 Poster: A snowHead
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I'm taking a gap year starting in July and wanted to do a ski season as a Chalet Host over the Winter 2016/17. Any suggestions where I should start looking?
Thanks
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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I'd write to every chalet operator you can think off - google is your friend. Just send them a cover letter telling them why you think you'd be a good chalet host and with a brief CV that illustrates customer service and cooking experience.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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If you can partner up with someone looking for a chalet chef job you will be about 10,000x more attractive to chalet operators - or to us at least!
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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In an application/cover letter what are the best things to include?
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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I think your title and opening post don't necessarily correlate - rookie chalet host isn't the job to do to maximise ski time. Working your socks off til January then ski bumming is.
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| Dave of the Marmottes wrote: |
| I think your title and opening post don't necessarily correlate - rookie chalet host isn't the job to do to maximise ski time. Working your socks off til January then ski bumming is. |
Exactly. Any highish paid job you can do during the summer months taking 3 months from Dec to Mar would do. IT, Locum, Working on sea walls.
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Working in the mountains sucks.
Get some credit cards, loans and bank of pop.
Ski and drink every day for 5 months.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Work hard over the Summer and Autumn to save up money for accommodation and lift pass, book a room in a seasonnaire chalet or similar, go out to resort and find weekend cleaning or transfer day jobs to fund food and beer while you are out there. Worked in Morzine for my son. Except that he worked hard the summer after to pay us back for the advance on the accommodation money...
He got a lot more skiing that winter than the previous one where he was hosting for Inghams. If you are going to do the hosting bit, try to be in a ski in ski out location, otherwise you waste significant amounts of precious skiing time getting to and from the slopes - daughter was in Belle Plagne this winter, which was great, she could be on her skis fifteen minutes after finishing shift.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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@LowriB,
Don't be put off the idea by the comments about ski time - I skied 5 half days and 1 full day per week all season as a chalet host. And I was in the bar every night. Admittedly sleep was at a premium!
Do you have cooking experience/qualifications? If you do, then that opens up many more jobs. In fact you should consider doing a course if you don't. Otherwise think what you would want as a client or resort manager from a host - cheerful, practical, considerate, good with people, able to manage a budget. Nothing wrong with having a passion for skiing either. If you have relevant language skills then flaunt them!
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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Yup, you can get good ski time as a chalet host. Not necessarily in the first couple of weeks, but once you are in a routine and organised it is possible to be on the slopes by 10am, and you wouldn't have to be back in the chalet until after lifts close. That would be 5 days a week, plus you get the whole of your day off (depending on how good you are at getting up after the previous night!). Transfer day is more often than not a no-go for skiing, but some people manage an hour or two depending on guest arrival/departure times.
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best bet is to try to get a job in a night club - work till late but don't start until the evening - try Dicks T Bar or similar.
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You know it makes sense.
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For a very young person such as the OP I think there are advantages to doing a working season, rather than being a ski bum. I interviewed a lot of new graduates when I chaired Civil Service Selection Boards and some people had learnt a lot doing that sort of job - or at least, were able to give sufficiently intelligent thought to the question to make useful points at interview! It gives you a structure - and a ready made team of people around you. And a whole series of time deadlines and required output - which often comes as something as a shock to the system. 
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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I think that is a great point Pam. Starting out on your career, employers would be much happier to see that you'd held down a job while skiing than just bummed
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Poster: A snowHead
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Depends doesn't it and the OP didn't ask about padding her CV. Working 2 unglamorous jobs in the UK for 6 months to save for a season sounds like it needs a bit more pluck and stickability (plus budget control etc) and finding own accommodation, etc etc demonstrates a but more initiative than rocking up into a nannied mainstream TO job where everything is provided/menus planned and even food procurement is done centrally. But as we've discovered on previous threads people who have been involved in recruitment positions seem to have a wide range of views on even the desirability of gap years.
There is no getting over the fact that the true ski bum gets vastly more skiing than a worker if they are sufficiently motivated and rookie workers a) take a fair while to get their system down so they can be out on the slopes sharpish and b) may fall into a trap of excessive alcohol consumption/partying such that they are incapable of skiing the next day and likely to return to bed between shifts.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| Quote: |
Working 2 unglamorous jobs in the UK for 6 months to save for a season sounds like it needs a bit more pluck and stickability (plus budget control etc) and finding own accommodation, etc etc demonstrates a but more initiative than rocking up into a nannied mainstream TO job where everything is provided/menus planned and even food procurement is done centrally.
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As you say, it all depends..... some people who have done mainstream TO jobs appear to have learnt nothing from it, others learn a lot. An experienced interviewer will find out. One lass who turned up with a claim on her CV to have started her own business in a Swiss ski resort had, in fact, been living in Daddy's chalet and did a bit of pocket money baby sitting mostly for other expatriates. Hadn't even required negotiating a pay rate in basic French or German. Not impressive - and irritating that she so inflated what she'd done, to make the application look better. Nul points.
If somebody had spent a season as a ski bum that could indeed provide good evidence of drive and resilience. A lot would depend on how it was financed AND what, other than skiing, they did whilst there.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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'If somebody had spent a season as a ski bum that could indeed provide good evidence of drive and resilience. A lot would depend on how it was financed AND what, other than skiing, they did whilst there.'
Well, the season my son spent as a ski bum wasn't intended to be as such. His plan had been to make short videos of holiday makers skiing, or take photos for them, and make money that way. He had put a lot of thought and work into it - website, what products to market, leaflets, printed DVD's, slogging round lots of the chalet operators in resort to sell himself at the start of the season, etc. However, as it was all below the radar and in France, he couldn't market it effectively, and he got very little business at all. He got some work doing promotional photography for a couple of chalet operators, and in the end decided to give up on it and got himself the cleaning and transfer jobs instead.
So his plan didn't work, but he freely admits that he learnt an enormous amount by trying, and had a really good winter at the same time.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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As somebody who interviews for trainee solicitor positions, I think I would on balance assuming intelligent answers to attributes again end while working as a chalet host assisted with organisation planning, communication skills etc could take positives whereas someone who had bummed in a ski resort wouldn't be able to show me evidence of discipline and other skills needed in the workplace. That said we would be look for someone with good communication skills, someone who could apply law practically to help people so it wouldn't be the be all and end all. That said the chalet host is more likely to be have experiences to fall back on when answering competency based questions.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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| Quote: |
I think I would on balance assuming intelligent answers to attributes again end while working as a chalet host assisted with organisation planning, communication skills etc could take positives
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and, of course, the all-important communication skills, 
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