Trainers

Polys Polykarpou

With a degree in Business Administration and specialization in Human Resources Management, has achieved the establishment of his professional career with the experience and knowledge, through professional and educational pursuits. He is also a Certified Hospitality Trainer (CHT)

He has participated in major European programs such as the Women’s Employment Counseling, gender studies, the European policy of maritime and more. He represented Cyprus in Europe in laboratory policymaking meetings on labor issues.He is a certified Labor consultant, with a career in Industrial relations, has acquired the knowledge and experience, allowing him to handle such issues within organizations.

With his experience in the field of Managing Human Resources, he has managed to create and develop HR departments in organizations, contributing significantly to the most demanding function of Management.As a Vocational trainer, he has designed, guided, taught and supervised series of training and development programs for all levels of staff. He is a Member of the Cyprus Human Resource Managers Association as well as th Cyprus Hotel managers Association.

Today, he runs Polykarpou hrd Ltd, a company for Training and Consulting Services as well as the Cyprus Educational Institute, partner of the American Hotel & Lodging Association, with specialization on Training and Certification programs in Hospitality.

Dr Heleni Asprogenous

She holds a degree in Tourismology from the State University of Belgrade, and a master in business administration (DBA) with specialization in Management. She has an extensive experience in human resources management, and she professional works mainly in training, consulting and Human Resources development.
She has gained significant consulting experience by participating in European programs related to the development of competitiveness and productivity of SMEs.

She has worked for 32 years as management / organizational Executive in the Tourism Industry. Over the last years, she is a trainer and consultant in Business. She worked for more than six years as a teacher in Business Administration at the European University of Cyprus, Varna Free University, and HHIC.

Her experience in adults training is continuous on issues such as Marketing, Sales, Productivity & Competitiveness, Customer Service, Human Resources, Risk Management, Leadership, Sustainable Development, etc .

She is a certified trainer by the Human Resource Development Authority of Cyprus (HRDA) and today is the Head Instructor of the Cyprus Hospitality Educational Institute, instructing AH&LEi certification programs, as well as other Management programs.

Eugenios Savva

Eugenios is a Hospitality Management honor graduate of Hotel Institute Montreux in Switzerland from where he has been awarded with the Outstanding Graduate of the Year Award.  He holds a Master’s Degree with honors in Human Resources from Middlesex University.  He is a Member of the Cyprus Human Resource Management Association and acts as General Secretary of the Board of the Cyprus Hotel Managers Association. He is also an active certified trainer by the Human Resources Development Authority of Cyprus.

He was actively employed in the Hospitality Industry in Switzerland and Cyprus for the last 26 years reaching the position of General Manager in Leading luxury hotels.  His passion and love for Human Resources has led him the last 8 years to take Human Resources Leadership roles in two local chains.

His vast experience as an Academic includes teaching at a local College and also presenting various masterclasses in both Swiss and Cypriot Hospitality Management Schools, the University of Cyprus, the Technical University of Cyprus and was invited as a guest speaker in various conferences.

Today he is running his own business representing the Hospitality and Culinary schools of the Swiss Education Group in Cyprus and Greece and acts also as a Consultant/Trainer at the Cyprus Hospitality Educational Institute (CHEI)

Antonis Antoniou (Anikitou)

Antonis Antoniou is a UK educated practitioner and has worked as a tourism & hospitality consultant, senior lecturer and as an executive trainer since 1999. Mr Antoniou holds a Masters degree from the University of Surrey on Tourism & Hospitality Education. Mr Antoniou has over 15 years of lecturing & training experience in Great Britain, Germany, Russia, Greece, Cyprus, Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Nepal, Cameroon and UAE. Mr Antoniou domain is in hospitality & Catering as well as in travel & tourism where he is also directly involved with the organisation of the department which specialises in Marine Training & Consultancy.  His constant involvement with the hotel industry is reflected upon the practical training sessions he performs. His trademark is simple but effective, matching theoretical and practical training techniques. Amongst his practice work ethics is the sense of quality and accuracy that should prevail at all levels of the training process. “The result of a training session is not countable at the end of it but at the beginning of a new working evolution”.

Elena Onisiforou

Ms. Onisiforou holds a BSc and an MBA from the George Washington University in Washington, DC, USA, in the fields of Human Resource Management, and Organizational Behavior and Development. She started her career working at the HR department of the International Monetary Fund, in Washington DC, USA for 12 years.

Ms. Onisiforou joined Polykarpou HRD Ltd as an HR Consultant/Trainer. Previously, she worked for over 15 years as a Business Management Consultant and Trainer for the Cyprus hotel and tourism industry, offering services in the fields of General Management, Human Resource Management and Quality Management Systems, ISO 9001 and ISO 22000. As a certified HRDA trainer, she has many years of experience in training managerial and non-managerial staff on various general business management, human resources management, and quality management systems topics.

She is a certified trainer by the Human Resource Development Authority of Cyprus (HRDA) and today is an Executive Instructor at the Cyprus Hospitality Educational Institute, instructing Management and certification programs.

Aliki Solomonidou

 MBA, CHT:  She did Hotel Management studies in Switzerland. She worked for a five star hotel in Limassol as Assistant F & B Manager.  Later, she was chosen from a well-known restaurant franchised and sent to the United States of America for training, assuming the duties of the trainer for the property. Within two years she was twice promoted and became the Area Director for Cyprus.

Meanwhile she won a partial scholarship and successfully achieved a Postgraduate Degree MBA. She worked for several years as a lecturer / trainer of Hotel Management in colleges. She is a Certified Hospitality Trainer (CHT) designation holder, from the American Hotel and Lodging Educational Institute (AHLEI), since 2003.

Costas Constantinou

Committed to excellence in the Hospitality Industry, with passion for further personal development, entail some of his personal characteristics. His educational background is purely Hospitality with specialization in the Food & Beverage Service.

As a professional he worked in all F&B positions such as Barman, Head Waiter, F&B Controller, F&B Manager in Hospital as well as operating his own Catering business.

With his experience as an Internal Trainer as well as F&B and Training consultant, he rightfully holds his current cooperation with two Public Universities in Cyprus, the Higher Hotel Institute Cyprus as Trainer in Food & Beverage Service, and the Cyprus University of Technology as a Food & Beverage Consultant.

As an adults’ trainer for more than 20 years, he holds a prime position in the vocational training.

At the Cyprus Hospitality Educational Institute, the International partner of AH&LEI, he is doing an excellent job by training, consulting and tutoring professionals, driving them to one of the most recognized professional Certification worldwide.

Andreas Georgiou

Andreas has been present in the tourism industry for over 30 years from all stages in the field of food and beverage, working in fine dinnig, night clubs,  Japanese cuisine and Traditional tavernas, He worked in all positions such as waiter, barman, restaurant manager and food and beverage manager in a chain of restaurant company.

He is the owner of a successful café restaurant business since 1992 He is a highly motivated person with passion, willing to pass his knowledge and experience to the new generation in the tourism industry.

Holding a Higher Diploma in Economics and Business Management, as well as Professional Certification in Human resources.

He is a certified trainer by ANAD and currently working with Polycarpou HRD as a trainer on the food and beverage section

Dr. Victoria Prymak

Victoria is an experienced lecturer of foreign languages with 17 years of pedagogical practice and a PhD degree in Linguistics. She is fluent in 4 languages and passionate to share knowledge with her students. After graduation from the State Linguistic University Minsk, Belarus, she started to work at the Department of German at the “alma mater” and delivered courses in German Conversation, Text Theory and Stylistics as well as communicative German and Russian language courses at Minsk State University and European Humanities University. Soon she continued improving her qualifications at the PhD studies. As a dedicated and qualified educator she could not miss the opportunity to combine her tourism branch and pedagogical experience and in 2007 developed a project offering intensive Russian language courses to Cyprus travel industry companies.

Her linguistic scientific research is aimed at the pragmatic-communicative aspect of the language, methodological innovations, as well as some cross-cultural peculiarities in language acquisition. The results of Victoria’s research were published in numerous scientific publications and presented at international congresses and conferences.

Savvas Savva

Savvas has a Higher Diploma in Culinary Arts at the Higher Hotel Institute of Cyprus. He also studied at the University of Derby in England, where he obtained his Bachelor of Science, Professional Culinary Arts. He continued his studies at the University of the West of England, Bristol (Alexander College Cyprus) where he obtained a Master of Arts in Education.

His special love about the traditional Cypriot cuisine and the spread of it, made him participate in many domestic and international culinary competitions. He won many awards in domestic as well as in international competitions. Savvas honoured his country, Cyprus and the Cypriot cuisine when he won the title of the Junior Chef International. Taking part in the 8^th International Istanbul Gastronomy Festival. Savvas won the greatest distinction so far in his career, when between 35 countries from all over the world; he won the gold award for the “Junior Golden Chef of the Year (International) 2010”.

Savvas has extensive culinary experience in the hospitality industry as a chef and as a consultant chef in hotels and restaurants. He worked as an instructor in private and public institutes. He is a certified trainer by the Human Resource Development Authority of Cyprus (HRDA) and today  he is a Culinary Instructor at the Higher Hotel Institute of Cyprus.

Olympiada Anastasiou

Olympiada is a graduate of the Hotel and Catering Institute of Cyprus. She earned a Diploma in Housekeeping and was awarded with the Outstanding Trainee of the Year Award. She held the position of Executive Housekeeper with over 30-year of experience, working in Luxury Hotels and is recognized in the Hotel and Catering Industry as an exceptional professional with high standards and ethos. Her Organizational and Leadership skills are indeed impressive and she has the knowhow of passing on these skills to others.

As a professional, she has worked as an Associate Instructor of Housekeeping in both the public and private institutes. During her employment she received extensive training in ISO, HACCP, Health and Safety and Environmental Management systems. Her experience in hotels has allowed her to thoroughly implement all professional systems and complete every inspection process with honors. Olympiada has extensive experience in the Training and Coaching of newcomers and professionals in the field of Housekeeping and is currently in the process of being Certified Trainer by the Human Resource Development Authority of Cyprus (HRDA) and she is an Associate Housekeeping Instructor at the Cyprus Hospitality Educational Institute.

Richard Bedenham

Richard is a highly motivated, experienced, hotel project, revenue, yield, channel manager professional. Richard has extensive web project management experience in planning, designing, and launching web projects including implementing efficiency specific plans for hotels. As well as digital marketing campaigns, social media platforms, reputation systems and custom relationship management systems. Richard has a strong work ethic and believes in getting the job done!

Richard is now focused on utilising his experience for the benefit of other industry professionals and provides specialist products & consultancy services to the hotel industry.
He is now the founder / CEO of RJB SYSTEMS LIMITED & creator of MyRatesMagic® for Hotels.
MyRatesMagic® is an administration system for hotel revenue management. Properties can design, organise, plan, compare and calculate hotel rate structures. It’s fast, easy to use and accurate. Discover more at www.myratesmagic.come.

Christos Harrison

Christos wears a dual hat. As a writer, speaker and author on the mind and principles for creating a life of our choice and as a Security Professional.
Having served in Her Majesty’s Forces (HM Forces), in the Royal Military Police (RMP), for 16 years, he left service in mid 2013. During that time he gained extensive knowledge in theoretical and practical security measures, all of which were put to use and consistently updated.

He has worked within the Security Industry in Cyprus, including the Hospitality Industry, during which time he gained additional knowledge in relation to the operational and security measures required within that sector.
Christos holds a Diploma in Security Management (BTEC Level 5, Perpetuity Training) and qualified in Close Protection. He also holds a Honours Degree in Chemistry from Imperial College, London and a PGCE in Science from King’s College, London.