Emulating passion and commitment, Professional Housekeepers Association (PHA), a platform that brings together housekeepers, purchase managers and other associated profiles of the same fraternity recently concluded its first anniversary celebrations. A brainchild of Jayshree Nagaraj, an ideator, innovator in the housekeeping industry and a DGC Puraskar winner, PHA has come a long and memorable way in the last one year.
The day long convention kicked off with the lighting of the Kuthuvilakku by Chief Guest Meenu Tognatta, Divisional Housekeeper ITC Hotels and the Guest of Honour Mohan Deshpande, Chairman HPMF. In her keynote address, Meenu highlighted the role of housekeepers as forward thinkers, front line managers, people with textile engineering and chemical wisdom, quality checkers, revenue generators and their potential to become masters in different organizations. She also requested the housekeepers to take pride in their profession and raise within their careers.
Sreenidhi, MD-Oscar Murphy Life Strategies Pvt Ltd captured the audiences’ attention turning the spotlight on the pure professionalism of housekeepers and opened their eyes to the distinctiveness of their work.
In her address, Jayshree outlined the association’s effort in bridging the gap between upcoming professionals and the veterans in the industry, of providing a brainstorming, idea-sharing and training platform in skill development training, education and mentoring for the industry professionals as a whole to keep up with the growth, challenges and stride ahead. The executive committee of PHA will be responsible for conceptualizing, creating and standardizing housekeeping norms in the industry, create and endeavour as an evaluating body to certify and approve vendors. To have a pan-India presence, to be involved in audits and specifications in the hotel industry are on PHA’s future agenda, she told.
On the occasion, Dr Malini Singh and Dr Sudhagar, HOD and Smritee Raghubalan, Faculty, Department of Hotel Management, Garden City College presented a state-of-theart case study and its outcomes on some of the hotels in Bangalore titled ‘Customer perception of service quality and a curated report on ‘Consumer experience analysis of Ecotel Hotels’ respectively. The convention also offered an interesting panel discussion over the unified functioning of procurement and housekeeping departments.
