4Review Article UDC: 005.961:005.336.1]:159.944.4
338.488.2:640.4 doi: 10.5937/menhottur2302129L
Personal and organizational factors impacting burnout syndrome among hotel employees: A bibliometric and content analysis
Jelena Lukic Nikolic1, Dusan Garabinovic2*
1 Modern Business School, Belgrade, Serbia
2 Higher Business School of Vocational Studies "Prof. dr Radomir Bojkovic", Krusevac, Serbia
Abstract: The hotel industry is very vulnerable to unexpected external changes, which have an impact on employees as the major success factors of hotel functioning and success. The aim of this paper is to establish, by conducting a bibliometric and content analysis, the characteristics of existing research in the sphere of hotel employee burnout syndrome and to single out the main factors that influence it. The bibliometric analysis conducted in the beginning of September 2023 found that only 37 papers dealing with burnout among hotel employees were published in only eight journals from the sphere of tourism and hospitality indexed in the Web of Science database (Clarivate Analytics Journal Citation Report). The majority of authors who write about this subject are from the USA and China. Content analysis revealed that burnout syndrome among hotel employees is largely dependent on the personal characteristics of employees, as well as on organizational factors.
Keywords: hotel employees, burnout, bibliometric analysis, content analysis JEL classification: J28, M12, M54
y • V • • • • • P 1 i • 1 • • • V • 1
Licni i organizacioni faktori koji uticu na sindrom sagorevanja zaposlenih u hotelima: Bibliometrijska analiza i analiza sadrzaja
Sazetak: Hotelska industrija je veoma ranjiva na neocekivane eksterne promene koje uticu na zaposlene, kao glavni faktor funkcionisanja i uspeha hotela. Cilj ovog rada je da sprovodenjem bibliometrijske analize i analize sadrzaja predstavi karakteristike postojecih istrazivanja u sferi sindroma sagorevanja kod zaposlenih u hotelima i da ukaze na glavne faktore koji na to uticu. Bibliometrijska analiza sprovedena pocetkom septembra 2023. godine identifikovala je samo 37 radova koji se bave izucavanjem sindroma sagorevanja kod zaposlenih u hotelima, objavljenih u samo osam casopisa iz sfere turizma i ugostiteljstva indeksiranim u Web of Science bazi (Clarivate Analytics Journal Citation Report). Vecina autora koji pisu o ovoj temi je iz SAD i Kine. Analiza sadrzaja ukazala je da sindrom sagorevanja kod zaposlenih u hotelima u velikoj men zavisi od licnih karakteristika zaposlenih, kao i od organizacionih faktora.
Kljucne reci: zaposleni u hotelima, sagorevanje, bibliometrijska analiza, analiza sadrzaja JEL klasifikacija: J28, M12, M54
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license ^http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)J_
1. Introduction
The hospitality industry is heavily reliant on human resources (Elbaz et al., 2020; Kim et al., 2007), due to the fact that all services involve human work, commitment and attention (Cheung et al., 2014). Human resources are one of the most significant factors not only in achieving, but also in maintaining business success in the hotel industry (Ognjanovic, 2023). Constant and unpredictable environmental occurrences cause significant changes in the hotel industry (Baquero, 2023). Hotel employees are frequently exposed to significant pressure due to the complex nature of the hospitality industry. They are typically facing long work hours, working nights, weekends, and public holidays, demanding customers, and managerial pressure to achieve high outcomes (Ahmad et al., 2021; Elbaz et al., 2020; Ghosh, 2022; Wallace & Coughlan, 2023). Hotel employees are frequently required to complete a variety of unrelated duties under time constraints (Rao & Goel, 2017). Furthermore, employees who have direct contact with guests must be pleasant and smile, even in challenging situations that might be exhausting and unpleasant (Kim, 2008; Pienaar & Willemse, 2008). As a result, service employees tend to exhibit a high rate of occupational burnout (Ayachit & Chitta, 2022; Lu & Gursoy, 2016). According to the results of a Statista global survey conducted in 2019 with 1,001 employees aged 19 to 81, the hotel, food services, and hospitality industries had the highest employee burnout rate at 80.3% (Dyvik, 2022). Not only is there a significant rate of occupational burnout, but there is also a growing trend of burnout among hospitality employees (Yin et al., 2022). Employees suffering from burnout syndrome have a negative impact on overall organizational results, as well as consumer satisfaction and loyalty (Ali et al., 2022). As a result, the hospitality industry's primary goal is to eliminate or at least reduce occupational burnout among employees (Cheng & O-Yang, 2018; Dai et al., 2021). Burnout has gained popularity in the media and popular science in recent years (Heinemann & Heinemann, 2017); however, it has not been thoroughly explored or analyzed in the hospitality setting. For that reason, in this paper, bibliometric and content analyses are conducted with the goal of examining existing published papers that deal with burnout syndrome among hotel employees and highlighting the most prominent journals, countries, authors, methodology used in published papers, as well as key personal and organizational factors that cause burnout.
The subject of this paper is the burnout syndrome of hotel employees. The aim of this paper is to establish, by conducting a bibliometric and content analysis, the characteristics of existing research in the sphere of hotel employee burnout syndrome and to single out the main personal and organizational factors that influence it.
2. Background
The first definition of burnout stated that this syndrome represents inappropriate attitudes toward clients and toward oneself, and that it is often interrelated with physical and emotional illness (Freudenberger, 1974). Burnout is manifested as "stress that had gotten out of control" (Hamann, 1990, p. 31). Further definitions explained this phenomenon as inadequate individuals' resources needed to meet work demands (Brewer & Shapard, 2004), which weakens the motivation of employees and the overall level of their commitment and engagement (Wang, 2020). Initially, burnout was associated with vocations connected to caregiving and service providing; but, during the 1990s, this phenomenon began to show and be noticed in other occupations and professions (Napoles, 2022). However, the research findings clearly show that this syndrome is most prevalent in terms of frequency and intensity in vocations that need a high level of interpersonal connection (Maslach & Leiter, 1997).
The Maslach burnout inventory categorizes burnout into three components: emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and reduced personal accomplishment (Maslach & Jackson,
1981). Emotional exhaustion refers to the feeling of being overworked and exhausted of one's emotional resources, whereas depersonalization refers to a negative or overly detached attitude to many aspects of one's profession in which the person purposefully places distance between them and intentionally ignores others. When there is a lack of effort and productivity at work, as well as a sense of incompetence, personal accomplishment is reduced (Maslach et al., 2001).
Burnout refers to an individual's mentally and emotionally depleted state as a result of chronic interpersonal workplace stresses (Maslach et al., 2001). The key job and organizational attributes that contribute to burnout are: hard working conditions, less job recognition (Freudenberger, 1977), work overload, lack of control, insufficient rewards, absence of fairness, conflicting values (Maslach & Leiter, 1997), unclear goals and roles, bureaucratic organizational structure, unclear and unsupportive communication (Maslach,
1982), restrictive rules and procedures, poor management (Nápoles, 2022), as well as blurred job nature and more diverse work responsibilities (Ali et al., 2022). As a result, burnout is defined as a job-related psychological syndrome induced by long-term uncontrolled and unresolved stress at work (Khammissa et al., 2022).
Employees and organizations may suffer from the burnout effect in a variety of ways (Prentice & Thaichon, 2019). Burnout can cause tiredness, separation, boredom, impatience, worry, sleeplessness, alcohol usage, weight loss or increase, high blood pressure, headaches, as well as anxiety, melancholy, other psychological diseases, and even suicide (Nápoles, 2022). Employees exposed to burnout tend to have a greater absenteeism rate, devote less time and energy to their jobs, do only what is necessary and demanded of them, have no or little passion or enthusiasm for their work, have low morale, and show lower job quality (Maslach, 1982). Burnout also causes job dissatisfaction, low commitment and engagement, high turnover, and poor performance (Elbaz et al., 2020; Han et al., 2016; Wang, 2020).
3. Materials and methods
In this paper, a bibliometric and content analysis is conducted with the aim to answer on the following research questions (RQ):
RQ1: Which journals and countries have published the most papers on burnout syndrome among hotel employees?
RQ2: Who are the most well-known authors on burnout syndrome among hotel employees? RQ3: What are the most significant publications on burnout syndrome among hotel employees?
RQ4: What are the key personal and organizational factors that cause burnout among hotel employees?
Data were collected from journals whose title refers to tourism and hospitality with an impact factor in the Web of Science (WoS) academic database, which includes a large number of social science and humanities journals and recognizes hospitality tourism as an independent academic category (Chen et al., 2023). This approach in the selection of journals was previously used in other papers (Andelic et al., 2019; Garabinovic et al., 2021; Garabinovic et al., 2023; Papic et al., 2023). In the Clarivate Analytics Journal Citation Report (JCR) for 2022, there were 27 journals matching these criteria. Advanced search options were used on the publishers' websites: Elsevier/Science Direct (eight journals); Taylor & Francis online (eight journals); Sage journals (six journals); Emerald
Insight/Emerald Publishing (three journals); Springer/Springer Nature (one journal).
Wiley Online Library (one journal);
Data collection was conducted in September 2023, using the string (burnout OR "burning out" OR "burn out" OR "burns out" OR "burned out" OR "burnt out") AND (hotel OR hotels) for searching its appearance in title, abstract and keywords of the published papers using the advanced search options available on the websites of the publishers of the mentioned journals. English was selected as the main language, with the unlimited time period of publications. By reading the title, abstract and keywords, each paper was additionally checked to see if it really corresponds to the stated topic.
Following the collecting of all papers that fulfil the required criteria, the number of citations for each of them was compiled using Google Scholar on November 21, 2023.
Data analysis was performed during October 2023 using Microsoft® Excel® 2019, and VOSviewer 1.6.19. A performance analysis of the most prominent authors, countries, journals, and citations was performed.
4. Results and discussion - bibliometric analysis 4.1. Yearly distribution of published papers
A total of 37 papers on the topic were identified (Figure 1). The first paper addressing employee burnout in hotels was published in 1991. After a decade, in 2001, another paper on this subject was published. Since 2006, there has been a surge in interest in this subject. The most papers were published in 2021 (5 papers) and 2012 (4 papers).
Figure 1 : Yearly distribution of published papers
■Number of paper
Source: Authors' research
Observing the distribution of papers by decade, it is noticeable that the number of papers related to the analyzed topic increases with each new decade. This is supported by the data that in the period 1991-2000, only 1 paper was published (2.70%), then in 2001-2010 10 papers (27.03%) and in 2011-2020 16 papers (43.24%). Since 2021, 10 papers have been published, which suggests that 27.03% of all papers on the subject of burnout were published in less than three years alone.
4.2. Journals with most published papers
The papers were published in eight analyzed journals (29.63%) (Table 1). Almost half of the papers (48.65%) were published in the "International Journal of Hospitality Management", with the "International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management" coming in second place (29.73%). The remaining six journals published one or two papers on this subject.
Table 1: The number of published papers in journals
No. Journal No. of published papers % of published papers
1 International Journal of Hospitality Management 18 48.65
2 International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management 11 29.73
3 Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management 2 5.40
4 International Journal of Tourism Research 2 5.40
5 Tourism Review 1 2.70
6 Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research 1 2.70
7 Journal of Hospitality Marketing & Management 1 2.70
8 Journal of Hospitality, Leisure, Sport & Tourism Education 1 2.70
Total 37 100
Source: Authors' research
4.3. Authors - characteristics, frequency and cooperation
The total number of authors, including multiple repetitions of the same authors, is 94. Comparing the above data with the data on the total number of papers (37), it is concluded that the average number of authors per paper is 2.54. The majority of papers are co-authored by two authors (15 papers; 40.54%). This is followed by papers with three authors (8 papers; 21.62%), four authors (7 papers; 18.92%), one author (6 papers; 16.22%) and six authors (1 paper; 2.70%), which also represents the highest established number of authors per paper. It is concluded that 31 papers, that is, the vast majority of papers (83.78%), were written in collaboration by two or more authors.
The following table (Table 2) shows the total number of papers by country. In addition, the papers are presented according to whether they were written by authors from one country or if there was collaboration with authors from other countries. In this research, the term "state" means a full member of the United Nations.
Table 2: Number of papers by country
Country Collaboration - No. of papers Total
No Yes
No. % No. % No. %
USA 6 40.00 9 60.00 15 40.54
China 6 54.55 5 45.45 11 29.73
South Korea 1 20.00 4 80.00 5 13.51
Country Collaboration - No. of papers Total
No Yes
No. % No. % No. %
Cyprus 3 75.00 1 25.00 4 10.81
Turkey 1 33.33 2 66.67 3 8,11
UK 1 33.33 2 66.67 3 8.11
Canada 1 50.00 1 50.00 2 5.41
Egypt 1 50.00 1 50.00 2 5.41
Australia 1 100.00 0 0.00 1 2.70
Greece 1 100.00 0 0.00 1 2.70
India 1 100.00 0 0.00 1 2.70
Ireland 1 100.00 0 0.00 1 2.70
KSA 0 0.00 1 100.00 1 2.70
South Africa 0 0.00 1 100.00 1 2.70
Spain 1 100.00 0 0.00 1 2.70
Source: Authors' research
Authors from the USA made the greatest contribution to the analyzed topic when the number of papers is taken into account (40.54%). Besides the USA, China (29.73%) and Cyprus (10.81%) had a significant share in the number of published papers.
The largest number of papers were written by authors from the same country (24 papers; 64.86%). The collaboration of authors from two different countries was realized in 11 papers (29.73%). The collaboration of authors from three different countries is the least represented - only 2 papers (5.41%).
Authors from the seven mentioned countries published most/all of their papers in collaboration with authors from other countries (KSA, South Africa, South Korea, USA, Turkey, UK), while authors from two countries collaborated with authors from other countries in writing half of the papers (Canada and Egypt). The following figure made using VOSviewer (Figure 2) shows the collaboration between authors from different countries.
Figure 2: Collaboration between countries
Source: Authors' research
Authors from the USA collaborated with authors from seven countries. According to the number of authors from different countries with whom they have collaborated, the authors from China and South Korea follow, who collaborated with authors from three countries each. Authors from Egypt and South Africa collaborated with authors from two countries each. Authors from Canada, Cyprus, Saudi Arabia and the UK collaborated with authors from only one country. Unlike those previously mentioned, authors from Greece, Spain, India, Ireland and Australia did not collaborate with authors from other countries.
The most significant collaboration of authors from the USA was with authors from South Korea (3 papers). This is followed by collaboration with authors from Turkey and China (2 papers each). In one paper each, authors from the USA collaborated with authors from Canada, Cyprus, South Africa and Egypt.
The most significant collaboration of authors from China was with authors from the USA and the UK (2 papers each). This is followed by a collaboration with authors from South Korea (1 paper).
The most significant collaboration of authors from South Korea was with authors from the USA (3 papers). This is followed by a collaboration with authors from China and Turkey (1 paper each).
Authors from Egypt collaborated with authors from the USA and Saudi Arabia in one paper each. Authors from South Africa collaborated with authors from the USA and Turkey in one paper each. Authors from Canada and Cyprus collaborated in one paper each only with authors from the USA, while authors from Saudi Arabia collaborated in one paper only with authors from Egypt. Authors from the UK collaborated only with authors from China in two papers.
The total number of authors, without multiple repetitions, is 84. Only eight authors (9.52%) published more than one paper on this subject, according to the number of published papers by authors (Table 3). The only two authors who have written three papers on this topic are Hyun Jeong Kim and Osman M. Karatepe. The first author worked in the USA and received a total of 1,391 citations for all three papers, whereas the second author worked in Cyprus and received a total of 591 citations for all three papers. All of the authors work in different institutions. Five of them work in the USA, while two work in China. In addition to the mentioned countries, South Africa and Cyprus are also present as author countries in one case each.
Table 3 : The information of impactful authors
No. of No. of citation
No. Author published Country Affiliation
papers
1 Hyun Jeong Kim 3 1,391 USA Washington State University
2 Osman M. Karatepe 3 591 Cyprus Eastern Mediterranean University
3 Chihyung (Michael) Ok 2 821 USA Kansas State University/ Temple University
4 JungHoon (Jay) Lee 2 821 USA Kansas State University / East Carolina
University
5 Dogan Gursoy 2 669 USA/South Africa Washington State University / University of Johannesburg
No. Author No. of published papers No. of citation Country Affiliation
6 Amarjit S. Gill 2 584 USA Touro University International
7 Wen-Long Zhuang 2 74 China Hung Kuang University
8 You De Dai 2 74 China National Chi Nan University
Source: Authors' research
Two collaborations between specific authors were achieved (Figure 3). The first is between JungHoon (Jay) Lee and Chihyung (Michael) Ok, and the second is between You-De Dai and Wen-Long Zhuang. Both collaborations were realized in two papers each.
Figure 3: Collaboration between authors
JungHoon (Jay) Lee
Chihyung (Michael) Ok
You-De Dai
Wen-Long Zhuang
Source: Authors' research
The number of authors according to the criteria of the country they come from is shown in the following table (Table 4).
Table 4: Top countries regarding number of authors that dealt with this topic
Country No. %
USA 23 27.71
China 21 25.30
South Korea 6 7.23
Turkey 5 6.02
Cyprus 4 4.82
Greece 4 4.82
Egypt 4 4.82
UK 4 4.82
Spain 3 3.61
Canada 3 3.61
Ireland 2 2.41
Australia 2 2.41
South Africa 1 1.20
India 1 1.20
KSA 1 1.20
Source: Authors' research
The USA has the most authors who have written about burnout syndrome among hotel employees. There are 23 authors in all (27.71%). China ranks second, with 21 authors (25.30%). South Korea is placed third, but it has only six authors that wrote about this topic (7.23%) in comparison with the USA and China.
4.4. The most cited papers (Google Scholar)
The analyzed papers have a total of 7,100 citations. The average number of citations per paper is 191.89. Six papers have more than 500 citations, thus contributing to the total number of citations >7.00% (Table 5). With 689 citations, the most cited paper was published in 2008 by author Hyun Jeong Kim. Two of the most cited papers presented in Table 5 were written by only one author.
Table 5: Papers with more than 500 citations
No. Author(s) (Year of publication) No. of citations % of total citations
1 Kim (2008) 689 9.70
2 Lu & Gursoy (2016) 621 8.75
3 Yang (2010) 605 8.52
4 Kim et al. (2007) 556 7.83
5 Lee & Ok (2012) 540 7.61
6 Gill et al. (2006) 510 7.18
Note: Number of citations is based on Google Scholar results on November 21, 2023.
Source: Authors' research
On the other hand, in order to obtain more relevant data on the influence of the analyzed papers, it is necessary to take into consideration the average annual number of citations per paper. The average annual number of citations per paper was calculated using the following formula: total number of citations / (2024 - year of publication). The results showed that there are a total of five papers that have an average annual citation of more than 40.00 (Table 6). The average annual citation of papers is 20.93.
Table 6: Papers with the highest average annual number of citations
No. Author(s) (Year of publication) No. of citations
1 Lu & Gursoy (2016) 77.63
2 Cheng & O-Yang (2018) 62.17
3 Lee & Ok (2012) 45.00
4 Yang (2010) 43.21
5 Kim (2008) 43.06
Note: Number of citations is based on Google Scholar results on November 21, 2023.
Source: Authors' research
5. Results and discussion - content analysis
In order to analyze the content in more detail and obtain more relevant results, the analysis of keywords was carried out applying the principle of completeness of names (instead of abbreviations), decomposition of complex expressions, finding synonyms, and avoiding false frequency by accepting only one occurrence of a certain word per paper.
VOSviewer was used in order to more precisely determine the connection of keywords. Using this tool, a visual representation of the connection of the analyzed topics was created. In order to emphasize the most important topics, as well as for a simpler visual representation, those topics with a frequency of >3 were taken into consideration. In the described way, four clusters were formed (Figure 4).
Figure 4: Interconnection of the most important topics
inte^jons
turqpver
engagement
orgyizat
norms psychology burnout
work
W hotels
comnqjfment
satisfaction
personality
charac^ristics
behgjiours
man.
place
employees lagement hospitality
tu*ey
customer .Te'.
resources
frorilline
emotion
intelligence
dlssopance
lead^ship^
series
transformation
Source: Authors' research
The first cluster (coloured red) includes burnout, characteristics, dissonance, emotion, employees, frontline, hotels, intelligence, personality, and Turkey. On the basis of the obtained cluster, the factors affecting the burnout syndrome among hotel employees can be singled out. The "Characteristics" factor implies job performance, including highperformance work systems, as well as essential personality traits. The "Dissonance" factor includes emotional dissonance. The "Emotion" factor includes to the greatest extent emotional labour, followed by emotional intelligence and dissonance, as well as emotional exhaustion and effort. The "Employees" factor includes factors arising from hotel staff, primarily frontline employees, but also employee well-being, reactions, attitudes, and commitment, as well as the role of domestic migrant workers. The "Frontline" factor emphasizes the role of hotel frontline staff and can be considered as part of the "Employees" factor. The "Intelligence" factor primarily includes emotional intelligence, but also artificial intelligence. The "Personality" factor includes the personality characteristics of employees.
The second cluster (coloured green) includes behaviours, customers, hospitality, leadership, management, place, resources, services, stress, and transformation. The "Behaviour" factor includes different ways of behavior of employees that can occur as a cause or consequence of burnout at work. It is based on the need to focus on customers, social and organizational citizenship behaviour, extraroles, including various forms of disobeying business rules, unethicality (for one's own benefit), as well as numerous counterproductive activities. The "Customer" factor includes the actions of users of services, and activities related to them. It is based on a focus on users, customer service management, as well as dysfunctional customer behavior. The "Hospitality" factor includes the influence of the specifics of hospitality in various aspects - industry, management, services, etc. The "Leadership" factor
includes the influence of different forms of leadership, among which transformational leadership stands out, but it also includes other elements - transactional leadership, leader-member exchange, etc. The "Management" factor includes the influence of managerial activities, especially human resources management, middle management, customer service management, etc. The "Place" factor includes the role of the workplace in burnout syndrome at work, which is expressed through loneliness, social descriptive norms, counterproductive behaviour, etc. The "Resources" factor is primarily based on human resource management, but conservation of resources theory also has its role. The "Services" factor is based on the characteristics and specifics of hospitality services, then sabotages, quality, and customer service management. The "Stress" factor includes the role of stress at work, as well as stressors in the sense of challenge and hindrance. The "Transformation" factor implies transformational leadership.
The third cluster (coloured blue) includes commitment, intentions, organizational, satisfaction, turnover, and work. The "Commitment" factor includes the organizational commitment of employees. The "Intentions" factor includes turnover intentions, i.e. intentions of leaving employees. This factor can be identified with the "Turnover" factor and viewed together as the "Turnover intentions" factor. The "Organizational" factor includes various organizational factors, such as organizational commitment, politics, perceived organizational support, supervisors' organizational embodiment, organizational citizenship behaviours, etc. The "Satisfaction" factor primarily includes job satisfaction, but also life satisfaction. The "Work" factor includes numerous factors that arise directly from the work process, among which the most important are job satisfaction and emotional labour, then work engagement, work-leisure conflict, and job performances/characteristics, but other factors are also present - workplace factors (loneliness, social descriptive norms, counterproductive behaviour), telework/work from home, high performance work systems, quality of work life, workload, work values, job crafting, job stress, violation of work rules, etc.
The fourth cluster (coloured yellow) includes engagement, norms, and psychology. The "Engagement" factor includes the influence of work engagement of employees. The "Norms" factor includes social descriptive norms in the workplace, behaviour aimed at violating business rules, and regulatory foci. The "Psychology" factor includes various psychological factors, such as psychological ownership, but also psychological capital and safety.
The content analysis results are consistent with those of other studies that demonstrate how frontline hotel employees who interact with customers are more likely to experience stressful situations and burnout syndrome, and how their personalities, emotions, and intelligence influence their behaviour (Choi et al., 2019; Wang, 2020). Additionally, content analysis results align with research indicating that managers and leaders play a major role in setting up procedures, resources, and workplace atmosphere in the tourism and hospitality industry (Chi et al., 2021; Kloutsiniotis et al., 2022). They aim to reduce workload, job stress, job crafting, loneliness, and unproductive behaviour while simultaneously fostering organizational citizenship behaviour, quality of work life, satisfaction, commitment and engagement (Dorta-Afonso et al., 2023; Kara et al., 2013).
In order to observe the interconnection of the most important topics depending on the year of paper publication, overlay visualization was performed using VOSviewer (Figure 5).
Figure 5: Interconnection of the most important topics (overlay visualization)
Source: Authors' research
The analysis of the presence of the most important topics in the published papers, with the aim of a simpler overview of the influence of time on the study of burnout syndrome, was also carried out according to decades (Figure 6).
Figure 6: Presence of the most significant topics by decade
100% 80% 60% 40% 20% 0%
■ 3rd decade of the 21st century
■ 1st decade of the 21st century
Source: Authors' research
2nd decade of the 21st century 110th decade of the 20th century
During the last decade of the 20 century, of the defined factors, only "Employees" and "Turnover (intention)" were present. During the first decade of the 21st century, the factors "Dissonance", "Intelligence", "Place", "Resource", "Engagement", "Norms", and "Psychology" were not present. During the second decade of the 21 st century, the factors "Personality", "Management", "Place", and "Norms" were not present. During the current 140
part of the third decade of the 21st century, the factors "Dissonance", "Emotion", "Employees", "Frontline", "Personality", and "Turkey" were not present. During the first decade of the 21st century, all the papers on personality, most of the papers on management, characteristics, and hospitality, and half of the papers on leadership were published. During the second decade of the 21st century, all papers on the topic of dissonance, most of the papers on the topic of intelligence, employees, emotion, hotels, frontline, Turkey, organizational, satisfaction and burnout, as well as half of the papers on services, stress and psychology were published. During the analyzed part of the third decade of the 21st century, all papers on the subject of place and norms, most of the papers on the subject of resources and engagement, as well as half of the papers on commitment and psychology were published. The topics of behaviours and intentions were mostly analyzed in the second and third decades of the 21st century, customer in the first three decades of the 21st century, and turnover in the third decade of the 21st century, while work was mostly analyzed in the second decade of the 21st century.
6. Conclusion
Results from bibliometric analysis conducted in this paper showed that the "International Journal of Hospitality Management" (ScienceDirect) published the most papers (48.65%) on burnout syndrome among hotel employees. Taking into account the number of papers by country and top countries regarding the number of authors that dealt with this topic, it can be concluded that the countries that made the greatest contribution to the analyzed topic are the USA (40.54% of the papers; 27.71% of the authors) and China (29.73% of the papers; 25.30% of the authors). Hyun Jeong Kim, School of Hospitality Business Management, Washington State University, USA, is the most well-known author if two criteria are taken into account - the number of published papers dealing with burnout among hotel employees (according to this criterion, Osman M. Karatepe, Eastern Mediterranean University, Cyprus, has the same importance) and the number of citations. Using the number of citations on Google Scholar on November 21, 2023, the results showed that the most influential papers (papers that have the highest total number of citations or have the highest average annual citations) are: Kim (2008), Lu and Gursoy (2016), Yang (2010), Kim et al. (2007), Lee and Ok (2012), Gill et al. (2006), and Cheng and O-Yang (2018). Furthermore, conducted content analysis revealed that exposure to burnout among hotel employees is largely dependent on their personality characteristics. Besides personal characteristics, there are organizational factors that may cause burnout among hotel employees.
The contribution of this paper is in conducting bibliometric analysis on the topic of burnout syndrome in the field of hotel management. In this way, data were obtained on: the temporal dynamics of the publication of papers (trend of growing interest in this field); representation in magazines; authors from the aspect of contributions of individuals, countries and achieved cooperation, as well as the most significant authors from the aspect of citations. The above data can represent a good basis for interested authors for further analysis of this topic. In addition, by conducting a content analysis, key topics, i.e. factors of burnout syndrome, were singled out.
The presented research is valuable not only in the academic sphere, but also in practice, for managers and leaders of hotels. The results can be used to establish clear organizational procedures and practices that will help in the process of eliminating or at least reducing burnout syndrome, as well as to create working conditions and an atmosphere free from stress and heavy workloads for hotel employees. Furthermore, managers and leaders may find out the strategies and methods for overcoming the problems and negative effects that may appear in hotels due to employee exposure to burnout.
The limitations of this paper arise from the search period (September 2023), the defined sample of journals, the method of selection of papers, content analysis based to a significant extent on keyword analysis, etc. Future directions of research should be aimed at eliminating the mentioned shortcomings and further expanding the analysis to the field of tourism and hospitality, and not only the hotel industry. Given the fact that business environment is constantly changing, it is almost inevitable that there will be many new papers on the topic of burnout syndrome in the hotel industry. As a result, the proposal is to perform an ongoing bibliometric analysis study in order to examine the most recent concerns regarding burnout and its negative effects, as well as to find suitable approach to overcome its antecedents and consequences.
Conflict of interest
The authors declare no conflict of interest. References
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Received: 16 November 2023; Revised: 28 November 2023; Accepted: 10 December 2023
