12th India International Hotel Travel & Tourism Research Conference March 3rd – 5th 2022

12th India International Hotel Travel & Tourism Research Conference March 3rd – 5th 2022

India International Hotel Travel and Tourism Research Conference, organized by Banarsidas Chandiwala Institute of Hotel Management & Catering Technology from 3rd to 5th March 2022 was seen as the first-ever time to be conducted in a Virtual mode in lieu of the pandemic and global crisis. However, the crisis didn’t halt or seize the opportunity for researchers and speakers across the globe to gather in a virtual teams room to present their works and delegations in this year’s theme of IIHTTRC: Renaissance 2.0: Re-think, Re-build & Re-coup" which aimed at absorbing the best practices adopted by the active players in the hospitality & tourism sector around the world. The conference provided a distinctive opportunity to converse and share the knowledge with the experts and focus on revised strategies in the tourism and hospitality field with a global perspective.  

Commencing with the mega event, Mr. Sidharth, faculty, BCIHMCT greeted and welcomed everyone to this special event where all the researchers with their industrial experience and intellectual minds were to present their ideas and views on this year’s theme, taking in mind the pandemic effects on the tourism and hospitality sector. It was followed by the auspicious blessings from Lord Ganesha through the  Ganesh Vandhana performance enacted by Nivedita, student, BCIHMCT.

Dr. Arvind Saraswati then shared with the audience this year's theme ‘Renaissance 2.0: Re-think, Re-build & Re-coup’ in order to suffice the excitement and wait amongst the researchers/speakers. He elaborated that the theme was based on the idea of The Renaissance, referring to a ‘fervent period of European cultural, artistic, political and economic “rebirth” following the Middle Ages, from 14th century to 17th century. Furthermore, he elaborated that how it promoted the rediscovery and recovery of classical philosophy, literature, and art to the present day. Relating to this, it was just like in the case of hospitality as seen during and after the Corona Virus Pandemic, and that it the stage for recovery and rebirth for this industry.

Mr. R.K Bhandari, Principal, BCIHMCT then warmly welcomed the gathering including all the special addresses’ speakers and keynote speakers. And to extend to the purpose of the IIHTTRC 2022 Conference, he enlivened the atmosphere by justifying the purpose which was to provide education to the young students in this industry, to develop them into responsible hospitality personnel with quality expertise and indicating that this conference is a way of connecting them to the experts in the hospitality sector that will broaden their knowledge and competences. Professionals, academicians and researchers from various countries were invited to share  their unique idea and research on this  timely, crucial and challenging issue, the hospitality and tourism sector is facing after the covid recession. 

Dr. Swarup Sinha, Principal, ITC Hospitality Management Institute at ITC LIMITED,

Hotels Division in his special address shared his experience and learning and believed that these two processes can happen every second and every minute of life, quoting  ‘There are decades when nothing happened and weeks where decade passed’. He injected the audience with the lesson that one can learn with experience and even while working which is more fruitful than reading books. Continuing with his motivational stories, he expressed that learning  is ‘When as a leader you are  the one to take the blame whenever failure happens, and whenever success occurs, you reward the right person who helped you.’ He took the recent lockdown for an example that it has opened the window to lots of innovation and ideas which will definitely benefit to decades to come. He emphasized on this scenario that currently, sanitation and hygiene protocol has become the top priority in the hospitality industry and all hotels are showing commitment towards health and hygiene amongst employees and to all the guests. This is the benefit that pandemic has brought us, he believes.

Coming to possessing the skills of a hotelier, he shed light on the subject of presentation and its importance such as to : Be Spontaneous, Know your Subject very well, Capacity to hold your audience for at least 20 minutes, Learn to deliver without presentation, Engage the audience, If you want to engage the people then you need to know a lot, reading is knowledge and a leader is a reader.

And coming back to the subject of crisis and dealing with it, he exclaimed on the question thar what the previous disaster has taught us is that these things will happen from now and then  whether it is a tsunami, 26/11 or COVID, He believed that there are 3 stages we should focus on: Survive, revive and thrive! We have to learn to co-exist with these situations. As a youngster, you need to have knowledge but more importantly, a  well-formed mind that can use that knowledge for actual benefits. Just as the real skill of the pilot is tested at the turbulence in the same way your real skill is tested in the time of pressure and crisis like this pandemic.

Prof. Shunsaku Hashimoto, Full Professor and Associate Dean, Faculty of Global and

Regional Studies, University of the Ryukyus, Japan, in his Keynote Speech,  presented the  ‘features of a hotel that still continues to grow even alongside with covid 19’ Through his presentation, he took the audience to the subject of Japan and its crisis. He elaborated that because of pandemic, the foreign tourists in Japan decreased by 87.1% and the domestic trips decreased by 48.4%. The room occupancy rates are now at a 34.6% decrease and even more than  40%  on average. Moving on, he elaborated that despite the recession in the hotel industry across various parts of Japan and all over the world, there still remains one hotel that continued to grow in this crisis, which is the  Hoshino Resorts. By presenting his fine example on the same, he further explained that on April and May 2020, Hoshino resorts’ occupancy rates plummeted to less than 30% across the board. However, in the coming July 2020 the occupancy rates of major hotels in Hoshino resorts returned to over 80% and went as high as 90% until the state of emergency was reissued in the third wave of Covid 19.

Coming to the question cum solution that how were they able to have such high occupancy even in the pandemic, he presented 3 features: Excellence in employees, placement of devices to raise the satisfaction level of experimental consumption means if the guest comes to Nasu so as to enjoy and experience Nasu culture, inferring to hotels having to place management devices that make the stay enjoyable and makes guests feel that way. And finally, promoting of micro tourism through media. Micro tourism is the locals’  trip to their hometowns. Above all, the biggest feature considered by Dr. Hashimoto is human resources.  Going by the concept of micro tourism and raising guest satisfaction, the whole responsibility falls to the employees. The employee is the one who interacts with the guest; they have to produce the content of their area which can increase the experience of the guests. This cultural concept is based on ‘Treating employees as customers’.  Its a core Internal marketing concept introduced by Berry and Parasuraman (1991). The same can be achieved by : Career support, Mental support and a Dialogue environment. The reform is to empower positivity in employees and motivate them by having them act on their own discretion. The concept of ‘Treating employees as customers’ has been deeply penetrated in the organization of Hoshino Resorts which he believes to be the reason for their high room occupancy rate even in the post-pandemic era.