Sometimes people forego their dreams out of fear of the unknown or commitments made to loved ones.
Then there are those who take the plunge to follow their dreams. Pohleena Selvanayagam, 37, a Quality Improvement Manager at Shangri-La Rasa Sentosa Resort, is one of them.
Hailing from Penang, Pohleena spent six years working in Shangri-La’s Rasa Sayang Resort & Spa, Penang. She graduated from Reliance College, an academy specialising in tourism and hospitality
When the opportunity came for her to move to Singapore back in 2013, she grabbed it.
Curious, I asked Pohleena why she chose to come to Singapore and not to stay on in Penang to be with her family.
“I just wanted to chase my goals and dreams,” she replied candidly.
Her role as a Quality Improvement Manager involves analysing guest engagement surveys and sharing monthly service performance statistics with the hotel operations teams to continuously enhance service standards for guests and workflow processes for colleagues.
However, since the start of the year when the COVID-19 pandemic began to take its toll on international travel, the hospitality industry has seen its occupancy rates dwindle drastically. Today, a large number of hotels house individuals serving their Stay Home Notices (SHN).
Without guests, Pohleena was unable to perform her quality improvement role. But she did not choose idle and instead made use of the on-going lull period to go for training.
As her primary job only required her to attend to guests on a contactless basis, she opted to attend courses that would enhance her knowledge, build her confidence and help her to become more proficient with guest-facing role and duties.
These included courses provided by NTUC LearningHub, such as ‘Develop Personal Effectiveness at Operational Level’ and ‘Project a Positive and Professional Image’.
These courses have allowed Pohleena to move beyond a back-of-house role to assist the front office team as a Duty Manager.
The ‘Develop Personal Effectiveness at Operational Level’ course equipped her with skills to better manage work priorities, contribute to team goals, assist with strategies, and improve workflow processes.
Through the ‘Project a Positive and Professional Image’ course, it sharpened her skills in communicating efficiently and professionally with both colleagues and guests.
Using the 3 “A” s she learnt - action (body language), articulation (verbal communication) and appearance (grooming), she was able to present herself more confidently.
Pohleena concluded: “I really appreciate organisations such as NTUC that are coming out with programmes right now for working adults … We [working adults] already have our family and other commitments to go through that sometimes make us lose focus of our priorities.
“But when we are given this kind of refresher courses, it reminds us of why we are working, and how we can achieve our dreams.”
