Investigating the Effects of Pandemic Related Workplace Changes on the Wellbeing of Ontario’s Food Hospitality and Food Retail Employees
Abstract
Food hospitality and food retail businesses underwent considerable transformations due to the COVID-19 pandemic. These alterations have the potential to affect how individuals in these industries engaged with their workplaces. This thesis identifies how COVID-19 transformed food hospitality and food retail businesses in Ontario and investigates how these changes altered employee wellbeing. The experiences of 39 staff members across these two industries were collected via semi-structured interviews that took place between June 2020 and May 2021. Grounded theory analysis was used to explore this dataset and a distinct theoretical frame emerged for the food retail and food hospitality industries respectively. Results demonstrate that for food hospitality employees their workplaces provided a combination of benefits and threats to wellbeing. In contrast, food retail employees emphasized the imbalance that existed between their perceived efforts and rewards. Future studies should consider investigating how these workplaces might be adapted to better support employee wellbeing.