than in New Providence. He said collaboration between UB and hotel operators over the past 18 months had signalled a stronger focus on addressing workforce gaps.

He said several hotel operators had partnered directly with UB to identify students suitable for employment in the sector. Mr Sands pointed to the College of Tourism, Hospitality, Culinary Arts and Leisure Management as continuing to produce “a cadre of disciplines on a year-by-year basis”.

Mr Sands added that the sector had also contributed to workforce stagnation, noting that compensation structures sometimes left line employees earning more than their managers.

He said hotels find themselves having to "work with and train up" middle managers for their positions.

"It's not that we don't have the cadre or pool of potential employees, but we have to find a way for them to matricule up and also compensate them accordingly, and that's some of the work that we're doing with UB and some of the other hierarchal opportunities," Mr Sands explained.

He said the shortage of middle managers reflected gaps in how the sector develops and advances talent, noting that more structured pathways were needed to help employees move upward..

He said his own advancement came through early opportunities to work abroad, citing his experience taking a pay reduction in 1982 to gain exposure in Guyana.

He contrasted this with the reluctance of many workers today to pursue similar pathways, not wanting to leave their "comfort zone".

"They sent me to Georgetown, Guyana in the middle of the jungle. Left my nice cushy job as deputy manager of the Nassau Beach Hotel to go down south and I had a salary pay cut, but I saw that as an opportunity to make a step backward to make ten steps forward," he said. "I don't know if there's that same type of initiative and commitment to do that,"

He encouraged Bahamian hotel workers to "embrace" such opportunities when they arise.