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This paper aims to focus on conditions for workplace learning (WPL) in highly transient workplaces, exemplified by the tourism and hospitality sector in the Arctic region. The aim is to analyse and discuss how employees and employers view the conditions for employees’ WPL from their respective perspectives.

The study is based on a qualitative approach. Ten interviews with employers and ten interviews with employees were carried out. This opens for different perspectives, including identifying “learning gaps”. The analysis was thematic, with a focus on opportunities and challenges for WPL in these transient workplace contexts.

Overall, conditions for WPL seem unsatisfactory. On the one hand, both employees and employers see WPL as essential for staff retention. Employers also see WPL as a strategy for business development and, thus, profit. On the other hand, high staff turnover makes it challenging to strategically invest in and organize for WPL, especially formal learning. Hence, a Catch-22 situation emerges.

As this study is qualitative in its scope, generalizations are analytical rather than statistical.

There is a shortage of studies on conditions for WPL, focusing particularly on transient workplaces. Moreover, by including employer and employee perspectives, the authors contribute to a gap in the literature. The empirical contribution of this paper thus lies in using a theoretical WPL framework on transient workplaces, exemplified by the tourism and hospitality industries in the Arctic region.

Travel and tourism graduates are facing challenges in securing jobs within the travel and tourism industry, as their degrees have low recognition among travel and tourism employers. Yet there are growing numbers of tourism courses provided by universities, and these are increasingly popular among students. This paper attempts an informed discussion of the relevance of travel and tourism degrees, comparing students' career expectations and aspirations with industry needs and perceptions of travel and tourism degrees and graduates. Students' perceptions were investigated, using a questionnaire survey, while the employers' perceptions and needs were explored through semi‐structured interviews. The results indicate a desire and optimism amongst current travel and tourism undergraduate students towards securing a job in the tourism industry, while the industry is not convinced, or at best unaware, of the benefits of tourism degrees and employing tourism graduates.

This paper aims to identify skills and competencies perceived relevant by tourism graduate employees and tourism employers for providing quality tourism services in Kenya.

Tourism employment is very diverse ranging from precarious, exploitative study to high-quality workplaces. However, poor employment images dominate the tourism industry, which makes attracting employees difficult. This study aims to examine the processes that lead to such image construction.

Using a qualitative methodology, the study develops a multilevel framing cycle comprising a media analysis of newspapers and magazines (macro-level), a conversation analysis of peer communication/negotiations (meso-level) and a content analysis of single employee/manager interviews (micro-level); and a comparative analysis of the macro-, meso- and micro-level findings.

The multilevel frame cycle identifies image-construction processes that pass through working conditions, payment, seasonality and human resource problems. These processes are shaped by the two cross-level dynamics of radicalization and attenuation. The latter consists of rationalized and repressed framings of tourism employment images (TEI) and the former consists of ideological and emotional framings.

Tourism stakeholders should support and participate in a pragmatic and open dialog to overcome the radicalization and attenuation of tourism employment. The key players require a new deal to end the “information warfare” on tourism employment, inaugurating a new era of collaborative and constructive employment relations.

This study develops a holistic and dynamic understanding of TEI by exploring how media products, peer groups and employees/managers jointly construct these images. It demonstrates how attenuation and radicalization shape poor employment images in tourism. It argues that these dynamics “lock in” the status-quo, create mutual recrimination between employers and employees and counteract common strategies that could otherwise improve employment structures and the image of tourism.

The aim of this paper is to present longitudinal data regarding the career progression of Irish tourism and hospitality management graduates.

A survey instrument was designed to incorporate questions relating to current and previous employments, recent training/education and personal details. The original study was sent to graduates by their respective colleges and there were 444 respondents to the survey. The follow‐up questionnaire in the current study was sent to all those who had responded to the initial survey and who had provided addresses (374).

There is a significant drop‐out rate from employment in the tourism/hospitality industry in Ireland, which is particularly obvious amongst women. Those employed in the industry identified poor remuneration and unsuitable working hours as the major issues in need of redress. There is constant reference to work conditions within the tourism/hospitality industry throughout this study and, in particular, their apparent incompatibility with family life.

Owing to the small sample size, results presented here are largely indicative. Nonetheless, some general trends are discernible.

The issues raised in this study have implications for those involved in the provision of tourism/hospitality programmes as well as tourism employers, particularly in an Irish context, where there is an ongoing shortage of skilled workers in the sector.

Tracking studies usually only attempt to monitor graduates' entry into the workforce and do not follow their career paths over time. The objective of this study, however, was to provide longitudinal data and unique insights regarding the career progression of Irish tourism and hospitality management graduates.

The COVID-19 pandemic changed how many of us work, where we work and what we need and expect from the workplace. In this paper, the researchers sought to describe how employers and employees experienced their changing workplace environments in the early days of the pandemic, with a focus on adaptation and recovery in Whistler in British Columbia, Canada. In addition, the authors aimed to develop a new model to inform other organizations undergoing the consequences of major catastrophes.

Applying a qualitative approach, the authors gathered data in a total of seven focus groups. Employer focus groups were held in June 2020, and employee focus groups were held in November 2020. A thematic analysis was completed by three researchers.

After completing an analysis of the employer focus group transcripts, the authors identified the themes of staffing and coordination, adaptability and connection, uncertainty, communication and community and strategies. The employees' concerns and experiences related to the themes of challenges, changes and community, communication, involvement in decisions, future employment and support and connection.

This study captured descriptions of workplace adaptation and recovery for employers and employees during the pandemic, generalizability is limited by the number of participants. These accounts depicted a period of significant change in working conditions, communications, and employment practices. This paper offers a new conceptual model, C4AR, exploring the role of communicate, coordinate, connect and community in supporting workplace adaptation and recovery.

This paper aims to explore the opportunities and challenges faced by hospitality employers in accommodating a culturally diverse workforce in Northern Ireland.

This is an exploratory paper based on interviews with hospitality employers in Northern Ireland. It seeks to answer the question “What opportunities and challenges does a culturally diverse workforce create for hoteliers in Northern Ireland?”.

This research highlights the potential of international workers as an invaluable new source of labour for the hospitality industry, provided that they are properly looked after and managed.

Future research could analyse the role of multicultural management in assuring business benefits associated with cultural diversity.

The research suggests the importance of a positive proactive management system and solutions for training that could be incorporated into the workplace that celebrates its employee's cultures, that values and explores differences and that actively seeks to learn from other cultures, demonstrates tolerance, respects differences, identifies similarities and strives for inclusiveness. Training solutions are provided.

This study suggests the removal of barriers to the successful integration of international staff into the workplace and society, while benefiting all staff, their organisations and the Irish tourism product.

Seasonality in tourism has a profound impact on the management of human resources in organizations operating in a seasonal context. Tourism employment in Canada is profiled and its seasonality examined in Atlantic Canada, where seasonal tourism employment is common. A model for managing seasonality in employment is proposed as a continuum, ranging from “embracing” to “challenging” seasonality. For each approach, differing human resource management practices are identified and operational impacts are discussed, providing possible strategies for employers operating in seasonal tourism contexts. Ongoing research is planned in Atlantic Canada’s accommodations sector, testing the model for managing seasonal tourism employment.

Introduction: Skills are vital for the survival of an organisation to meet its objectives through producing goods and services. Due to their importance, they are among the sought-after aspects of employment. However, organisations need more skilled employees to bridge the gaps due to disruptions, shifts in consumer demands and needs, and transformations in the global world.

Purpose of the Study: This study aims to identify various skill gap in talent, competencies, and experience emerging in the hospitality sector. It will also present some challenges to the hospitality sector that faces due to the skill gap identified.

Industrial and Academic Justification of the Study: The study examines the needs and challenges from academic and industry perspectives. Hence, it provides significance for academics and industry to apply the findings to address skill gap.

Research Gap: Previous research has focused on different aspects of skills in other countries. This study will look at the issue globally and the recent trends emerging from disruptions and shifts in consumer behaviour.

Results and Findings: Though the study is ongoing, the findings show that specific skill gap exist, particularly in emerging technologies, digitisation, data, robotics, and various job openings from different countries’ perspectives, hospitality, and the tourism industry.

Practical Implications: The findings have implications for the tourism and hospitality industry as a whole, as well as individual organisations. The tourism and hospitality industry should apply these suggestions, such as operational skills, digital skills, and interpersonal skills in various sections of tourism and hospitality organisations

This paper aims to assess receptiveness for Tourism and Hospitality as a career path among students in the Tourism Department of Sultan Qaboos University (College of Arts and Social Sciences), located in the Sultanate of Oman. The following objectives were identified to achieve this aim: assess respondents’ perceptions of tourism and hospitality employment; respondents’ tourism and hospitality employment commitment factors; and respondents’ perceptions of tourism and hospitality jobs.

A self-administered questionnaire was used to gather data and measure respondents’ perceptions of the subject under investigation. Survey questions were developed from the literature reviewed which provided the framework for the questionnaire. The questionnaire comprises four different question categories: general information; students’ general perception of tourism and hospitality employment; and tourism and hospitality employment commitment factors; students’ perceptions of tourism and hospitality jobs. Data were tested for normality of distribution; then, means were used for data description and ranking; thereafter, the independent-samples t-test and analysis of variance were conducted to test for significance between groups of respondents; the level of significance used was p ≤ 0.05.

The paper revealed that nearly 41 per cent of the students will continue working in tourism and hospitality for some time. For them, working in the industry is a step on the way, but is not a career path. Only 21.6 per cent are willing to consider tourism and hospitality as their long-term chosen career path. Tourism and hospitality students’ perceptions of the industry tend to be negatively affected as they progress in their study plan. Commitment to employment in Tourism and Hospitality is shaped by four major interrelated factor categories: industry, personality, education and society. The Omani tourism and hospitality industry was not able to project an image that could generate interest among Omanis. Consequently, very few graduates join the Tourism and Hospitality job market, leading to shortages in Omani workers in the industry. The major drawback of such trend is the inability to achieve the Omanization planned figures.

The findings are intended to assist tourism and hospitality educators, employers and policymakers better understand students’ future employment intentions.