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Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, African students studying tourism and hospitality internationally had diverse experiences in their professional endeavours. This study seeks to examine the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the career progression and perspectives of African undergraduate students specialising in higher education in the fields of tourism and hospitality.

The study utilised qualitative content analysis, which involves subjectively interpreting text data by systematically categorising and coding it to identify themes or patterns.

The findings deviate from how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the career advancement of African international students studying tourism and hospitality in North Cyprus. Consequently, most developing nations face an increased need for security measures. Tourists will pay higher prices to visit highly secure areas rather than risking their lives. This is one of the reasons why many students from developing nations choose to pursue their careers in developed countries.

It is imperative for the governments of developing nations to make substantial financial contributions to the development of their respective tourism sectors. Augmented investment has the potential to allure international tourists, thereby generating employment prospects for the host economies. The lack of investment forces young individuals to pursue their education overseas. Furthermore, it is imperative for developing nations to enhance their security infrastructure.

Our findings suggest that policymakers should establish a diverse management team that includes student employees to develop suitable strategies for industry management. Insufficient student inclusivity can result in a lack of dedication, whereas involving them in management strategies can contribute to the industry’s prosperity.

The findings obtained from this research can stimulate the formulation of strategies within the tourism industry to tackle the intersection of career obstacles.

This study examines the relationship of positive career shocks and career optimism. The mediating role of career decision-making self-efficacy (CDSE) between positive career shocks and career optimism and the moderating role of consideration of future consequences – immediate (CFC-I) between CDSE and career optimism are checked.

Through cluster sampling, cross-sectional data from 192 professionals of electronic media industry were collected via an electronically administered questionnaire. For preliminary descriptive data analysis, SPSS version 21 was used. SmartPLS version 3.0 was used for testing the proposed hypotheses.

The results showed that positive career shocks have a relationship with career optimism via CDSE. Also, CFC-I moderated the relationship of CDSE and career optimism such that the relationship of CDSE and career optimism was stronger at higher level of CFC-I.

The study provides implications for the career consultants, human resource professionals and senior management of organizations. All these stakeholders can strive to build an inventory of positive career shocks. Also, shifting to a surprised business model of announcing compensations and promotions is another area to work on. The results of this study further suggest disengaging the fresh potential employees in the initial processes of recruitment. Interdepartmental coordination of health and safety department and human resource management department is also a very important implication for this study to highlight the positive aspects of being optimistic.

The study is among the few empirical studies which investigates the relationship between positive career shocks and career optimism via CDSE. Also, in light of the latest call of various empirical works in the domain, this study adds a moderating variable, i.e. CFC-I in predicting career optimism. Furthermore, contrary to the conventional approach of applying students' data on career models, this study tests the proposed career model on data collected from professionals.

This study intends to examine the impact of a fear of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) on workers' career optimism via perceived job insecurity among non-managerial working restaurant employees.

Time-lagged quantitative data were collected in two waves from 316 non-managerial on-job restaurant employees. Structural equation modeling technique was applied to examine the measurement and structural model.

The study showed that workers' fear of COVID-19 positively impacts their job insecurity. Further, the study found that increasing level of job insecurity depletes workers' career optimism—an outlook of their future career prospects.

The study suggests organizations should work to make employees feel secure in terms of their job continuity and career progression. Eventually, this would support employees in shielding themselves against possible resource loss (e.g. career optimism) due to pandemic crises.

Extant literature has tested the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on employees' workplace attitudes and behaviors such as job satisfaction (e.g. Bajrami et al., 2021) and safety performance (e.g. Kim et al., 2021). However, little has been researched on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on employees' future career outlook, particularly of non-essential workers in the hospitality industry. To the best of the author's knowledge, an explicit examination of the impact of COVID-19 fear on career optimism has not been conducted previously. Hence, this study will not only be a valuable contribution in the literature of career management, but will also yield important practical implications.

This chapter explores the impact of equality, diversity, and inclusivity (EDI) on internal change agents’ (ICAs) personal and professional development. We have surveyed 117 ICAs that undergo a four-year digital development programme at Edinburgh Business School (EBS). Our survey design draws from expectancy, surprise, sensemaking, and attribution theories to test four hypotheses using Spearman’s rank. We found that diversity features such as gender, age, sector affiliation, work experience, management responsibility, and programme stage do not strongly impact ICAs’ experience of personal and professional development. Surprisingly, some diversity features had a modest or moderate impact on ICAs’ experience of personal and professional development. This disconfirmed our basic assumption about the effectiveness of inclusivity practices in the digital development programme at EBS. We conclude that future research should further investigate the impact of evaluation on ICAs’ personal and professional development and how we can secure it in a digital Business School context.

The purpose of the present study is to explore the effects of early life international exposure on the career capital (CC) of adult third culture kids (ATCKs).

The study adopts a qualitative research design based on 34 semi-structured interviews with ATCKs who have had international exposure in their childhood as members of an expatriate family.

The results show that a globally mobile childhood has extensive long-term impacts on ATCKs' CC in the areas of knowing-why, knowing-how and knowing-whom. Additionally, their early international experience also had several negative impacts across these aspects of CC.

This paper provides a novel understanding of the long-term impacts of early life international exposure on ATCKs' CC, and this paper is the first study to use the CC framework among an ATCK population.

This mixed-method, collaborative study investigated parents’ perceptions of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) learning through use of STEM kits specifically designed for in-home use by parents and preschool-age children.

Parents with a child attending a community-based childhood development center and ranging in age from three to four were invited to participate. Data were analyzed for the participants’ surveys, which were completed at two different times (pre and post) for this study.

After utilizing the STEM materials with their child over a two-week period, the parents’ perceptions of STEM content changed. The results indicate that regardless of the at-home STEM materials, positive outcomes for their child occurred, including the likelihood that their child would pursue additional STEM opportunities.

With a small sample size and a short timeframe for conducting the study, the results lack generalizability. The findings add information about the effectiveness of STEM materials for preschoolers while providing insight into educational opportunities in home environments.

As the nation addresses workforce shortages in many areas, including STEM, rethinking STEM education during the first five years is important. The more opportunities for young children to engage in meaningful STEM, the greater the potential to pique interest and develop critical thinking skills.

This chapter critically evaluates the role of creative identity and how this shapes entrepreneurial identity. The main driver for creative practitioners is one of being ‘creative’, but this is in combination with the factors that support entrepreneurial behaviours, and it provides the narrative for their entrepreneurial identity. The quest to operate successfully as a creative practitioner in the creative industries drives entrepreneurial behaviour. The research examines the relationship between creative identity and entrepreneurial identity and how these two identities intertwine. To respond to this question, the study critically evaluates the concept of creative identity and entrepreneurial identity with fourteen creative practitioners in the UK, working as either chartered architects or freelance photographers. The research employed a qualitative approach and interpretivist ontology. Semi-structured interviews were undertaken with the participants. The key finding that highlights the driver for entrepreneurial identity is the quest to operate successfully as a creative practitioner in the creative industries. This quest is underpinned by the desire to be able to express their creative identity, often referred to as a creative ‘voice’. Entrepreneurial identity and entrepreneurial behaviours function as conduits in which creative practitioners channel their primary driver of creative identity. This chapter contributes to the knowledge about creative practitioners’ entrepreneurial identity and creative identity and how these two identities relate to each other.

Successful knowledge transfer (KT) between younger and older workers (YW and OW, respectively) is critical for organizational success, especially in light of the recent surge in employment volatility among the youngest and oldest segments of the workforce. Yet, practitioners and scholars alike continue to struggle with knowing how best to facilitate these exchanges. The qualitative study offers insight into this phenomenon by exploring how KT unfolds in YW/OW dyads.

The authors performed a reflexive thematic analysis of semistructured interviews with two samples of blue- and white-collar younger/older workers from the USA (N = 40), whereby the authors interpreted the “lived experiences” of these workers when engaged in interdependent tasks.

The analysis, informed by social exchange theory and exchange theories of aging, led to the development of the knowledge transfer process model in younger/older worker dyads (KT-YOD). The model illustrates that, through different combinations of competence and humility, KT success is experienced either directly (by workers weighing the perceived benefits versus costs of KT) and/or indirectly (through different bases of trust/distrust perceived within their dyads). Further, humility in dyads appears to be necessary for KT success, while competence was insufficient for realizing KT success, independently.

In exposing new inner workings of the KT process in YW/OW dyads, the study introduces the importance of humility and brings scholars and organizations a step closer toward realizing the benefits of age diversity in their workplaces.

This paper aims to consider the training provided to Volunteer Police Cadet (VPC) Leaders in police forces across England and Wales who, as part of the wider policing volunteer family, lead organised youth development activities for uniformed police cadets.

An online ethically approved questionnaire was administered to volunteer leaders across six VPC schemes hosted by police forces in England and Wales. The sample population being selected due to their geographical spread across both nations, along with the similarities of their VPC schemes. The questionnaire collected demographic information of respondents, then used a blend of closed questions. Likert scales and free text boxes to explore attitudes.

The training for the volunteer leaders seems to focus on the mandated elements provided to protect the cadets from harm and also the organisation from litigation. With little development of additional knowledge, skills and behaviours (and in some cases required qualifications) to enhance the service and opportunities delivered to the young people by the volunteers.

Due in part to the limited response rate, this research cannot claim to be representative of all individuals engaged in this voluntary role; it does however provide insights into the training of such volunteers.

The research informs the decision makers of how the training of volunteer cadet leaders within forces seems to focus on the completion of the mandatory elements, with little further development of the volunteers to deliver both varied and challenging activities for the cadets.

The research provides an insight for decision makers on how the training of volunteer cadet leaders within forces seems to focus on the mandatory elements, with few opportunities for further development of volunteer leaders to deliver new, varied and challenging activities for the cadets.

First developed in the 1980s, one of the most essential ideas in international business research has the been the concept of emerging markets. Since the start of the twenty-first century, empirical research has shown that there is no clear correlation between long-term real growth in gross domestic product and real equity returns in firms active in emerging markets. The purpose of this paper is to develop an explanation for both the pervasiveness and endurance of the emerging market discourse despite empirical evidence that substantially questions its very robustness.

The author offers a “weak form” critique of the emerging market discourse that identifies weaknesses and gaps in the emerging market concept and offers suggestions on how to modify it without fundamentally rejecting its conceptual and ideological core. This paper also offers a “strong form” critique of emerging markets as a discourse arguing that the discourse itself is actually propagated to maintain and reinforce global economic inequality and should, therefore, be fundamentally transformed.

Based on the strong form critique of emerging markets discourse, this paper shows how a three-phase process allows emerging market discourse to engender strategic and public policy practice. Scholars and educators play a pivotal role through their writing and discursive interactions with students and executives in their classroom. The centrality of scholars and educators is supported by the broader media ecosystem as well as being reinforced by interactions between executives and policymakers.

This paper makes the case that international business scholars and educators should play a leading role in fundamentally transforming the emerging market discourse and to launch a renewed critical, inter-subjective discussion of dependency and global inequality through three mechanisms: peer-review research; course syllabi and programs; and public intellectualism.

Through critical discourse analysis, this paper addresses for the first time how emerging markets as a concept has prospered in academic and managerial circles despite credible empirical evidence of its lack of robustness.