A career in the hospitality industry: An exploratory study of female postgraduates' attitudes and perceived difficulties

A plethora of studies have examined employee motivations in pursuing a career in the hospitality industry. However, there’s a paucity of studies examining female employees in particular. This paper aims to close this research gap by examining female hotel management students’ perception about a career in the hospitality industry. This study employed the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) as the theoretical framework to understand female postgraduate students’ attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived difficulties towards a pursuing a career in hospitality. A total of 23 respondents responded to the interview. Results from the qualitative interviews revealed 5 positive attitudes, 6 negative attitudes, 7 reference groups, and 9 perceived difficulties as potential motivators towards pursuing a hospitality career. Results revealed the personal interactions between customers as the most reported positive attitude. Some of the negative attitudes elicited were long working hours and difficult customers. With regards to perceived difficulties in pursuing a hospitality career, students reported barriers such as difficulty in obtaining working visa and stressful environment. In general, female students perceived the hospitality industry as a short term working goal and this paper have identified that future family commitments is the leading perceived difficulty to move up into higher management.