Management education, training and development is a key issue for the British economy which has, by international standards, an undereducated, underqualified and undertrained workforce. However, the varied nature of managerial work reduces the value of prescriptive approaches to management education. The Hotel, Catering and Institutional Management Association (HCIMA) recently redesigned its professional qualifications to try to meet the complex needs of the hospitality industry more closely. In general its proposals have been well received but it is clear that as elsewhere, hospitality managers need to take a more positive stance towards personal development and education if they are to cope with the 1990s as effectively as their European counterparts seem ready to do.