Motivation and Barrier Factors of the Career Intention in the Hospitality Industry: A Systematic Literature Review

Abstract

The hospitality industry worldwide has been seen supporting constant growth year by year. Although Covid-19 may have halted much of the travel and tourism activities, it is expected that people are eager to travel after the painstakingly long restrictions when this pandemic is over. Moreover, hospitality is a broad industry made up of different sets of sectors. This creates a number of job openings to be fulfilled, increasing the demand for talented and skilful human resources targeted to hospitality students. However, past studies have shown that most hospitality students did not fancy the idea of pursuing a career path in the hospitality industry, mainly due to the negative perceptions they had. It is safe to say that this alarming pattern is observed not only in a few countries but in most of the hospitality industry across the regions. Therefore, this systematic literature review aimed to identify the motivation and barrier factors that significantly influence students’ career intention in the hospitality industry. The perspective of hospitality students and industry players are taken into account. Article search was conducted from December 2020 until May 2021. Two hundred eighty-eight articles were retrieved from Scopus, Science Direct, Emerald Insights, CAB Direct, Mendeley, and snowballing technique. After a thorough screening, 17 qualitative or mixed-method articles were included and appraised using the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (CASP) checklist; then, the data were analyzed. The identified motivators are effective training set, passion for the industry, employment opportunity, well-established companies, and surroundings. On the other hand, the established barriers are nature of work, country-specific issues, industry-education gap, lack of information, industry image, bad internship experience, attitude, and managerial incompetency. Thus, this study could guide future researchers, scholars, or policymakers who are attempting to deduce a way of improving the employment of hospitality students in the hospitality industry.