Work satisfaction and COVID-19: the case of the cruise sector
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17561/ree.n1.2024.8132Keywords:
COVID-19, cruises, employee experience, cruise companies, satisfactionAbstract
Tourism sector labour market is normally a subject of discussion due to the characteristics of the sector, which involves long hours of work and low wages, resulting in unsatisfied workers and a high level of turnover. The main objective of this work is to know the level of approval of the employee experience in the cruise sector and how it has changed after the pandemic of COVID-19. It also looks at the motivations of cruise ship employees. In addition, it is aimed to know the existence in this sense of differences between employees based on their origin, job position, salary and other relevant variables. The methodology used in the research combines quantitative analysis statistics based on a survey to employees who work on cruise ships for long periods, and qualitative analysis through semi-structured face to face interviews to workers at the time of disembarking at the port. Results show that, in general, employees are satisfied, including satisfaction towards the pandemics management. However, there are some elements that need to be improved, as they highlight the low wages and the difficult working conditions on cruise ships, since 70.36% of workers remain on board for more than 7 months, 93.21% work 7 days per week and 87.14% work more than 9 hours a day. It is concluded that the cruise industry needs to implement reforms in the working conditions in order to improve and optimize the employee experience. It’s relevant that, especially because of the COVID-19 pandemic, procedures and protocols have been implemented and have been useful to improve this situation.
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