TORONTO — Joe Baker has joined the team at Ontario Restaurant Hotel and Motel Association (ORHMA) in a newly created role as strategic director, Workforce Development to lead the Passport-to-Hospitality initiative. Baker will work collaboratively with the ORHMA senior-leadership team and industry stakeholders on several upcoming key workforce-development initiatives.
“There has never been a more critical time for ORHMA to support the accommodations and foodservice sector across this province as we work towards recovery,” says Tony Elenis, president & CEO of ORHMA. “ORHMA has identified the workforce as a huge issue to hospitality success and has aggressively embarked through series of initiatives to support the industry. Adding someone with Joe’s experience to our team allows us to collaboratively build a better future for our industry, which includes a variety of key players involved in workforce development.”
Over the last couple of years, Baker has worked to support several tourism-and-hospitality industry recovery activities, including the launch of Tourism HR Canada’s Propel Student Work Placement Program providing wage subsidies to industry employers who hire post-secondary students on work-integrated learning experiences, and Ontario Tourism Education Corporation’s Tourism and Hospitality Emergency Recovery initiative.
“I have spent my entire career in Ontario’s hospitality-and-tourism industry and can confidently state that we will collectively overcome the adversity of the last two years. We are now at a critical stage of recovery. We now need to create capacity within our businesses, and this cannot be achieved without engaged and aligned talent,” says Baker.
