A few of the cleaning industry equipment suppliers are providing training on the equipment at various colleges. Don Bosco too is open to the cleaning industry providing training to their students.
Housekeeping is always a pressuring and time bound operation. As one guest checks out of the room, the staff may have just about 10 minutes to get the room cleaned, change bed covers, replace towels, accessories, etc., all in a systematic manner. Carrying out the housekeeping work behind closed doors is simpler than when it comes to doing it in the presence of the guest. It not only calls of systematic cleaning but also needs to meet the satisfaction of the guest. “I need to do it in a way that I would like it, if I were in the place of the guest,” said Keith.
Etiquettes are most important. “If the staff is not able to complete the task within the stipulated time and an impatient guest is expressing his frustration… we just have to take a deep breathe. This is because making a room does take time, at least about 20 minutes. Working with the time pressure probably comes with practice and experience,” said Sunny.
Career option
In spite of having a good experience of doing the housekeeping job while training, the students were reluctant to take up housekeeping as a career. It was a big “NO” from most of them.
Was it because they considered cleaning to be a girl’s job? “No. Housekeeping is definitely not just a girl’s job. Currently, there are more men working in housekeeping than women. Front office perhaps has more women. Any day, catering or working in the kitchen is a better job to housekeeping,” said Peter.
While, catering is the core subject and housekeeping perhaps an added necessity, it is not viewed as an independent profession.
“Even in a kitchen, it is the kitchen steward who is responsible for the cleanliness. Housekeeping does not have a role.”
“Not just that, housekeeping has its limitations. It is a tough job and one cannot grow fast or get promoted in this profession.”
“It is not a well-paying job either.”
“Given the opportunity I would like to take up a career in the F&B,” says Swapnil. Unlike another who wants to start his career with cleaning the public areas, “where you get to learn a lot more than doing just the rooms.”
Being students, the misconception that one has to have knowledge of housekeeping only because it is a part of the training course, pinpoints to the need of emphasising on gaining knowledge not just for the sake of performing tasks but for mastering the profession.
To be a supervisor one has to first master the cleaning process as a cleaner. It is only then one can supervise the worker and differentiate the wrong from the right. Similarly, even as a kitchen staff, it is essential to know if the kitchen area has been cleaned in the right way using the right tools, chemicals and equipment. It is only when they have learned about the best cleaning practices would they be able to produce clean dishes in the kitchen.
Maintaining the area of work clean in a kitchen is also a housekeeping skill that each of them needs to know and not just the kitchen steward. One has to clean along instead of letting the whole thing pile. What happens when one does not clean the kitchen as they cook? “If the food fallen on the kitchen table or the floor is left unclean, it will decay, get into the corners of the table, emit smell and that smell could affect the other dishes being cooked…” One other major problem arising out of unclean kitchens is pests. Pests breed in unclean kitchens.
One of the most crucial impediments determining the students’ decision to take up housekeeping as a career is also family pressure. “We all love housekeeping but when it comes to explain to our families, we are helpless.”
“After doing a degree course, you have learnt to sweep the floor. You could have done that without your degree too…” This was one of the students expressing his parents’ reaction.
However advanced the cleaning profession may be in the international market, and however important this operation may have turned into, most homes in India associate housekeeping to “saaf-safai” and find it demeaning to introduce their children to this profession. This attitude which percolates down to each and every institution has rendered it an unimportant job.
The housekeeping service providers engaged by client companies in India face severe discrimination right from payment terms to penalty to delayed payments to narrow margins… When there is limited dignity attached to the housekeeping profession, how can we expect parents to let the future generation take up such jobs?
There are no professional courses either when it comes to housekeeping nor are there lucrative jobs to attract students to take up housekeeping as a career.
With dwindling number of housekeeping staff in the market today, the demand for skilled workers is rising. The demand-supply disparity has already begun. Hope this disparity will bring dignity to this profession and boost pay scales, making it a better career option for the future generation.
