Creative, committed, and exceptional talents are at the heart of the onboard hospitality sector but recent redundancy programmes and retrenchments have seen the sector bleed out some of the best trained and experienced resources in the business.

As recovery begins, it will be people who drive success and value. To this end we are pleased to welcome key players in the recruitment, retention, mentoring and wellbeing fields to our Get Onboard Now! People Action Group.

Contributing to the group to push the talent agenda forward will be…

Keith Yates, partner at Yates+

Roy Wilson and Mike Pooley, partners at The Hayward Partnership Search, Recruitment and Mentoring team

Augustin Scott, director at Clip (past winner of the Onboard Hospitality Mentoring Award)

Sandra Pineau Boddison, also of The Hayward Partnership Executive Search team who combines this specialty with her role representing the IFSA scholarship programme.

This group will also extend its remit to focus on the importance of wellbeing across the sector, sharing insight on topics such as staff motivation, brand delivery, nutrition and allergy awareness. Contributors will include experts in the passenger experience, crew training and menu design areas including…

Gianfranco ‘Panda’ Beting of Jetgroup in Latin America,

Caroline Benjamin, director at Food Allergy Aware,

Marc Warde owner / director of Niche Free-from Kitchen/Libero Special Meals bringing insights and examples of good practice to apply around the globe.

This latest Action Group is the second of three to be created as part of our Get Onboard Now! Campaign designed to support the return of top quality, thoughtful and well designed onboard hospitality options to the top of the agenda.

The group will seek to highlight and drive the debate on recruitment, training and mentoring for our sector as it builds back into a new era onboard. It will look at critical success factors and provide timely awareness of passenger needs and expectations as recovery kicks in.

Supporting the campaign and this second Action Group, Mike Pooley, of The Hayward Partnership said: “There has been huge disruption to the careers and professional development of some fantastic talent in our sector. Onboard hospitality is a very specialist field and needs high quality, resilient and creative innovators with a strong understanding of the challenges facing travel providers. Our goal will be to support re-engagement with the best in the business to ensure the knowledge pool is strong and the core skills needed for recovery are recognized and rewarded.”

Onboard Hospitality will provide the forum for debate and the oxygen of publicity to initiatives and innovation identified by the Action Group and share with the onboard industry worldwide.

The wider Campaign will seek to identify and promote best practice processes and solutions that support quality passenger experiences and airline profitability across three key themes:

People – the talent and skills needed to deliver best hospitality
Planet – sustainability in onboard products/catering/supply chain
Profits – emerging revenue streams and digitalization

Watch this space for the names of those joining the People and Profits Action Groups too.

Get involved

We want to hear from you.

If you are an air, rail, cruise or ferry operator with specific needs in these areas – come forward and share the issues with peers and help develop thought leadership on the solutions you require.

If you are a supplier with needs or solutions in these areas, step up to the campaign, share your research, ideas and solutions, and help spearhead recovery.

Email your ideas and expressions of interest in supporting the campaign and Action Group to julie.baxter@onboardhospitality.com