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Monthly Archives: May 2014

Surrounded by Excellence: Laura Zizka

14 Wednesday May 2014

Posted by charlesrthomasjr in Uncategorized

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Ecole Hoteliere de Lausanne, excellence

May 14, 2014 5:45:29 PM

When EHL’s Executive MBA Class received their first significant writing assignment this past September, they received a jolt—it had been some time since they had to write an essay to a high and exacting standard.  Dr. Marc Stierand made it clear that he didn’t want to receive the kind of quick-and-dirty writing that passes for sufficient in many business settings.  Ecole hôtelière de Lausanne employers expect crisp-thinking, clear-writing leaders, and Stierand’s expectations were high for this first writing assignment.  For some in the EMBA Class of 2014, the assignment was a blast—like the icy waters of Lac Leman, swimming in early Spring!

Portraits_Laura_Zizka_copyright_EHL_jean-marie_michel_web1

Hearing the challenge was Laura Zizka, veteran instructor and longtime faculty member.  Having worked with hundreds of EHL students – both native and non-native English speakers – Laura had seen this reaction before.  Without hesitating, she sprang into action, revising her Business Communications seminar and workshop to directly address the needs of the Class of 2014.  The next several hours she spent preparing everyone to meet Dr. Stierand’s high expectations for his Economics of F&B Hospitality coursework.

For the Class of 2015, Laura Zizka has bold plans that include September sessions on writing skills and January sessions on oral presentation skills.  Laura’s devotion to Ecole hôteliere de Lausanne student-scholars and, in particular, our EMBA in Hospitality Administration candidates reminds me of a somewhat-obscure jewel of a Jimmy Buffett song about a chance encounter with a street sweeper —“It’s My Job”…

Till the lights go on and the stage is set
And the song hits home and you feel that sweat
It’s my job to be different than the rest
and that’s enough reason to go for me
It’s my job to be better than the best
and that’s a tough break for me
It’s my job to be cleaning up this mess
and that’s enough reason to go for me
It’s my job to be better than the best
and that makes the day for me

Demanding excellence, delivering excellence.  It’s an honour for me to work with Laura Zizka, a leader by example.

Never one to rest for long, these days Laura spends her “free time” completing a PhD in Management from Walden University with an emphasis on communications in the hospitality industry.

Je vous remercie, Laura Zizka!

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Creativity and Innovation in Haute Cuisine

07 Wednesday May 2014

Posted by charlesrthomasjr in Uncategorized

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creativity, Ecole Hoteliere de Lausanne, innovation

“Chefs’ personal creativity is often guided by intuition, whilst innovation is a process of social evaluation, greatly dependent on the perception, knowledge and value judgement of the testers”—concluded Ecole hôtelière de Lausanne Assistant Professor of Service Management, Marc Stierand and his fellow researchers, Viktor Dorfler and Jillian MacBryde from the University of Strathclyde Business School.Portrait_Stierand-Marc_2013_100x100

The March 2014 issue of Creativity and Innovation Management features a special section on facilitating creativity and innovation in hospitality organizations, Dr. Stierand’s specialty.

In “Creativity and Innovation in Haute Cuisine”, Stierand, Dorfler, and MacBryde describe what they learned from in-depth interviews with chefs from noteworthy restaurants in Michelin’s Guide Rouge and the Gault Millau restaurant guide.   The specific challenge of this study was to examine the nonlinear nature of innovation which is often described as a straightforward, sequential process.

In concluding the authors noted that:

the ‘personal creativity part’ of the innovation process is an embodied experience that is often guided by intuition and that the ‘social evaluation part’ of the innovation process always depends on the perception and knowledge of the domain gatekeepers to recognize the quality of an idea.

Marc Stierand joined the Ecole Hoteliere de Lausanne faculty in Fall 2013; he teaches Economics of Food and Beverage Hospitality in EHL’s Executive MBA in Hospitality Administration programme, emphasizing the role of innovation.

Stierand, M., Dörfler, V. and MacBryde, J. (2014), Creativity and Innovation in Haute Cuisine: Towards a Systemic Model. Creativity and Innovation Management, 23: 15–28. doi: 10.1111/caim.12050

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