Tourism Productivity in a Small Island Destination

The purpose of this study is to examine productivity in a small island destination. Productivity is an important benchmark that relates to the long-term competitiveness of an industry. A key driver for productivity is the... [ view full abstract ]

The purpose of this study is to examine productivity in a small island destination. Productivity is an important benchmark that relates to the long-term competitiveness of an industry. A key driver for productivity is the human capital that the tourism sector’s workers possess. While tourism makes a significant contribution to small island destinations, productivity is an under researched area in tourism supply studies. This study pertains to Aruba, a mature small island destination in the Caribbean that caters annually to over a million international tourists.
The study employed a path analysis to examine the relationship (direct and indirect) effects of quality of work life on organizational commitment and job satisfaction. The study captured 370 hotel employees as respondents over a one month time period in 2011. The results suggest that workers’ satisfaction with their job is primarily driven by a creative and challenging work environment as well as the workers’ life cycle experience. In other words, the younger generation (Y) seems less satisfied with their tourism job compared to the more senior generation (Boomer). This means that Gen Y seems less productive than the Boomers.
The younger generation is less committed to a career in tourism and a major driver that could improve this commitment is by an engaging supervisor behavior in directing and inspiring the work environment. Thus, this island destination has the opportunity to come up with training programs in order to educate supervisors and Gen Y regarding the intricate relationship between tourism workers’ satisfaction and productivity. The results suggest that these training programs may increase the productivity and long-term competitiveness of the tourism industry for a small island destination.