On 23rd March 2023 Professor Erwin Losekoot from the AIHR (Academy of International Hospitality Research) presented a webinar on Hospitality, Hospitals and Healthcare – A research agenda. The seminar was organised by the Responsible Customer Engagement research group and the University of Derby and it was powered by ATHENA. Registration and participation were free of charge.
Hospitality and Healthcare have a long tradition together. Just like corporate hospitality, healthcare is currently struggling with the contrasting challenges of choice versus efficiency, the good of the individual versus society, professionalisation versus personalisation, staffing, and ultimately who pays the bills. These issues are increasingly driving academic and industry debates not just in the Netherlands but all over the world as carry serious implications for education, for business, and even (in my opinion) for society. Covid has shown us all how hard it can be to show caring attitudes and behaviours and developing concepts such as “hostmanship” (the art of making people feel welcome) may well provide some ways forward. This session aimed to bring together a growing network of researchers in hospitality, hospitals and healthcare. The webinar reviewed what we currently know about the origins and nature of hospitality and how we got to where we are now. It considered what research has been done thus far in the field of hospitality and hospitals, and the challenges of researching in a culturally and ethically sensitive setting such as healthcare.