Beijing 2008

Chris Sheppardson — Managing Director Chess Executive
The Changing Face of Emerging Talent

C Sheppardson_presentation.pdf

Gerry Fernandez –President & Founder Multi–Cultural Foodservice and Hospitality Alliance
Customer Service in a Multicultural Millennium: What Will It Look Like?   

FOOD SERVICE’S FUTURE: A BRAVE NEW WORLD
Whither the world of food services? Headed for basic shakeup, that’s where. Note some seismic shifts: During the lives of most people now alive, the world will feature another three billion mouths to feed. One billion of them will want to eat meat once a day at least instead of once a week at most. One third of all the grain we grow doesn’t make it from the crop field to the human stomach—to grow a half kilogram steak can take almost four kilograms of grain, in a world where grain supplies are falling ever-further behind consumption (plus, much grain is now diverted for fuel). Growing grain to grow meat also takes a lot of water: 16,000 liters for every kilogram of beef--and many countries are outright thirsty already. A single hamburger diverts enough wheat to produce five loaves of bread. Our carnivorous predilection serves to push up grain prices right around the world—as may be observed in soaring prices for bread, pasta and beverages at check-out counters of Western-world supermarkets. There are also now more overweight people than underweight people.

All this generates profound repercussions for tightening supplies of water and grain, also energy. It also leads to a major upsurge in greenhouse gases and other pollutants. Indeed it leads to a whole series of revolutions in the food service industry: greatly expanding products, greatly expanding wastes, organic foods, new foods, fair trade products and food miles products, sourcing patterns, nutrition standards, consumer tastes, health factors, safety constraints, cultural factors, and lifestyle shifts. All these need to be pursued within a context of the ultimate goal, Sustainability. An approach of “business as usual” will result in some very unusual outcomes.

The biggest challenge of all will lie with our ways of thinking about food service. Should we even view the challenge for participants as a case of advancing from human beings to human becomings?

CHANGING THE WORLD ONE BITE AT A TIME
“Help Our People & Planet Earth”, HOPPE is a sustainable and pragmatic business model for the brave new world we face in foodservice today. This session describes the core concept of the HOPPE model, which is based on three dimensions of human values: our self, our planet and underprivileged people around us. Many green businesses are built around the HOPPE model, a concept developed by Dr. Nagarkar over the past fifteen years as an Ecologist.

Can we change the world and are we ready to live in the brave new world? The answer is YES. Through the HOPPE model, one will be amazed how a consumer can make a huge difference in our world by “changing the world one bite at a time” and it also demonstrates the power of human courage. This will be discussed through an example of “THREE SIXTY”, an Organic Supermarket in Hong Kong. This is a live example of green business in foodservice where all the elements of HOPPE model can be seen and touched! From green building materials to organic and natural foods on stalls where recycled and organic themes permeate through the entire healthy eating setting. It employs the farm to fork supply chain concept, which ensures growth of the organic farmers, sustaining the entire system of supply and consumption. This is one live example of tomorrow’s brave new world!

PRACTICAL SUSTAINABILITY IN FOOD SERVICE
Is there no end to this sustainability agenda? Who would have predicted this fundamental change in our business landscape? In just a few years the emphasis has moved on from the traditional issues of legal compliance, features and benefits, fit for purpose and best value. Business is now measured on what resources it can save, how green are its policies and how corporately socially responsible it is. This is impacting on every aspect of what we do; our designs and structures, our equipment specifications, our food supplies and our management advice.

There is a new set of values and language out there and in business we are going to have to adapt to survive. The reality is that Food Service Consultants are not going to save the planet nor is the Food Service Industry. We do though have to demonstrate leadership and in our own business. We have to get wise as to the changing demand of our clients.

Geoff will highlight the key challenges facing Food Service Operations, Consultants and Industry Suppliers. He will explore the conflict between “legal compliance” and sustainability. The session will demonstrate that there are practical ways forward. He will show that sustainability for some a massive opportunity, where enterprise and investment could bring huge rewards.

FCSI WORKING TOGETHER CATERING FOR A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE
In February 2006 the Caterer and Hotelkeeper magazine published an article that helped to spark an interest in the increasing awareness within the hospitality industry of the need to address environmental and sustainable issues. The growing importance of this had already been captured by FCSI and re-enforced at the FCSI Worldwide Conference in Edinburgh in May 2006.

At this time there were a number of Professional and Allied members of FCSI also working to address many of these issues.

In March that year an informal meeting was held between a number of these professional and allied members to explore if and how the various elements of work each were conducting could be brought together to provide the industry with a more cohesive approach and in so doing achieve greater results. The fear was that in isolation the good work of one group may be unwittingly undoing the work of another.

A resounding "yes" was the outcome and not only could the various factions work together but there was a tremendous resolve to do so.

The result was to be the creation of the Catering for a Sustainable Future Group in the U.K.

GLOBAL INTELLIGENCE AND PARTNERSHIPS - KEY TO CARBON EFFICIENT EQUIPMENT
"Sustainable kitchen design requires careful meshing of equipment with the larger patterns and flows of food and people in response to the changing needs of the consumer. Futuristic equipment designs must recognize this; encompassing new technologies that are environmentally friendly, flexible, compact, reliable, and easy to use...providing sustainable kitchen designs that improve operator profitability".

THE CHANGING FACE OF EMERGING TALENT
The world and society is changing at a faster pace than most people understand. Change is challenging everyone's "comfort zones" and it is placing greater and greater demands upon businesses as employment costs - including recruitment and retention - escalate at a higher rate than almost any other cost on the P&L. And yet much of this cost is hidden. What needs to done and what is being done?

Social change is a global reality and yet the make-up of boards has not changed much in the past thirty years. Recent research has indicated that only 4% of directors of FTSE 100 companies are female. The US has seemingly made great strides forward in diversity, yet few are making equal progress. Why? The UK is a classic example with research into the UK Hospitality industry indicating that only 2% of senior directors are from ethnic minority backgrounds. What are the potential ramifications of this? The face of management in both The Middle East and Asia is changing. What will it look like in 2020?

Running alongside this change, the emerging generations are bringing new value sets to the fore. The Baby Boom generation; is having to learn to adapt and communicate to a whole new audience with which it has less than it realises in common. How the value sets different? How is communication changing? What implications for business does this have?

This is an issue that is complex but one that everyone needs to spend time understanding.

CUSTOMER SERVICE IN A MULTICULTURAL MILLENNIUM: WHAT WILL IT LOOK LIKE?
As a result of changing demographics, food and hospitality employees are becoming more multicultural, more ethnic, and more racially diverse. Globalization will only accelerate this trend and the hospitality industry will have to learn how to manage diversity from many perspectives. Customers, employees, supply partners and communities will all play an increasingly important role in shaping the future success of restaurant and hotel operators.

The question is, how will service change in the future? How will all this ethnic and racial diversity translate into the quality and level of service that is provided to food and lodging patrons? Will our employees all need to speak multiple languages? What role will technology play in the delivery and assessment of service? How will companies deliver services to their internal customers- employees?

These are the difficult questions that will need to be addressed if the foodservice and hospitality industry wants to compete for the best and brightest talent. Moreover, people groups from different parts of the globe view and assess customer service in separate and unique ways. What is determined to be “excellent customer service” by one group of people may be considered to be below average by another.

The future hospitality workforce will need to be educated and trained to a consistent standard of service. We all need to be thinking about what that service will look like, who we will be serving, and how we deliver top quality service if we want sustainable success.

UNCHARTED TERRITORY: PREPARING FOR A FUTURE WITHOUT PRECEDENT
The foodservice industry is experiencing unprecedented changes. Climate change is now very much on the minds of the public, and companies are struggling to be sensitive to it without destroying their profit margins. Technology is changing the rules on how, when, where, and with whom business is conducted, from the “leaning out” of the supply chain, to the way food service organizations interact with their clients, and how those clients interact with their customers. Biotechnology is becoming a two-edged sword, with new technologies improving the useful qualities of foodstuffs, while also revealing new food sensitivities among consumers. It’s also creating new controversies, first over genetically modified foods, then cloned foods, and, in future, foods created without farms. The kinds of foods demanded are shifting, in part due to the aging of the populations of North America, Europe, Japan, and the Anzac countries. And food commodities – and prices – seem to have been caught up in the surging demand for resources coming from the Rapidly Developing Countries like China and India, in part because of the increasing caloric intakes of their rapidly expanding middle classes.

Coping with these uncertainties and shifts in markets and sources of supply is a major issue for those organizations who plan to survive. Richard Worzel is a Chartered Financial Analyst, strategic planner, best-selling author, and one of North America’s leading futurists. In this far-ranging presentation, he outlines what is happening, why it’s happening now, and what it means for the future. In the process, he offers a roadmap to tomorrow, along with planning tools that forward-thinking organizations can use to plan and prepare for the challenges and uncertainties ahead.