Gender and Engineering Career Development of Hotel's Employees in China

This paper studies the career development of the employees in hotel industry in mainland China. A surveying was carried out with a structured questionnaire to gather career information from a sample of top managers (n = 633) working in 114 hotels. The data was then analyzed using a range of descriptive and evaluative techniques. Results show that women gain initial management jobs earlier than men and advance to senior position, but they are more difficult to become general manager than men. That means the “glass ceiling” exists for women in hotel industry in China. The career/family conflict and gender stereotypes are the important obstacles existing in women's career development. A number of positions are traditionally perceived as men's job and accordingly excluded from women's consideration, including such positions as manager of engineering department and security department. These findings have implications on employment for individuals and organizations.