AgentBee Spoke with Christian Cargouet, the CEO of our partner institution, FBSTI.
Describe FBSTI in a few sentences.
F&B Service Training International (FBSTI) is a Swiss hospitality school providing restaurant management programs all over the world.
Our head office is based in Neuchâtel, Switzerland but we provide our courses worldwide in various destinations mainly in our school in the warm and beautiful Thailand.
A slow revolution is taking place in the hospitality education sector. With our innovative approach, our Swiss expertise and French “Savoir-faire” we have perfectly bridged the learning gap between theoretical needs and practical realities of the restaurant industry. This new teaching model is designed solely to increase the student’s employability through rapid integration; fast development and better understanding of the industry.
Why should international students consider studying at FBSTI?
FBSTI is a Swiss restaurant management school. Switzerland is the the birthplace of the hospitality industry with an unequaled reputation for training the best restaurant managers in the world. A Swiss flag (certification) on the students’ resume will fast-track their career.
We’re dedicated to ensuring top-notch restaurant education is accessible and affordable to students worldwide. By creating a whole new model of courses, we have been able to reduce the time of obtaining a Swiss Diploma, reduce the cost of education and increasing the accessibility of Swiss education.
The student’s employability is our single most important priority. Everything we do, all the courses are specifically designed to significantly increase student employability
The hospitality industry is the among the fastest growing industries worldwide and has been for the past 20 years. This unending growth creates hundreds of thousands of new jobs worldwide every year. But the best hotel chains and restaurants struggle to fill these positions because of the lack of qualified and properly trained people in the marketplace. FBSTI students will get precisely the training and the skillset the industry is looking for, thus will get an edge when applying for a job.
In Thailand we are providing the same course with the same Swiss recognised certification than any hospitality school in Switzerland but at a more reasonable tuition fees.
What role do education agents play in your international recruitment strategy?
Our agents are the most important asset of our school. Without them we would not have any students.
We work closely together to achieve the best result. We have simplified enrolment process for our agents to focus and spend more time on the recruitment and less time on the enrolment. We’re always available to help our agents (through a video conference or by visiting our agent office) with their students giving them more credibility toward parents and students.
In summary, FBSTI provides strong support to our agents and we doing everything we can to maintain a good and long relationship.
What do you look for in new education agent partners?
We are looking for our agents to develop a recruitment strategy locally to increase our enrolments. We are looking for agents who have a perfect knowledge of our courses to pass proper information to their clients. We want our agents to be very involved with FBSTI and the selling of our product.
We expect our agents to enrol a good and constant number of students for each intake.
We represent the Swiss education industry so professionalism and honesty from our agents are critical.
How do you work with education agents?
FBSTI does not enroll students directly. Any students who call or write to us will be automatically re-directed to their local FBSTI authorised agent.
If we identify a strong agent relationship in a certain region or territory we will offer exclusivity to that agent.
We have simplified the admission criteria and the enrolment process in order to make the registration for the agent faster and easier. We will assist our agents all the way through the registration process.
We are also at the disposal of our agents for any presentation or talk they want us to make to finalise a student’s registration.
After a successful recruitment for a couple of intakes, our agents are invited on an incentive trip to our establishment where they will be able to visit the school, participate to some classes, speak with our students and lecturers and visit local activities.
We use AgentBee to grow, monitor, and manage our agent network with a focus on professionalism, integrity and transparency. It is important for us to be able to track result and performance of each one of our agents.
Want to become an FBSTI education agent?
FBSTI is keen to work with education agents who share our commitment to professionalism, integrity and transparency in international student recruitment.
Education Agents – click here to apply.