Getting Certified

It’s taken a while for me to admit that I am enjoying my furlough time. 

Don’t get me wrong I miss my team and the challenges of hotel operations. Most of all, I miss the feeling of being needed and of being a support for my team. What this furlough time has forced me to do is focus on myself, being attentive to my needs, and being my support. Because of that, I decided to focus on sharpening some current skills and developing some new skills. 

It was very counterintuitive for me to look at spending money on these certifications while furloughed, but after a lot of thought and discussion, I chose to make the investment. My goal was to be strategic in terms of what certifications to focus on since I still want to improve my skills as a hospitality professional. However, I also want to be prepared shall I need to pivot in my career. To learn more about the two certifications, see below.

Certified Professional in Talent Development (CPTD)

I’ve always been a people person. Although I work in a highly-customer-focused environment, the highlights of my career have been when I was able to help someone grow and develop in their career. Some aspects of this certification I am already familiar with, such as training and facilitation, technology application, and performance improvement. I am looking forward to learning more about instructional design as I’ve never designed a learning and development course from scratch. Ultimately, when I complete this certification, I would like to work on helping organizations create dynamic teams by setting the teams up with all the tools and resources necessary to be successful. 

Six Sigma Green Belt (SSGB)

I am a natural at optimizing processes and logistics. I’m always inclined to see how I can make improvements, how we can work smarter. The world of Six Sigma revolves around process improvement, defect reduction, and subsequently ensuring the quality of products or services. I was lucky enough to be introduced to this world in my current role, but sadly my projects were cut short due to the pandemic and furloughs. On the bright side, the certification course goes well beyond the scope of hospitality, so I am enjoying learning about how the practices apply to pretty much every type of workplace. 

The common ground between these two certifications is problem-solving. They both have a heavy emphasis on identifying gaps and needs, and they use systemic approaches to improve the current state of the organization. If there’s anything I’ve learned in my 14 years in hospitality is that I love problem-solving, and I hope to use these skills to help individuals and organizations alike to be the best they can be. I am grateful for the time and opportunity my furlough has provided. 

Are there any career skills you’re working on? Or would like to work on? If you’re not, that’s totally okay too! We are in a pandemic after all.