Champions for inclusive and positive wellbeing in culinary workplace practice

Group Category winner: Initiatives for progressing hauora and wellbeing in education

Distance Delivery Team on the Bachelor of Culinary Arts, Food Design Institute, Otago Polytechnic | Te Kura Matatini ki Otago

"Using our experience as chefs and vocational educators, our purpose is to equip aspiring and existing culinary leaders with the capabilities and tools to foster hauora within their workplaces."

Responding to wellbeing issues within the hospitality industry, Chloe Humphreys and Juliane Tautz aim to equip both emerging and established culinary leaders with the skills to foster hauora within their workplaces. Abusive behaviours associated with toxic kitchen culture have been glamourised by celebrity chefs such as Gordon Ramsay, however, beneath the surface lies a dark reality, where such behaviours contribute to poor staff wellbeing and high attrition rates within the industry. The team are aware that, on top of staff shortages and high stress environments, chefs face an additional challenge - a lack of access to leadership education due to their work commitments. While many industry leaders are desperate for change, they simply don’t have the time, capacity, or access to educational development opportunities to make it happen. The Distance Delivery Team’s mahi is a direct response to this. Chloe and Jules, who make up this team, work within a wider group of eight who deliver the Bachelor of Culinary Arts (BCA) at the Food Design Institute, Otago Polytechnic. The course currently has approximately 85 ākonga across New Zealand and abroad, 25% of whom are in the Distance Delivery pathways. These pathways include a flexible Work Based Learning (WBL) pathway and an Assessment of Prior Learning (APL) pathway that formally recognises experienced professionals’ expertise, alongside on-campus offerings. Ākonga are predominantly working chefs, hospitality leaders and culinary educators from across Aotearoa and abroad.

Chloe’s background in secondary education, design and hauora, informs a learner-centred holistic approach to education, while Juliane is a chef-turned-online-learning-coordinator with expertise in positive culinary leadership. Together they design, deliver and review the BCA Work Based Learning (WBL) and Assessment of Prior Learning (APL) pathways. They collaborate with the wider BCA team and maintain regular dialogue with industry mentors to keep ākonga projects authentic and impactful.

The programme’s bicultural framework, co-designed with Māori chefs, learners, and industry, fosters a kaupapa where ākonga, community, and environment can thrive. To support this, the team equips aspiring and current culinary leaders with tools to cultivate workplace hauora, enhancing the wellbeing of themselves, their teams, and their workplaces. This means equipping chefs with the skills to design menus that are sustainable for staff workloads and providing them with a leadership toolkit to manage high-pressure situations. As many chefs are time-poor and new to higher education, the learning environment is made intentionally safe, supportive, and mana-enhancing. This is done by embedding manaakitaka (care and respect for others’ wellbeing), whanaukataka (positive relationships and belonging), and kotahitaka (unity, collaboration, and shared purpose) within the team’s teaching practice.

Within the Work Based Learning pathway, students who are already in the industry can study the BCA while remaining in full-time work.  The programme is delivered entirely via distance, with ākonga working through a series of co-designed projects tailored to their specific work context. The team works with ākonga and workplace mentors to guide them through projects and provide support.  Regular three-way reviews with the learner, mentor and employer keep the scope flexible yet focused, allowing projects to remain viable even when business conditions change. A tripartite agreement between the facilitators at Otago Polytechnic, the workplace, and the learner outlines key responsibilities for all parties, ensures that students have sufficient support within the workplace, and safeguards their ability to continue studying in the case of a workplace relationship breaking down. In the first year of the WBL pathway a further safeguard was added to the agreement, requiring students to complete their 90-day trial period before starting study.

The Assessment of Prior Learning pathway enables experienced culinary professionals to validate their industry skills and knowledge through the development of a reflective portfolio, which is assessed against the BCA graduate profile. Within the portfolio, ākonga use storytelling to reflect on their experiences under other people’s leadership, critically evaluate their past and current leadership practices, and develop an evolving understanding of effective leadership in the context of hauora. Many of the team’s ākonga are culinary tertiary educators; others are experienced chefs who engage with the APL pathway to allow them to transition to secondary school cookery teaching. Through the APL pathway, the team has upskilled over 25 culinary lecturers across Aotearoa in culinary leadership education, working with lecturers from EIT, Toi Ohomai, Wintec, Weltec, Ara, and NorthTec. They have also partnered with the William Angliss Institute in Australia to support the upskilling of their culinary educators. By working with existing leaders and educators on prioritising hauora in leadership, the team contributes to real positive change for the next generation of young chefs.

The team further promotes hauora through its industry networks. Since 2015, the BCA programme has hosted the Break the Cycle Facebook group, connecting over 130 national and international industry professionals to share stories of positive well-being practices. In 2024 they expanded this initiative with the launching of the She’ll Be Right podcast series, offering chefs a platform on which to share stories and engage in critical conversations about workplace culture and hauora. The team’s research connects with like-minded educators to drive industry change at an international level. Both APL and WBL pathways have had a 100% success rate since their inception, including all of their Māori, Pasifika, and neurodiverse students.

"As our mahi filters outwards, from individual ākonga to employers and the wider industry, it cultivates a generation of chefs who can sustain both their craft and the wellbeing of their communities."

Chloe Humphreys and Juliane Tautz's profile video