Staff learn colleague’s trade

Chennai: A butler gets to know of security, a chef comes to know how to handle customers- seems bizarre? This is an all-familiarising game, on at the ITC Grand Chola hotel.

In a bid to make learning easy and set a stage for knowledge sharing, the premier hotel is having first-of-its-kind, pan-India, two-week workshop for its employees.

Aman R. Kidwai, resident manager of ITC Grand Chola, says, “We have training programmes round the year. But this time we are trying to make things more fun and interactive.”

The event started off two weeks back and would culminate on Wednesday.

Almost 1,200 employees right from the upper rungs to the lower are under one roof to get to know each other’s trades. Similar training is on at all ITC hotels in the country.

He adds, “We have arranged for quiz and exhibition. The whole idea was to make knowledge sharing fun. For example, the inside crew is made to know of the security apparatus available in the hotel and the others, of the ingredients used in the kitchen.”

Movie watching was another initiative, he adds. “Educative movies were screened, but the whole experience was given a better touch with a real movie trip with popcorns.”

Occupancy levels in hotels around the city dip this month, and being somewhat off pressure, the event was scheduled for now, he said.