Page 50 - Regional Employment & Skills Plan

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The following areas have been identified as skills gaps within the tourism industry:
• Higher level culinary skills
• Customer service skills98
Swansea Bay City Region
The development of the Swansea Bay City Region as a tourism destination forms an important part of the region’s regeneration strategy. This places an emphasis on exploiting the natural beauty of the region and developing a wider range of attraction and accommodation options.
Growing Mid Wales
Tourism and recreation are a key sector for the region with a number of opportunities for significant impacts along the coast and in the Brecon Beacons and Cambrian Mountains as well as opportunities to develop activity tourism and existing themed brandings. The partnership has already prioritised the strategic development of the Vale of Rheidol railway as the southern gateway of the Wales’ significant tourist attraction narrow gauge themed marketing. The region’s higher education institutions present specific opportunities for the development of niche business tourism and conferences.
Employers Voice99 Significant Challenges • Recruitment of qualified staff
Recruitment Difficulties
• Difficulty in recruiting all office administration staff
• Qualified and experienced instructors
• Trainee instructors
• Drivers – Trailers and vans maintenance staff
• We developers
• Chefs
• Individuals with a level 3 qualification
in childcare
Work Readiness of New Entrants
Drivers of Change
• Tourism and education
Barriers to Training
• Real life experience is what is required and traditional FE and HE courses cannot deliver this.
• Demand for an apprenticeship qualification that can be delivered by the business.
• Lack of formal training available on a part time basis – seen as low-skilled work therefore university graduates aren’t attracted.
• Need to develop part-time/one day courses to up-skill staff in certain areas, these include but are not limited to customer service, food preparation, marketing, social media, HR etc.
• Wrong training and provision of qualifications, therefore entrants are not work ready.
• Not always – Some highly educated people have no customer service skills or realistic expectations of the
working world.
98 RLSP – Demand and Supply Assessment, 2015
99 RLSP Large Company Survey & electronic survey (April- June 2016)
Regional Employment & Skills Plan South West & Mid Wales Foundational Economy