Last Wednesday 13 May, the local Southern Branch Institute of Hospitality had a virtual meet up with local Hotel organisations, including Southampton Hoteliers, BH Area Hospitality Association and incoming Chair of the New Forest Hoteliers Association. We also welcomed a member of the Hospital Caterers Association
We were updated to understand what businesses were currently supporting the NHS and key workers and also how hospitals are managing. We were informed that prior to the pandemic NHS sites were struggling to fills spaces for chef vacancies and now however they were fully staffed.
Many staff within hotels are furloughed and remaining staff where appropriate were keeping the Hotel ticking over, some managers taking on the gardener role and cutting the lawns and adding security to their CV’s
Our NHS attendee highlighted that they had created a ‘Staff Risk Assessment in response to Covid-19’. It was mentioned this is an evolving document and may change as we move through the return to work phases for staff. The form would need to be adapted for your business as appropriate and only used as guidance.
We had a great range of attendees who were all able to contribute and add value to the call and also gaining knowledge from the other participants.
Future events
We will be running similar events with just a catch up and networking but it was also decided to run events with speakers on topical events, below FYI are dates to hold in your diary. If you would like to be notified of the registration for these events, please email me to be added to the distribution list.
On the call we carried out an online poll which stated that the main areas of interest are
- Mental Health Awareness 58%,
- Best Practice Post Covid-19: 75%
- Food safety Post Covid-19 48%.
With this in mind we are looking to organise the following online sessions. There will be an opportunity at both sessions to network at the start in breakout rooms, and a Q & A panel session to answer queries. There would also be just general catch up session arranged adhoc dates tbc
Wednesday 11 June 2020: 19:30 – Mental Health Awareness, 3 guest speakers
- Colin Symington – Bailey – giving an overview of MH first aiders, the importance of havng First aiders in your work place, stress and burnout
- Lou Banks – Rising Vibe, practical tips on MH awareness and management
- Mark Lewis – Hospitality Action, what support the charity can offer
Wednesday 24 June 2020 (Time tbc) –
- NSF – speaker(s) covering – Food Safety and Best practice Post Covid-19
- Guest speaker – China – Experiences and lessons learnt TBC
On-Call chat – useful information
Thank you to Peter Rose who provided the following link which is a resource for hospitality businesses provide by Nestle ‘At Boiling Point: Addressing mental wellbeing in professional kitchens’
https://t.uk.nestleprofessional.com/nes/nesUK_LP.jssp?lpk=%40dlr4htLrSkg7zJpDkfZUzA%3D%3D
The FSA have produced guidance on adapting your food business during Covid-19 which may be of assistance.
https://www.food.gov.uk/business-guidance/reopening-and-adapting-your-food-business-during-covid-19
The links below will also help you with connecting and keeping in touch with other organisations if you have links you would like to share feel free to email me and I will send out on your behalf.
IOH – Southern Branch
https://www.facebook.com/groups/170898044333/
https://twitter.com/IoHSouthern
Southampton Hoteliers Association
https://www.linkedin.com/company/southampton-region-hoteliers/
https://www.facebook.com/SotonHoteliers/
https://twitter.com/SouthamptonHA
BH Area Hospitality Association
https://www.linkedin.com/company/bh-area-hospitality-association/
https://www.facebook.com/BhAreaHospitalityAssociation/
https://twitter.com/bhareabaha
Hospitality Superheroe’s – Monica Or
https://www.facebook.com/groups/hospitalitysuperheroes/
We hope you can join us for future events and look forward to meeting face to face when we are out of the woods from the current Covid-19 situations.
#LetstalkHospitality #HospitalityProud
