At Les Roches Global Hospitality Education, we ensure you strengthen the skills you learn on campus by gaining first-hand experience of the workplace. In our latest YouTube series, we have been following a number of our students as they complete exciting internships in amazing locations.
One such student is Elia Brunner, who has just completed his internship at the five-star Hotel Schweizerhof, located in the bustling city of Zurich. He spoke to us about applying himself to a real workplace, the challenges he faced, and why internships are highly beneficial to your future career.
1. Having the right skills to build on
“Arriving in Zurich for my internship, I felt fairly confident about myself, my skills and my abilities,” Elia said. While there were some challenges, he felt that Les Roches’ education had given him the tools he needed to succeed. I am convinced that Les Roches gave me an extremely good base to start my internship, and I felt like I had an advantage compared to the other interns.”
2. Boosting your confidence
[quote]Internships provide you with the opportunity to see the world, as well as make valuable contacts and bolster your CV.[/quote]
Elia believes that the internship, which saw him work as a chef de rang, has helped him grow both personally and professionally. “Coming back to my fourth semester, I feel more confident, not just in F&B operation, but I believe also that I have grown a lot as a person from this experience itself,” he said. “I was able to go out of my shell, and learn an incredible amount of new knowledge. I now know how much a certain task takes to be done, helping me to plan not just service-related things, but also things in my day-to-day life.”
3. Bolstering your CV
Internships provide you with the opportunity to see the world, as well as make valuable contacts and bolster your CV. Elia believes that every student should experience it. “It’s a great opportunity, not only for the type of work you are doing, but also travelling to a different city, country or even continent,” he said. “At my internship, I received an incredible operational experience. I worked in the department where I see myself working in the future, not in the position of a chef de rang, but managing a fine dining restaurant. The hotel’s flawless management team gave me valuable insight on how such operation should be run, and this is giving me a very good example on how I will be doing tasks in my future.”
Want to see what our students get up to while on internships? Go to our YouTube channel to see more videos.
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