A Study on Flight Attendants’ Perceptions towards Airline Careers: The Effects of COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

This study sought to explore the problems experienced by Thai flight attendants and understand how they perceive the careers in airlines based on the problems caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. This study employed a qualitative approach to identify the problems Thai flight attendants experienced during the pandemic and understand how those problems have contributed to their perceptions towards airline careers. Thirty Thai flight attendants both employed and unemployed were selected as participants. To collect in-depth data, the semi-structured individual interview was employed. Thematic analysis was utilised to organise data while interpretive analysis was employed to interpret the data. The findings showed that the participants faced with five main problems; namely, physical and mental health problems, pay and benefit loss, struggles for future plans, job insecurity, and loss of trust in organisations. As influenced by these problems, the findings revealed three different types of perception that the participants had towards airline careers, which were stable, quite stable, and unstable. The study also contributes to the understanding of relationship between the problems and Thai flight attendants’ perceptions and its significance which could be beneficial for both educational and business contexts. For the educational context, educational practitioners might consider including contents regarding impacts of COVID-19 on the airline business in their airline-related courses so that it could benefit students who want to work in this business. For the business, those who work in human resources departments might use the findings of this study in future staff planning and risk management.