Overview

With international travel forever on the increase, understanding how different cultures may respond and act differently to your own culture is a vital skill for people working in hospitality. Speaking other languages is effective when explaining points to customers but isn’t the whole picture of being culturally aware. All customers have the right to feel safe, be treated with respect and welcomed and this module aims to give hospitality team members ideas that they can implement in the workplace and deliver GREAT customer service.

This module identifies why cultural awareness is an important part of customer service using the Behaviour Cycle to illustrate the impact on customer responses and moves on to explore some key aspects that distinguish cultures including; different styles of greeting, eye contact, physical contact, body language and name formats. The impact of how cultural attitudes to eating may have in the business are explored with some example religious practices and dress.

A section on adjusting communication encourages learners to think how, what they say to people may be completely misunderstood and to identify the need to rephrase. Learners can try their hand at learning a few key phrases!

Key benefits of this module:

• Understand why being culturally aware in hospitality is so important
• Relate the Behaviour Cycle to understanding how customers respond
• Think different cultures!
• Be aware of greeting customers from different cultures appropriately
• Be aware of the impact of eye contact and physical contact on customers
• Address customers from different cultures appropriately
• Increase awareness of how body language and gestures may differ in meaning
• Understand different cultural approaches to eating
• Accept different forms of dress that customers may wear
• Adjust verbal and visual communication with customers from different cultures
• Increase standards of customer service

Format

The course is delivered fully online and is split into three highly interactive sections. Learners will engage with questions and activities that use real hospitality situations to draw out an understanding and learn from a video and case studies, finishing with a quiz to ensure points are remembered and understood. The module may be completed in short sections over a period of time or all at one go!  In addition, there are links to websites and documents that can be used to research further learning.

Sections include:

• Why is cultural awareness important?
• Exploring cultural differences
• Ways to adjust communication

Learning Objectives

• Define what is meant by being culturally aware and why it is important
• Describe how cultures may differ and why it is important to be aware of differences 
• Identify ways to ensure customers from different cultures are welcomed and respected
• Identify ways to adjust communication and deliver great customer service

Accreditation

This module is accredited by the Institute of Hospitality with CPD points

Who Should Take This Course?

The module is suitable for ‘front facing’ team members, supervisors and managers working in different types of hospitality including hotels, restaurants and bars along with Conference and Event venues. The module may be successfully used at any point during employment to meet a specific need to drive up standards of customer service in teams or with specific individuals.

Learners on an apprenticeship programme may be able to use this module to contribute to their off the job training hours.

Assessment

At the end of the course, learners complete a 24 question quiz in the same style as the learning activities (drag-and-drop, single choice, multiple choice). The pass mark is 80%, with unlimited retakes available. Certificates endorsed by The Institute of Hospitality are available instantly upon passing.

Post-Module Action Plan

Completing training doesn’t always mean that action and change happens! Learners can download our unique action plan from within the module and complete a series of questions which help learners to apply the information in the module to their workplace and identify areas where they need further information or training. Managers can use the action plans to discuss with individuals or their whole team not only to organise additional information to drive customer service improvements.