Mixology, pastry making, Hospitality Think Tank… all part of a made-to-measure workshop for our MSc students

Students on our postgraduate MSc in International Hospitality Management, designed and delivered in partnership with emlyon business school, participated in a workshop to discover new specialist areas and to develop specific knowledge tailored to their career ambitions.

At Institut Paul Bocuse, our pedagogical model focuses on experiential learning, interactivity and personalisation of the training programme. Our students learn in a fun way and in direct contact with the professional world thanks to a multitude of collaborative projects, business games, trend tours and consulting missions, which are all built into their curriculum.

The current health situation has led us to rethink the format of the courses and projects offered to students.  Our School has been granted a dispensation by local education authorities to continue providing certain practical courses in strict compliance with health regulations.  Our academic team therefore came up with the idea of organising a made-to-measure workshop designed to allow our MSc in International Hospitality Management students to discover new areas of study combining theory and practice during semester 1.

Each student chose a theme they wanted to discover and develop as a skill, following a 15-hour format of courses and workshops alongside an expert in that discipline.  From mixology to pastry-making, from the world of beer to the great classics of French gastronomy, not forgetting the discovery of wines from around the world, all the students took an active part in the project and dived into an often-unknown universe that brought them out of their comfort zone.  They were supervised by a team of multi-disciplinary experts from the hotel, restaurant and culinary arts sectors, including our Meilleurs Ouvriers de France in wine waiting, chocolate and confectionery making.

During the workshop, students also participated in distance learning conferences hosted by leading names in the hospitality industry, including Serge Trigano – co-founder of the famous lifestyle hotel chain Mama Shelter, Emmanuel Sauvage – co-founder of the Evok hotel group and Vincent Billiard – General Manager of the Hotel de Crillon in Paris.

To round off this event, our students set about designing the “hospitality business of the future” by taking part in the Think Tank International Hotel of Tomorrow, a kind of focus group and ideas lab led by Ron Swidler, international expert at the Getty Group.