John Hyde
Chief Executive Officer, HIT Training
In 2006, with the advent of the government’s new ‘Train to Gain’ programme, John was tempted out of retirement to start a new training company to deliver Train to Gain programmes solely to the Hospitality sector. Thus HIT (Hospitality Industry Training) was born.
Several of John’s old management team and directors joined the new company. The company is 86 per cent owned by the 60 founding employees who invested in HIT at the very beginning. Seven per cent is owned by suppliers to the company and seven per cent by ‘private investors’ who were invited for their expertise alongside their cash. After two and a half years HIT now operates across every English region, and employs over 200 professional training staff.
Uniquely HIT out-sources all non-core activities and only directly employs professional hospitality trainer-assessors and their line managers together with four directors and a small support services team.
Since August 2006 the company has doubled its turnover each year and is on target to achieve £12million in the current contract year. HIT plans to grow by at least 30 per cent year on year for the next four years. Over 7,000 adults working in the hospitality and leisure sectors have gained or are working towards their NVQ qualifications with HIT to date. This year HIT has won five national or regional awards.
John currently chairs the ALP (Association of Learning Providers) Train to Gain and Hospitality Special Interest Groups and is the ALP work-based learning Hospitality Skills Champion in the tripartite agreement between ALP, the AOC and the SSCs. John is a founder patron of Springboard and a patron of Hospitality Action, the hotel and catering industry’s leading charities. John sits on various committees and forums with British Hospitality Association (this industry’s trade body), City & Guilds, Institute of Hospitality (this industry’s professional association) and People 1st (the hospitality industry’s sector skills council).
Before this John was made redundant due to restructuring at HCTC in 1992, so he founded his own training business, ‘Hospitality Plus plc’, to deliver Modern Apprenticeship programmes to the hotel and catering industry. John developed this company nationally, and within five years it had grown to become the largest hospitality training provider, operating from 50 locations across the UK, employing 400 professional trainers and delivering apprenticeship programmes to some 17,000 young people annually. Eight years on, John sold the business to the VT Group.
John joined HCITB/HCTC at the start of YTS (Youth Training Programmes) and progressed to become Regional Manager for London and the South. This was after he sold off his first entrepreneurial venture where he developed a chain of three restaurants and an outside catering business in Brighton, his current home.