The mismatch between supply and demand in the tourism and hospitality labor markets becomes increasingly serious in the past few years. The main reason for such a problem is that tourism and hospitality students are equipped with academic knowledge but lack VUCA skills. VUCA are the acronyms of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. However, little research has explored the antecedent mechanism of tourism and hospitality students’ VUCA skills. Hence, the purpose of the present study is to clarify the leading factors that would enhance tourism and hospitality students’ perceived VUCA skills. This study collected data by distributing questionnaires to senior students majoring in tourism and hospitality management (THM) from five universities in China. The results show: First, students’ perceived the effectiveness of outcome-based education (PEOBE) has a significant effect on their perceived VUCA skills and self-concept including cognitive self-concept (CSC) and affective self-concept (ASC). Second, THM students’ CSC is positively related to their perceived VUCA skills. Finally, the relevance of ASC and students’ perceived VUCA skills was not significant. The present study further justified that PEOBE is the prepositive variable of THM students’ cognitive self-concept, supporting the linkage effect of “PEOBE → CSC → self-efficiency → perceived VUCA skills”. From the practical implications, this study focuses on OBE as the entry point to explore the antecedent mechanism of THM students’ perceived VUCA skills, supplying a basic formulation of educational reform policies for the administrative department of higher education around the world. © 2023, The Author(s).
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