Suchergebnisse

Tourism is regarded as a modern-day engine for growth and is one of the largest industries globally. South Africa has earmarked tourism as a key sector with excellent potential for growth and development. With its spectacular scenery, friendly people, world-class infrastructure, South Africa is becoming one of the most desired destinations in the world. Being a labour-intensive sector, with a supply chain that links across sectors, tourism is a priority sector in the government's planning and policy frameworks and it is perceived to be one of the six job drivers of the New Growth Path framework. To realise this vision, the government has embarked on skills enhancement drive to complement the tourism growth strategy. Initially tourism training was conducted in Technikons, and vocationally oriented colleges. With the introduction of tourism and hospitality education in conventional universities, a lot of programmes have sprouted up. But to what extent do the current curricula address the training needs in the industry? This paper argues that tourism and hospitality training should address the immediate needs of industry by preparing students for career related occupations. On one hand most graduates from conventional universities tend to delve deeper into more abstract issues, they tend to lack immediate skills that are demanded by employers.On the other hand graduates from colleges lack the aptitude and skills to drive innovation. Whilst higher education institutions play a significant role in the development of the hospitality and tourism industry manpower, they are failing to provide industry with knowledgeable graduates who are highly skilled with positive aptitudes, attitudes and behaviours towards work. The overpowering challenge facing higher education institutions is how to overcome the perceived lack of credibility of higher level hospitality and tourism management programs by the labour market. This paper identifies Work Integrated Learning (WIL) as the vehicle to prepare graduates for employability. The paper concludes with a set of critical success factors for higher education institutions, implications to curricula development and necessary industry partnerships.

South Africa by international standards has a poor public healthcare system. There has been a substantial increase in the literature on reforms such as austerity measures to improve healthcare service delivery in government health institutions. The global crisis of 2008/2009 forced the government to implement cost-cutting measures to reduce public expenditure and resolve budgetary pressures, including in the health sector. This paper adopted a mixed method to investigate the impact of staffing moratoria in the delivery of healthcare services in the Department of Health. 177 survey questionnaires were distributed to healthcare workers and 9 key informants were interviewed regarding staffing moratoria. Quantitative data was analysed using descriptive statistics, Chi-square tests of association and the Cramer's V test whilst qualitative data was analysed thematically. The results showed that staffing moratoria resulted in severe staff shortages and the deterioration of working conditions as a result of excessive working hours, job enlargement, and limited personal development opportunities. Staffing moratoria also promoted distrust between employees and management that furthered job dissatisfaction at the workplace. The paper concludes that staffing moratoria should be supported by a decentralised multi-dimensional approach in planning and implementation to ensure a collective consultative process involving all relevant stakeholders. Keywords: Healthcare; Service delivery; Staffing moratoria; Budgetary pressures; Job enlargement