IHG and JA Worldwide Launch Global Partnership for Young People in Hospitality
September 26, 2019
InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) and JA Worldwide are launching a partnership to introduce young people to career opportunities in the hospitality industry. The announcement comes just in time for United Nations World Tourism Day 2019.
The year-long partnership will support more than 750 young people as they gain skills and experience in hospitality in nine major markets around the world, including the Canada, China, France, Germany, Japan, Mexico, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, and the United States.
The theme of the United Nations World Tourism Day 2019 is “Tourism and jobs: A better future for all.”
“The tourism sector is an integral part of the global development agenda, driving economic growth, and creating jobs, in particular for women and youth. UNWTO believes that private sector cooperation is essential if we are to realize tourism’s true potential as a force for good. We warmly welcome this new initiative and are confident it will make a real difference to the lives of many young people. UNWTO also looks forward to working closely alongside IHG to create more and better opportunities for all.”
The partnership with IHG also continues JA’s efforts to align our programming with the United Nations Global Goals for Sustainable Development, particularly goal eight—“Decent work and economic growth”—and its sub-goals—“Promote youth employment, education, and training” (8-6) and “Promote beneficial and sustainable tourism” (8-9).
Working together with JA, IHG is developing a curriculum to run a hotel work-experience event called IHG First Look, to provide young people ages 14–18 the opportunity to receive hands-on experience working in a hotel. Combining classroom work and a practical hotel takeover, students receive a close-up look at what a career in hospitality entails.
“We’re proud to be the first hospitality company working with JA Worldwide to inspire hundreds of young people to experience careers in the industry. Our partnership demonstrates the real variety of opportunities that a career in the sector can bring, and it reflects IHG’s promise to provide True Hospitality for everyone—which includes making a difference in our local communities all around the world. Together with JA, we’ll be able to give young people a close-up view of the variety of roles available in hospitality, together with the skills they will gain through different experiences and training.”
IHG has already started to debut its First Look events, partnering with local JA networks in Dubai, UAE, London, UK; and Atlanta, Georgia, in the United States. Students at these events participated in a variety of activities in IHG hotels to help them gain first-hand experience of the industry, as well as job shadow front-line roles.
DUBAI:
United Kingdom:
In early 2020, as we build on the relationship, IHG and JA will run a set of innovation camps, focused on solving a sustainability-based problem core to the hospitality industry. Students that come up with the most innovative idea will enter a virtual global final—with scope for the winning idea to be implemented across IHG’s global hotel estate of more than 5,700 hotels.
“Working with IHG gives JA the opportunity to engage our students with the hospitality industry, which we know offers rich and varied opportunities in the world of work. Just like IHG, JA is a global organization in more than 100 countries, and this sets us up well for what will be an inspiring and fruitful partnership that helps create pathways to employability and job creation in the tourism sector. ”