Tutor Profile: Hala Akkad

ITC tutor Hala Akkad has over 25 years’ experience in staff training and customer service in the travel, tourism and hospitality industries. Here she shares some information about her background and her love of travel and adventure.

I started working as a guest relations officer at the Sheraton Hotel, then moved into sales and marketing with the international hotel brand Le Méridien.

I decided to move into the airline industry, which was a great life-changing decision. I began as a flight attendant, and then became a flight attendant safety instructor with Saudi Airline. During my time there I enjoyed teaching 54 different nationalities of flight attendants from all around the world.

After this I worked as a senior airport service agent and training facilitator for Emirates at Auckland airport, where I gained extensive knowledge about the airline airport operations, customer service and experience with reservations, fares, ticketing and the Global Distribution system relating to the travel industry.

Having a passion for airline travel and cruising I have myself taken trips to many countries around the world. Places I have been to on my travels include the entire Mediterranean, most of the Asian countries, Eastern and Western Europe, the Middle East, USA, Canada, Panama Canal, Fiji, Mexico, the Caribbean and the Bahamas. The best thing about travelling is experiencing all the different cultures, food, shopping and the great outdoors. I am an outdoor person who loves walking, biking and kayaking and I try to work this into my travel whenever I can. The extent of my travels, my passion for the outdoors, and my staff training and hospitality experience means I am an enthusiastic teacher and I love to share this knowledge and experience with our students at ITC. I have enjoyed working with many different cultures during my working life, which has given me a cultural awareness and an appreciation of diversity that I also try to pass on to our students.