Individual reactions of HR managers and professionals to corporate sustainability – Direct effects
and the mediating role of Sustainable HRM and meaning of HR work
Marco Guerci (Politecnico di Milano), Adelien Decrameri (Ghent University), Thomas Van
Waeyenberg (Ghent University) and Ina Ehnert (Université catholique de Louvain)
This paper contributes to extend our knowledge on individual-level effects of corporate sustainability,
understood as the dynamic balancing of economic, social, and environmental performance of the firm. In
particular, we provide empirical cross-country evidence on the impact of corporate sustainability on
individual reactions of HR managers and professionals – through a survey in six European Countries
collaboratively developed with the European Professional Association of HR professionals (i.e. EAPM).
Specifically, we demonstrate that when HR managers and professionals perceive their employer to be
oriented towards sustainability, they develop higher levels of job satisfaction and lower levels of turnover
intentions.
We collaboratively designed a questionnaire and collected cross-country data across six European
countries. The questionnaire focused on both the organization (i.e., corporate sustainability, Sustainable
HRM) and the respondent (i.e., HR managers’ and professionals’ job satisfaction, turnover intentions and
meaning of HR work). The questionnaires were directed to the HR department of the organizations. In all
target countries, two emails from the HR professional association were sent to their members (excluding
those members operating as HR consultants). Overall, the response rate was around 18%, and the resulting
sample consists of 176 HR managers and professionals (97 female; 79 male). To test our hypotheses, we
followed the two – step procedure recommended by Anderson and Gerbing (1998) using the lavaan –
package (Rosseel, 2012) in R. In a first step, we used confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to test the
measurement properties of the constructs included in our research model. In a second step, the hypothesized
structural path model was tested.
We found corporate sustainability to exert those impacts both directly and through the mediating effects of
the implementation of Sustainable HRM (i.e. HRM practices aimed at the development of social,
environmental and economic organizational performance). Indeed, the implementation of Sustainable HRM
results in more meaning attached by HR managers and professionals to their HR work which, in turn, leads
to higher job satisfaction and lower turnover intentions. We discuss our findings putting forward the idea
that the positive individual-level outcomes emerged in this study may represent a data-driven argument for
stimulating the HR professional community to play a more active role on corporate sustainability
development.
The first basic limitation of the study is that it is based on cross-sectional data, and that the responding
population was confined to specific European regions. Future research could address the generalizability
of our findings in more demographically and as such more institutionally diverse samples. Particularly
relevant are the changes in institutional settings (changes in law, regulations, budgets constraints, ...) which
need to be taken into account when examining the here addressed relationships. Starting for example from
the contextually-based HRM theory framework (Paauwe, 2009), we recommend future studies to examine
the possible impact of the institutional environment on the adoption of corporate sustainability and of
Sustainable HRM. Moreover, longitudinal research is needed to examine if the relationships between (the
institutional environment,) corporate sustainability, HRM and outcomes remain stable. A second key
limitation of the present study is its focus on individual effects of corporate sustainability and HRM on HR
managers and professionals. It would be interesting to examine effects of corporate sustainability and
Sustainable HRM on individual actions and behaviors of individual employees within the organizations. In
addition, future research should not only focus on the employee level (i.e. individual attitudes and behavior)
to determine whether there is an impact of corporate sustainability; but also link corporate sustainability,
Sustainable HRM and employee level attitudes and behavior with relevant organizational-level outcomes.
References
•
Anderson, J., & Gerbing, D. 1998. Structural equation modeling in practice: A review and
recommended two-step approach. Psychological Bulletin, 103(3): 411-423.
•
Paauwe, J. 2009. HRM and performance: achievements, methodological issues and prospects.
Journal of Management Studies, 46: 129–142.
•
Rosseel, Y. 2012. Lavaan: An R package for structural equation modeling. Journal of Statistical
Software, 48(2): 1-36.
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Corresponding author, adelien.decramer@ugent.be