Nadia Perez and Anna Fernandez had their hands full as they walked through a congested Colangelo College of Business courtyard.
It wasn’t the oppressive heat or foot traffic that made it challenging for the Grand Canyon University students. Instead, Perez and Fernandez were holding handfuls of literature about hotel employment opportunities at a recent Sports and Business Hospitality Fair.
“This facilitates your opportunities to put yourself out there, as well as connect with specific groups, and allows you to feel more confident when you’re applying,” said Fernandez, a junior business administration major. “You’ll have a better understanding of what you’re getting into.”
And the timing couldn’t be greater for the college's students looking for jobs or internships in the hotel industry. This marks the start of the peak tourism season in the Valley, and GCU has taken steps toward adding tourism to its hospitality degree.
The Arizona Biltmore posted openings for 28 full- and part-time jobs, ranging from cooks, to front desk agents, to accounting analysts.
“These employers desperately need workers because they’re ramping up,” said Dr. Jennifer Elfenbein, hospitality management chair. “So this is the perfect time to get a job in hospitality. Because it’s going to get busier.
“It’s nice that our season follows the school year, so when the tourism industry gets slow, it’s when students go home.”
Perez, Fernandez and other students met with representatives from prominent hotel chains, such as Marriott International, Hyatt and Four Seasons, as well as Valley institutions, such as the Fairmont Scottsdale Princess and the Biltmore.
And those representatives liked that Elfenbein provides a forum like the fair to meet students and showcase opportunities that might best suit their interests and skill set.
For instance, the Fairmont Scottsdale Princess offers a manager-in-training program.
“They would rotate through different departments,” said Joanna Jara, director of learning and employee relations. “We would train and build them up to get them ready to be a manager after they graduate.”
Human resources generalist Karla Lopez has worked for Marriott for more than 25 years and emphasized its values, such as a Voyage program for students who are interested in management.
Another attraction is the potential to transfer to another hotel property.
“Say you get hired at one property to work at the front desk but want to go to management,” Lopez said. “There’s always growth for training and all that.”
That drew interest from Kendra Ellis, a sports and entertainment management major from Minnesota.
“I’m not staying in Arizona after graduation, so I’m just seeing what might be available,” said Ellis, who is interested in working in the hospitality component of the sports management department. Her father works for the Wyndham Hotels and Resorts chain, so she’s familiar with the hotel business.
Nevertheless, “CCOB is helpful finding jobs and getting connected,” Ellis said.
Mohamed Abdelrahman, a freshman, said his mother and two brothers work in the hospitality management industry.
“I’m the only one who took an initiative in business administration and marketing,” Abdelrahman said. “But I’m highly interested to gain as much experience as my brothers gained from their majors. I would like to learn more from real life.”
Presenting opportunities to students with merely a casual interest could lead to something more significant.
“Ideally, it would be nice when it’s not 100 degrees, but (the hotels) need to start hiring now,” Elfenbein said. “It’s great for the students, even if they’re not looking for a job, because they meet people. You just never know. You get that business card, and you can reach out to them when you’re ready for a job. They’ve already met you.
“These recruiters get many resumes, but when they meet a person, in person, they get a true feel of who that person is. That’s so much of a better connection than reading a piece of paper about somebody.”
GCU News senior writer Mark Gonzales can be reached at [email protected].
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