Former Team Sports Experiences: Development of Collaborative and Leadership Skills for Future Hospitality Managers

Abstract

<p>Some hospitality firms thrive, because they have effective functional teams (e.g., front of the office (FOH) within a hotel and back of the house (BOH) within a restaurant) in their respective hospitality organizations. Functional teams can be viewed as structured teams in hospitality milieus. For functional teams to succeed, proper leadership needs to be implemented to inspire and to motivate employees to work cohesively towards a common goal. The purpose of this study was to examine team sports’ impact on collaboration and leadership tactics among hospitality undergraduate students⎯our future hospitality managers and leaders within this diverse industry. The multifactor leadership questionnaire (MLQ) 5X short-form instrument was utilized to examine a convenience sample of 170 undergraduate students’ leadership styles. The MLQ scoring key was used to determine that 64.1% of undergraduate students who participated in team sports developed successful leadership styles. Results also indicated that individuals with team sport experiences preferred to work in groups synonymous to hospitality firms.</p>