Although Government is committed to expanding some of the Caribbean Vocational Qualification (CVQ) programmes beyond Level 2, this country’s Minister of Labour, Senator Dr. Esther Byer Suckoo, is urging graduates to make good customer service a part of their lifestyles.

She offered this advice today while addressing Ocean Two Resort and Residences’ CVQ Level 2 graduation ceremony at the hotel’s Dover, Christ Church, location.

Senator Byer Suckoo reminded the graduates that it was good customer service that kept customers coming back to a business.  In the case of the hotel sector, tourists often credited the excellent customer service they receive as the reason why they keep coming back to visit our shores.

“Make customer service a part of who you are.  You have to develop the art of genuinely caring about other people; this is a value that we hold dear in Barbados and something which our tourists have identified,” she stated.

She continued: “Good customer service would enhance our competitiveness and it would make Barbados a better place not just for our tourists, because we cannot only think about Barbados as a tourism destination. We have to realise that Barbados is where you live and we have to think about how our attitudes affects us.”

The Labour Minister noted that citizens needed to work towards a better society and warned that all the learning the participants received during the course would come to naught if it did not help citizens to become better individuals.

“We talk about doing business … and we look at how Barbados ranks on the world business scale with the rest of the world…You know what makes it very agonising in terms of doing business, is the attitudes that we encounter.  Go the extra mile; this CVQ certifies to the Caribbean that you have the skills to take our region forward,” Senator Dr. Byer Suckoo