A Silver Lining for the Bahamas

There's a silver lining behind every dark cloud. And that includes the current economic downturn.
A decline in hotel visitors has led to increased employee productivity and levels of visitor satisfaction, according to Bahamas Hotel Association president Robert Sands.
And while the Bahamas has sadly had to lay-off hundreds of hotel workers because of global belt-tightening, this has made employees more determined to offer top notch service to keep visitors returning to the Bahamas.
Sands has noted an unequivocal improvement in service delivery and attitudes among
“That has been one of the major, if you can call it, benefits of these hard times during this particular period," he told The Nassau Guardian.
And Barrie Farrington, senior executive of Kerzner International and president of the He said productivity has improved as a result of a smaller workforce.
To cap it off, Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham said visitors to the Bahamas have noted and reported that the Bahamian people are friendlier and the quality of service has improved.
He said the Bahamas is repositioning itself for the turn around that must come to meet higher visitor expectations.
The Bahamas Hotel Association says of 23 hotels surveyed, 96 percent continued to train workers in 2008. And 35 percent increased spending on training last year.