Marília Durão is Assistant Professor and Coordinator of the Hospitality Management Degree at Universidade Portucalense Infante D. Henrique (UPT), Portugal. She holds a PhD in Tourism (2021) and a Master's degree in Tourism Planning and Management from the University of Aveiro (2009), and a Bachelor's degree in Tourism from Instituto Superior de Administração e Gestão (ISAG, 2007). In 2015, she was granted a Doctoral scholarship by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT). Her PhD thesis was devoted to career management, employee retention, and quality of work life in the tourism and hospitality industry.
She is also an integrated member of the ‘Territory and Development Research Group’ of REMIT – Research on Economics, Management and Information Technologies (UPT) and a member of the Research Group ‘Tourism and Development’ of GOVCOPP – Research Unit in Governance, Competitiveness and Public Policies (University of Aveiro). Over the past few years, she has been working on EU capacity-building and strategic partnership projects with HEIs in Europe and Asia. She has been involved in research projects related to human resources management, employment, education and training, entrepreneurship and innovation, and gender equality in the tourism and hospitality industry. Development and management of tourism destinations, sustainable tourism, and visitor management and interpretation are also among her research interests.