Immigrant Employment in the Slovak Hospitality Industry: Profiles, Experience, and Education

Abstract

The hospitality industry is dependent on migrant employees. This statement is also valid for Slovakia, where the percentage of migrant workers rose in recent years. This research seeks to answer whether part-time and full-time applicants are overqualified and, if so, to examine whether male and female applicants tend to be overqualified using Pearson's chi square test, focusing on the likelihood of overqualification in both genders. Drawing from the immigrant hospitality applicants' CVs, which were collected and examined, the paper strives to explore their profiles and previous experience in the hospitality industry, but mainly to analyse the education they have attained. The data were collected through quantitative methods, comprising CV analysis and netnography. The analysed CVs were obtained randomly from a job recruiting and advertising domain in order to achieve the maximum objectivity possible. The findings show the majority of applicants to be of Ukrainian and Serbian nationality. Most of the international candidates possess appropriate knowledge of the Slovak language and already have work experience in the hospitality sector. More applicants were attained that had a tertiary education than with secondary education only. Thereby, the results suggest a tendency for migrant applicants to be overqualified regardless of their sex while presenting possible insights into the researched issues.