Students get a real taste of hospitality

Barton Grange has been working with careers and enterprise company, Inspira to help roll out its local Lancashire network of enterprise advisers.

These are volunteers drawn from businesses and other employers to work directly with the leadership of individual schools and colleges, helping them to create effective employer engagement programmes.

Barton Grange’s general manager Daniel Rich has been appointed as an advisor, and recently hosted an event at the Barton Grange Hotel to introduce 23 advisors to their new roles.

As a result, students studying degrees for both international hospitality management and international tourism management at the city’s University of Central Lancashire have been getting some hands-on the venue.

They were given a ‘behind the scenes’ look at the hotel’s management and marketing by the and introduced to the hotel’s busy operational management structure giving them a practical insight into how a hotel business is run on a day-to-day basis.

As part of the initiative the students will carry out an environmental analysis to assess the hotel’s business and, produce a development report with recommendations.

I’m a firm believer in investing and training young people to help them develop their careers and potentially prepare them for a role in the hospitality industry.

Daniel said: “It’s vital that we give them the skills they need to be able to develop a strong career path and allow them to understand what it’s like in the reality of running a business.

UCLan lecturer Amanda Payne said the link up was “an amazing opportunity for the students” adding: “The visit provided valuable exposure to a real-life organisation.”