Institute of Hotel and Restaurant Management, Assistant Professor: Mr. Pratik Kumar Nath Interview

Pratik Kumar Nath is the Assistant Professor at IHRM, Kolkata. He has pursued a B.sc in Hospitality and hotel administration from IHM Bhubaneswar. He has 9 years of industry experience and 4 Years of academic experience.

Being a Faculty of the Department, what are your roles and responsibilities towards the students?

Being a faculty of the department is a very challenging and at the same time very crucial job. It is almost a list of KRA (Key responsible areas) for example representing college or university in different conferences, providing academic support to students, and being very active on the phone and email. I receive doubts in emails texts or calls and have to be present to answer all of those. I have to attend Faculty and departmental meetings and voice concerns or provide suggestions for improvement, develop professional logistics to improve student performance, and guide, lead, and mentor students in research projects. I evaluate, monitor, and mentor student academic progress, and create, innovate, and implement career-enhancement programs and activities. I also supervise and support teaching assistants, and serve and support functional activities of departmental committees. Last but not least, I also assess, review, and evaluate student activities and progress.

What valuable advice would you like to the students for them to have a prosperous career ahead?

Never be yourself. Being yourself is a myth. Always try to better yourself. Make yourself worthy of your success. If you're too comfortable in your job or your career, you won't think of setting new goals. Challenge yourself, every single day. A career should always be an incremental graph, not a stagnant one. So does your life. Grow every day.

What do you see as the department’s/ college’s greatest strengths and how it can be enhanced?

The biggest strength of the International School of Management is its mission and vision. The availability of a good education system, recruitment of excellent trainers, development of the best environment, and acceleration of the education system of Bihar are the exact missions. To enhance the strength we should believe in its belief and at the same time contribute to our fullest so that it can prepare the roadmap easily.

What are the interventions and approaches you bring in apart from the curriculum to train/teach the students?

In one lesson a faculty may use many different training approaches with different end goals. They can know about their students and develop their thoughts. They can follow the concept of explicit instruction to focus on frequent questioning and guided practice to help them learn a topic.

How does the department enhance the skills of the faculty and prepare them according to the industry standards?

A faculty’s skill enhancement is related to the development of his/her competencies and competence which will enable and empower him/her. It includes training and practice in various techniques, approaches, and strategies such as soft skills, counseling skills, interpersonal skills, and lifelong learning skills which will help in planning and conducting a proper assessment.

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How does the curriculum of your department ensure the best practice of the industry? 

Curriculum strategies lend themselves to the development of particular employability skills. Faculty can provide a vision of the usefulness and effectiveness of the materials, and students can deliver input on the level of engagement, learning effort, and overall impression of the curriculum. If the curriculum is tied to a technician profession, involve industry representatives in reviewing and examining the curriculum. This should be done as part of the development process, but if it is not, the department could consider a representative to review the curriculum for alignment with industry expectations.

When you came to the Institute, what was your vision and how are you trying to achieve the same?

Vision: To educate students to be successful, ethical, and effective problem-solvers and life-long learners who will contribute positively to the economic well-being of our region and nation and who are prepared to tackle complex challenges to face the world to achieve the same, follow the concept of summative and formative assessment.

What are the challenges you faced/ are facing to uplift the quality of education in your department?

The biggest challenge of today's education quality is to recognize the difference between learning and accepting; children start their study but do not understand it properly and then forget the difference between how they learn and how much duration of time they take to learn. So to bridge this gap and educate those students in the right way is a challenge facing the department.

Do you have any extracurricular activities/ programs to enhance the skills of the students or expose them to real-world challenges?

The extracurricular activities/programs include sports, volunteer and service-related activities, cultural club activities, IT club activities, HR club activities, and other activities.

How do you help your student to cope with the competition being so high in the outside world?

We help the students cope with the competition being so high in the outside world by providing a self-awareness program, outlining the terms that they learn and why they learn, providing work-integrated learning opportunities, and getting students out into the real world, showing students how to learn from their mistakes and encouraging students to get out of their comfort zones.

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What are your views on the placements and higher education about the students from your department or how does your department prepare students for Higher education?

It has been found in research that one in three interns do not work, it can be attributed to any reason such as they do not want to work, lack of skills or they do not know what to do. The deficiency can be overcome by conducting time-to-time competitions among the students or by checking in which areas they are interested and in which areas they are interested more. We can also check and implement some ideas to bring them forward.

How do you strategize the curriculum and how often does it get updated to make it befitting for the students?

As faculty, we should strategize the curriculum in a formative and summative way using ongoing feedback from students. So it will be easy to improve the technique of teaching. We can also improve the strategies by answering questions such as What do we expect our students to learn? How will we know they are learning? What is the output of their assessment analysis?

What are the best practices offered by the department to the students that help them gain the necessary skills?

The department may conduct different activities from time to time for the growth of their students such as webinars/seminars, expert talks, live Projects, Student Development Programs (SDP), quizzes, workshops, etc.

How do you try to bring in a practical approach towards subjects and make it industry-oriented? 

Practical skills of education can train their students and gain industry focus. Being industry-focused means two things: keeping up with the industry and involving the industry. In addition to keeping up with current trends and technologies and implementing these into daily classes, we invite smart people from the industry to do workshops with our students and teaching staff. By doing so, we get fresh ideas and inspiration to improve the practices of the classroom.

How do you tend to establish healthy relations with the students and fellow faculty?

To create a healthy relationship with students we should believe on 1 on 1 interaction with them. It is helpful for them especially those who are struggling with behavioral issues. We should be a part of their events and listen to their ideas and views also. For our fellow faculty, no one likes insincere behavior. When you interrelate with a coworker, be honest. Look to create open connections with your fellow faculty, not transactional ones. This will show that we are invested in the relationship.