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Breaking New Ground
Blackpool and Fylde College started a course to train local people in casino skills when the UK government announced plans to expand and overhaul the country’s casino industry – and even if the area does not get the supercasino license, it now has a training centre which could change the recruitment policies for casinos in the UK for good.
With support and encouragement from companies like Bally and a forward-thinking management team, this could – and should – be the country’s centre of excellence when it comes to training casino staff. It may even mean operators need to run less of their own training courses and consequently suffer less dropouts, with increased efficiency in recruitment – feedback from companies that have taken on Blackpool and Fylde’s students so far has been excellent and the operators are coming back for more. Carnival Cruises are among those enthusiastic about taking on Blackpool and Fylde’s graduates, and Stanley Casinos have staff on the Gaming Academy’s books. Gala Casinos use the Academy to improve their junior managers generic management skills.
It’s not only on the gaming side, courses include slot management, where students learn the confidence and problem solving ability to cope with the ever-evolving slot industry. This is another major part of what the Academy offers, alongside croupier training, degree qualifications and bespoke staff courses at this award-winning education centre. So how did it come about, where did they find a blueprint for something so new to the UK?
With knowledge that the gaming structure in the country was to change and that Blackpool was looking to improve its conference facilities, the Blackpool and Fylde College looked around for a place that had gone through similar change – of course, Atlantic City came out top of the list. The college Principal forged links with the Atlantic City Community College Principal, and B&F representatives visited the US to find out more.
Maggie Dollin-Evans, Head of the School of Tourism, Leisure and Hospitality, was among the college staff who visited, and recalls significantly: “Their training had all started after the casinos have been built, with the result that all the supervisory and management jobs went to people outside of Atlantic City because nobody was trained. So then we decided that if we came back and we developed the training now, before any casino was actually built, people would be able to go away get a few years experience and come back and take the managerial positions that were in the casinos in Blackpool.
“We came back here and saw a private trainer in Gravesend who taught us the games during the day and we wrote it up as curriculum at night. We actually got the course accredited as a BTEC Advanced Diploma in Casino Operations. We then went on and appointed a trainer, Wendy and developed the first course which started around May 2004.”
Setting the curriculum, Maggie says, was not that difficult with the input of someone who knew what the industry demanded in its operatives. And the college had other strings to its bow, with an established tourism and business studies courses that could easily complement any casino course, as the experience of customer-facing training is vital. Maggie explains: “We had many years of teaching tourism courses and BTEC courses that were business studies, and knew the sort of extra things that we thought would provide added value to the course. So we look at the social impact, the economic impact, we look at problem gambling. There’s a lot more in the course which will enable anyone who takes the course to look at other aspects of the industry if they decide they don’t want to be a croupier. From that point of view, the more and more we got to know the industry, the easier it became. But there were no standards, there was no course – this course is new, this course was absolutely unique and still is.”
As well as the forward-thinking management of the college, one appointment was vital to the success of the Academy – the position of Manager. Colleen McLaughlin is in this position; the right person in this role makes or breaks the course’s success, and I’m delighted to say that the Academy has found the perfect figurehead. Colleen is dedicated, focussed and driven, but also aware that gaming needs to be fun. After 14 years in the gaming industry, plenty of which was at customer level, she is ideally positioned to guide her charges and impart knowledge of all levels of casinos. Her enthusiasm and passion for the college is nothing short of infectious, and her man management seems to be spot on.
She trained as a croupier at 19, working on cruise ships for two-and-a-half years, eventually ending up working in the South African casino industry. After that, a short spell on other cruise ships followed until she came back to the UK and worked her way up through Stanley’s ranks, which included a spell as Senior Gaming Manager at Star City, still the UK’s largest casino. With family commitments in Blackpool, when the opportunity to remain in the industry and break new ground came up, it was Colleen and the Gaming Academy’s lucky day.
Colleen explains that the course is geared towards providing as close to a finished product in its students as possible. “They say to deal with the sort of high end of the industry you need to have a certain amount of experience. And whether that’s a true statement or not that’s what the industry wants,” she says. “You know they don’t want trainee dealers, dealing with people in London – they want a minimum of two years experience. To go and work on the cruise ships they want a minimum of 12 months experience, but we’ve managed to break that mould.”
The courses on offer are not only open to local applicants, they’ve had international applications too. In dealing with the Regional Development Fund, which has partly financed the creation of the Academy, there is an agreement that the Academy will out a certain number of people into work. They’re well on the way to achieving some of their targets, but with government delays over the supercasino license their goals may have to be re-assessed. When the Academy was established, it was with the expectation that a new-style casino, possibly even the supercasino, would be operational by now, so governmental foot-dragging has not helped the cause of these innovators.
In terms of marketing, the Academy has had to do very little as they have generated plenty of free publicity. They work closely with the local JobCentres in Blackpool and the surrounding area, informing them of what the Academy is doing and how they can work together; the Academy has adapted its croupier training course so that people on means-tested benefits can train and still claim essential benefits, with less than 16 hours a week. The course is usually 22.5 hours a week, so this means a greater number and breadth of people can take advantage of Blackpool and Fylde College facilities. It can help mothers back into work, as Colleen enthuses: “If they are juggling a family they can’t come into college four days a week, you know two days is more than enough. I’ve worked as a manager in a casino, I’ve given people jobs loads of times over the past six or seven years. But there’s nothing better, this is a completely different feeling. When they come through that door they don’t know anything about gaming, you sit and talk to them, you weigh up whether these people can work with the public. You know we test them on basic skills on maths and English; that’s not a pass or fail thing that’s just to understand what level they’re at when they come to us. At around 14 weeks [of 18 weeks training] I will try and get them a table test at a local casino where they want to work, go along with them, and watch them.
“When they’re given the job the look on their face… I’ve never been thanked enough by these people you know, it’s a complete change of life for them. They’ve tried to get work to work in casinos, well they’re not doing training schools at the moment, it’s expensive for them to do training schools they don’t want to do them. So this has been absolutely brilliant, fantastic to get a whole new generation of people into the gaming industry and people of all ages come on these courses. You know on the next course we’ve got a girl who literally turns 18 a few days before the start of the course and we’ve got a gent who’s 48 who used to work in the gaming industry when he was 18. And he now wants to, his kids are grown up, they’re at an age where he can go and work back in the gaming industry and his family life won’t be affected. So it’s from one end of the scale to the other, it’s great.”
What does the college look for in applicants then? Colleen explains: “At the end of the day, customer service skills, are the key to the gaming industry. You keep them bums on seats and you know eventually the taking drop should take care of itself. You know I’m looking at someone who’s looking at me when they walk in the door with a smile on their face. And not you know the ones that are talking to me and they’re not even looking at me, you know that’s not the way forward. Obviously we teach customer service in the classroom and then apply that to the games at the table, but you need some customer service there to work with.
“Initially, we do a telephone screening interview, so I ask them first of all if it’s ok for me to ask a few sensitive questions. Obviously we need to discuss CRB, criminal records bureau checks and I ask them if they have had any convictions past or present. And if any people have convictions then I explain why I’ve asked the questions and if they would like to maybe come in and sit down and talk to me about convictions and then we have quite a few people go quiet at that one. A lot of people won’t come in and talk about convictions.
“What I say to people is that if you do have criminal record, it doesn’t mean you’re not going to get a gaming license you just need to be open and transpar ent about it. I mean yes there are going to be offences they are not going to tolerate, like going to prison for drugs, and so they really don’t like drugs.
“If you’re talking armed robbery and all those other things. We would like to think we wouldn’t be allowing that but you know it’s not necessarily…I’ve got two gents coming on my next course who had a colourful past, nothing too serious. So what I do is I actually phone the Gambling Commission up, our local Gambling Warden is a Gambling Board Inspector, I’ve got a great relationship with him, he comes in and talks to our group. Every new group that we have he comes in and has a chat with them. So if I’ve got somebody that I’m not sure whether they would get a gaming license, I’ll phone him up and explain the conviction, and it’s a yes or no answer. There’s no point putting people on this course if they cannot get a Section 19 certificate off the gaming board, and I say that to them quite openly.”
The Academy also boasts the ability to provide a bespoke service for a casino client. A one-day refresher in customer service, a couple of days learning about the law, whatever you need you can find it here. With the college’s background in business and tourism studies, the modern casino can genuinely find everything their staff needs under one roof. Blackpool and Fylde College is also recognised as a Centre of Vocational Excellence for customer service, the only one in the country.
At some point in the not-too-distant future, this Academy could set a benchmark for all others to follow, with other colleges wanting to establish either the same courses or similar ones depending on local needs. In that future, Blackpool and Fylde will clearly have more experience and an established structure for such courses, and could act to ensure all vocational gaming training courses are of the necessary standard in the UK, with Blackpool and Fylde accreditation. This bold project could have far-reaching and very positive repercussions for the gaming industry.
It’s not without risks though, with other colleges potentially introducing alternative qualifications, as Colleen explains: “The last thing we need at this stage is for other qualifications to be put together because it would confuse the industry. They need to be very gently introduced to what we’re doing, and they are very responsive to what we’re doing at the moment. So I think if we do just build on what we’re doing at the moment and just try and get other people on board if they are going to start gaming training I colleges, to be delivering our qualifications.” With Colleen on board acting as a bridge between the college and the industry, Blackpool is in pole position to establish itself as the gold standard. Hopefully other colleges will acknowledge their blend of talents and direct experience, and afford it the necessary respect.
The staff at the Regional Gaming Academy rightly take immense pride in their achievements and, more specifically, the achievements of their graduates. Of 40 people that trained with them last year, 38 are in gaming-related jobs. Seventeen of the 40 came off benefits as a result. The other two apparently took the course for other reasons, and were not pursuing a career in casinos. That’s an outstanding record for any vocational course and says everything about the courses they offer and the attitude of the college. People leave prepared for work, and at a level which means they are immediately employable. There’s no higher praise for a vocational college than this.
The Mature Student
Linda, 35, started a two-year foundation degree in Casino Operations this year and was three weeks into the course when I visited the centre. With a pending divorce and a sense of liberation, Linda is keen to stress that she is doing the course for herself – but with the total support of her employers, Stanley Casinos, who give her a day a week to study on-site. She’s a croupier at Blackpool’s Castle Casino, and found the course herself and approached her employer. Linda explains: “I found it and went to my employer and said ‘I want to do this’. “I wanted to get the old brain cells working again. I realised that at 35 I didn’t want to stand behind a table and deal all my life, as much as I enjoy the job, I wanted to do something about it. “I’m looking to the future now, I’ve spent far too much time bothering about everyone else, I need to think about what I want – so here I am.” As for the course, Linda says it’s a “business degree course based on Casino Operations because that’s the industry that we work in, but you can basically adapt it to any business. So it just opens a whole bunch of doors for you.” She’s also ‘dragging herself into the 21st century’, as she puts it, as the course is giving her the chance to learn computer skills, an aspect which could be invaluable when attracting mature students into the college as a byproduct of the degree. As daunting as this is for Linda, she says the staff are “brilliant. The teachers are excellent. You just can’t go wrong, there’s just help left, right and centre. Whenever you need it there’s always somebody there to help.” Regardless of whether she takes an upward path with her current employers, Linda knows she can use the skills she is learning to enhance her performance in her current role. She explains: “Where I work I normally run the card room. So I do Texas Hold’em and Poker three days a week. And within the confines of how you can advertise and market within a casino, we can’t as you know have adverts all over the TV and all over the newspapers, things like that, so we have to find alternative methods. But the marketing and everything we learn from that’s going to help me so much more just coming up with other ideas to market and advertise a casino that you’re not allowed to tell anybody about really. It’s quite difficult within the guidelines of the Gambling Commission.” With the investment of a day a week, Stanley will benefit massively from Linda’s development both personally and professionally – which is not a gamble for any employer.
The Young Gun
Tom Washington (above) moved to Blackpool and enrolled on a Croupier course after his mum suggested it, seeing Tom playing poker online. At just 22, Colleen McLaughlin, Regional Gaming Academy Manager, says he has a very bright future ahead: “He’s going to do really, really well, he’s one of my most promising students. He’s picked things up very quickly, his customer service skills are fantastic.” But Tom isn’t letting the praise go to his head – he has a realistic attitude toward a career in gaming, and wants to start on cruise ships. he says it’s about “getting my foot in the door, but of course the opportunity’s there to do better anyway, isn’t it. At the moment this is one step in my life that I’ve actually taken to better myself like and with opportunities to keep on bettering myself I’m sure I definitely will. At the moment I’m enjoying just getting my head round the games and everything, doing the best I can.” He recognises that, as a customer- facing employee, he needs a broad set of skills but that the course has also helped him massively with this. “I have always worked hard since I left school. And this is working hard, but it’s mentally hard and for me that’s something that I’ve never been really good at. So now that I’m good at it in the arithmetic and everything we do, it’s making me feel a lot more confident in myself and bringing myself out. And moving up to Blackpool and being surrounded by people I don’t know, at first anyway being without my security blanket, has made me a much stronger, more confident person to how I was two or three months ago. Even though everyone you meet will say they’ve got confident, myself, I feel a lot better for it. “You’ve definitely got to be open-minded in being able to speak to people, really that’s, and also with the maths you’ve got to be a little bit sharp if you want to pick it up – but not the sharpest, because I wasn’t when I first came here. It comes with practise and training. But really the best part about it is your people skills really, because if you can come across friendly and nice with people it’s a lot more relaxing and a lot more fun and that’s the name of the game at the end of the day – fun. People come to win money as well, but I definitely think you’ve got to have good people skills.”
