INTERNATIONAL hotel brand Sheraton Cebu Mactan Resort is opening it doors to students from the Visayas and Mindanao to gain knowledge and acquire skills through the hotel’s internship program to address talent scarcity in the hospitality industry.
Dottie Wurgler-Cronin, Sheraton Cebu’s general manager, sees the program as a strategy to not only address a talent shortage but also develop the next generation of hospitality professionals.
“Our hotel and for Marriott International as a whole in the Philippines right now is we’re really building our talent… and we’ve started to do partnerships with schools,” said Wurgler-Cronin.
Sheraton Cebu’s first student interns were from a school in Barili, Cebu. Eight of them went through the usual hiring and orientation processes and were deployed to various key departments of the hotel.
“We let them really work during the internship. They are really integrated,” she said.
Besides Barili, Sheraton Cebu also inked partnerships with a school in Malabuyoc, Bantayan, Leyte and Ormoc. Next year, the hotel is eyeing to get interns from Mindanao.
According to Wurgler-Cronin, the interns underwent a transformative journey, evolving from initially shy and reserved individuals into confident, self-assured individuals who exhibit a positive and proactive attitude toward their work.
“Personally, the fulfillment is when we saw the transformation of these students after about a month. They become more engaged with hotel guests using the English language, for example,” she said.
“These are the kind of students that we would actually like to give the opportunity to expose themselves. You know, you are coming to an international hotel, right? Everybody would want to work for an international brand, and we gave them that,” she added.
Since offering the program in 2022, the hotel has already graduated at least 200 interns.
Some of them were absorbed by the hotel, while others entered other industries. Notably, one intern was hired as a store manager of a fast-food chain after the chain learned about his Sheraton Cebu internship background.
Wurgler-Cronin said this program is a strategy of Mariott International to build future leaders in the hospitality industry, especially at this time when the industry is losing its talents to other high-paying jobs.
Industry stakeholders said the hospitality industry is facing an insufficient supply of workers because those who left during the Covid-19 pandemic have since found new careers in business process management or in cruise lines. Hotels overseas like Thailand are also hiring Filipinos.
In an earlier interview, Hotel, Resort and Restaurant Association of Cebu president Alfred Reyes said the shortage of hospitality workers is already an old issue, noting that the industry has felt it since the lifting of the travel restrictions.
“Tourism-related businesses, especially hotels, have been in a crisis to hire enough people. And this isn’t only a Philippine issue. It’s a worldwide issue,” said Reyes.
He explained that local hotels are affected since they did not have on-the-job interns and the graduates did not have the experience. Hoteliers also face the challenge of losing workers to business process management firms that offer generous income packages.
“Working in our industry requires a lot. You’ve got to have the passion, the willingness to sacrifice, and of course, be hospitable,” said Reyes. “So now it depends on how your brand as a property would be able to convince even those with non-hospitality courses to join you. You’ve got to have a strong human resource department to effectively execute strategies.”
According to the latest employment report, accommodation and food service activities is one of the top five sub-sectors that recorded an increase in employed persons in September with 608,000 workers.