Spa Business issue 2 2012 - Leisure Opportunities

INVESTIGATION PART ONE
ing partner of spa consultancy Spa
Strategy and previously vice-president
of spa operations for Starwood
Hotels. “But graduates are not able
to hit the ground running. Th ere’s
no entry into spa… I’ve seen some
people get a foot in the door by
doing some modality training, or
starting on the front desk, but that’s
a hard call when you’ve spent that
much money on a degree.”
Rather than blaming universities, says
Fenard, the industry should work with educators
to provide clearer career paths for
graduates, as well as ongoing support – possibly
through a postgraduate follow-up course
or coaching or mentoring schemes. Patel
agrees the industry could do more: “Th ese
are students who’ve only just graduated. Th ey
need a lot of support and guidance.”
With this in mind, Six Senses has invested
in a fast-track spa management trainee
scheme for up to 10 graduate recruits a year.
During the programme, the graduates spend
a year shadowing and assisting a spa manager
for a small stipend. Aft er this, they join
a pre-opening crew, before fi nally moving
into an assistant spa manager role within the
company. However, in contrast with other
sectors of the hospitality industry – such as
rooms or F&B – such opportunities for graduates
in the spa industry remain rare.
BEST OF BOTH WORLDS
Although the lack of a clear career path for
graduates is a problem, many spa employers
believe that the universities themselves
could also do more to prepare graduates for
Derby has an on-site commercial spa to help
students with crucial operational skills
40 Read Spa Business online spabusiness.com / digital
“Rather than blaming universities,
the industry should work with
educators to provide clearer
career paths for graduates,
as well as ongoing support”
the real world of spa operations. As well as
better management of expectations, says
Bjurstam, there needs to be more vocational
training. Th is means mandatory work
placements of at least a month and more
emphasis on practical skills, including not
only ‘live’ business assignments in partnership
with spas – something that’s integral to
Tabacchi’s spa modules – but also hands-on
training in massage and beauty therapy.
Raoul Andrews Sudre, founder of
Florida-based consultancy Aspen Spa
Management and the International Hotel
Spa Academy – a training company helping
government ministries in Morocco and
Nicaragua develop wellness tourism strategies
– agrees that hospitality degree courses
do not provide enough practical training to
turn out viable spa managers. “Th e academic
institutions baulk at the fact that hands-on
is a very important part of the business,” he
says. “And until they recognise that and off er
some training in that direction, the education
they’re off ering is incomplete.”
It’s a divisive issue, however. “I don’t think
therapy training is needed,” says Fenard.
“How many CEOs know the technical detail of
how the people on the ground provide serv-
ices within the business? Success
in spa depends on teamwork and
that requires drawing on everyone’s
core competencies. Th erapists provide
a service that they train hard,
and are qualifi ed, for, whereas the
role of a leader is to lead. Th e most
important quality in a spa manager
is the business acumen that comes
with a college degree.”
Th e ideal solution, believes Tabacchi, is a
degree programme that combines MBA-level
business input with vocational skills in massage,
beauty, health and healing. While there
are certifi cate and diploma courses off ered
by colleges in North America that combine
therapy with management training, all too
oft en the business education they off er is
insubstantial. “They may get an adjunct
professor to talk about basic accounting or
marketing,” she says. “But that doesn’t get
you through in today’s business world.”
Across the Atlantic, the landscape is a little
diff erent, as the last decade has seen the
introduction and rise of a number of dedicated
spa management degrees, off ered
by UK universities in particular. Yet even
within this emerging niche, there are huge
variations in the ratio of vocational versus
business education on off er. University
College Birmingham, for example, off ers a
three-year bachelor’s degree in spa management
with hospitality that includes
no vocational training, in contrast with a
number of two-year foundation degrees
offered by other UK institutions, which
focus predominately on practical skills with
some basic business classes thrown in.
The University of Derby Buxton, UK, launched its international spa management degree in 2001
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