Hospitality and event management

To be a successful restaurant or bar manager you will need to have excellent organisation, problem-solving, promotion and people skills, including the ability to build strong relationships with customers and staff. Budgeting and stock-taking skills are also highly desirable. While practical experience is vital for progression in these areas, third-level qualifications have become far more commonplace amongst employees, particularly those in management positions.

Along with giving you vocational training, a travel and tourism degree will develop your communication and business management skills and increase your career prospects. Numerous industries make up the travel and tourism sector such as tour operators, currency exchange, retail travel and tourist boards. Also encompassed are the fields of passenger transport and visitor attractions like zoos, museums and heritage sites.

Successful events are all about great planning. Whether you are organising a conference for 1,000 delegates or a marquee wedding for 100 guests, you will be under pressure to get things right. Duties can be varied. In setting up a conference you might need to book a venue, liaise with delegates and arrange accommodation and catering while also coordinating the conference schedule and controlling budgets.

You can develop your career in hospitality through postgraduate study or on-the-job training. Depending on the programme of study that you have pursued, you may enter the graduate workforce at either operational level or a position higher up the hierarchical chain. However, the current trend for organisational structures is to become flatter so, no matter what level you are employed at, you are increasingly expected to take on responsibility.