Abstract

This study examines the influence of social capital on employee creativity in the hotel industry, focusing on hotels in Cape Coast and Elmina in Ghana. Grounded in social capital theory, the study addresses an important research gap concerning individual-level creativity within the hospitality sector, particularly in developing economy contexts where empirical evidence remains limited. A cross-sectional research design was adopted, and data were collected from 260 hotel employees using structured questionnaires and a simple random sampling technique. The data were analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) to examine the relationship between social capital and employee creativity and to test the moderating role of gender. The results indicate that social capital has a significant positive influence on employee creativity in the hotel workplace. The study further revealed that gender does not significantly moderate this relationship, which means that the influence of social capital on employee creativity is relatively consistent across male and female employees. This study contributes to the hospitality management literature by providing empirical evidence on the relationship between social capital and employee creativity in the hotel sector, particularly within the Ghanaian context where such research remains limited. The findings also offer practical implications for hotel managers and policymakers in promoting collaborative work environments that strengthen social capital and enhance creativity among employees.