Organizational Culture and Women's Career Advancement in Three to Five-Star Hotels in Nairobi City County, Kenya

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Date
2023
Authors
Maringa, Leah
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Publisher
Kenyatta University
Abstract
The profile of the hospitality industry is characterised as youthful, with a high proportion of women. However, in the corporate hotel ladder, women are underrepresented at every level, non in the middle and senior management and fall in number the higher they climb. Only 5% of women make it to the very top. In addition, most studies on organizational culture and women's advancement come from North America, Europe and a few from Asia. Studies that have been done in Kenya fail to capture this important area. Arising from this gap, this research aimed to provide an understanding of the organizational culture factors that influence the advancement of women into top management levels in 3 to 5-star rated hotels in Nairobi City County, Kenya. This study examined the relationship between organizational culture, the dependent variable and the hotel environment, the mediating variable on women's career advancement, and the independent variable. The objectives of the study were to establish the cultural beliefs about women, workplace practices and structures and patterns of interaction on the independent variable of women's career advancement in the Nairobi City County 3 to 5-star rated hotels. The study had five hypotheses. The study adopted embedded mixed model design involving a pragmatic paradigm. The target population was 342 employees from 35 three to five-star hotels in Nairobi City County. Of the total, 18 hotels were sampled using systematic random sampling. Purposive sampling was used as the sampling technique to select 96 heads of departments from each of the 18 Nairobi hotels. The systematic sampling technique was used in this research to select 246 operatives. This research used interview schedules and questionnaires to collect qualitative and quantitative data. The thematic analysis technique was used to analyse the qualitative data. Descriptive statistics employing percentages, frequencies, means, and standard deviations was used to establish the demographic characteristics and perceptions of managers on the various organizational culture dimensions. Factor analysis, multiple linear regression, was used to identify the best predictor variable got women career advancement. The study used hierarchical regression analysis to test whether the hotel environment moderated the effect of organizational culture on women career advancement. Generally, this research showed that organizational culture influences women's career advancement Specifically, cultural beliefs about gender prevalence hurt women's career advancement in 3-5 star rated hotels in Nairobi City County, leading to the rejection of the null hypothesis. Under the workplace practices, talent retention has a positive and significant effect on women's career advancement in 3-5 star rated hotels providing evidence against the null hypothesis. From the interviews work life balance, long working hours, and extensive travel are obstacles to women career advancement Inadequate decision-making power possessed by women and male dominance in social gatherings had a negative and significant influence on women career advancement. This study also indicated that the hotel environment has a moderating role in the relationship between cultural beliefs about gender prevalence and women's career advancement but no moderation effects were noted with workplace practices and patterns of interaction. This research makes necessary recommendations to hotel practitioners to promote gender-neutral culture in the hotels, by providing unconscious bias training for all employees and to the policymakers to development and implement a standard framework for monitoring and evaluation of women career adoption. To achieve maximum desired change that promotes women career growth in hotels most efficiently, priority emphasis in any intervention should be given to the organization support factor of work place practices variable.
Description
A Research Thesis Submitted In Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Award of the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Hospitality Management) in the School of Business, Economics and Tourism of Kenyatta University May 2023
Keywords
Organizational Culture, Women's Career Advancement, Three to Five-Star Hotels, Nairobi City County, Kenya
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