Are high-performance work systems (HPWS) appreciated by everyone? The role of management position and gender on the relationship between HPWS and affective commitment
| Pages | 1046-1064 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/ER-03-2018-0080 |
| Published date | 02 August 2019 |
| Date | 02 August 2019 |
| Author | Jim Andersén,Annelie Andersén |
| Subject Matter | Hr & organizational behaviour,Industrial/labour relations,Employment law |
Are high-performance work
systems (HPWS) appreciated
by everyone? The role of
management position and gender
on the relationship between
HPWS and affective commitment
Jim Andersén
School of Business, University of Skövde, Skövde, Sweden, and
Annelie Andersén
Department of Educational Studies, Karlstad University, Karlstad, Sweden
Abstract
Purpose –Althoughmost studies on HPWSfocus on various firm-leveloutcomes, therehas been an increasing
interest in how employees are affected by HPWS. However, most of thesestudies use social exchange theory
and, based on an idea of reciprocal exchange, implicitly assume that all employees become more affectively
committed to organizations using HPWS.Based on social identity theory,the authors argue that management
position and gender likely influence how individuals respond to HPWS. Thus, the purpose of thispaper is to
examine how HPWSaffects AC among managers, subordinates, men and women.
Design/methodology/approach –Hierarchical linear model analysis of 356 employees in 26 Swedish
small- and medium-sized manufacturing companies.
Findings –In the sample examined, managers and women show increased affective commitment (AC) in
organizations using HPWS. For men with non-managerial positions, the results indicate a reversed
relationship, i.e. HPWS could actually reduce AC.
Originality/value –The findings indicate the need to consider individual differences when examining the
effect of HPWS, and highlight the usefulness of relational-oriented theories when studying the employee
outcomes of HRM-systems.
Keywords Gender, High-performance work systems, Human resource management,
Affective commitment, Social identity theory
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Based on the notion that employees are the most important organizational resource
(Andersén et al., 2016; Molloy and Barney, 2015; Wright et al., 1994), the concept of
high-performance work systems (HPWS) (Becker and Huselid, 1998; Huselid, 1995) has been
examined, and advocated for, in both human resource management (HRM) (Paauwe, 2009;
Subramony, 2009) and strategic management research (Chadwick et al., 2015; Colbert, 2004).
The term HPWS refers to a group of interconnected HRM practices that focus on “flexible
job assignments, rigorous and selective staffing, extensive training and development,
developmental and merit-based performance appraisal, competitive compensation, and
extensive benefits”(Takeuchi et al., 2007, p. 1069). The overall purpose of implementing
these practices is to contribute to achieving company objectives (Huselid et al., 1997) which
ultimately generates competitive advantage (Boxall, 1996, 2003) and improved firm
Employee Relations: The
International Journal
Vol. 41 No. 5, 2019
pp. 1046-1064
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0142-5455
DOI 10.1108/ER-03-2018-0080
Received 16 March 2018
Revised 29 August 2018
2 October 2018
Accepted 5 October 2018
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0142-5455.htm
This work was supported by the Swedish Research Council for Health, Working Life and Welfare
(FORTE) under Grant No. 2012-1067.
1046
ER
41,5
performance (Becker and Huselid, 1998; Tregaskis et al., 2013; Way, 2002; Wright et al.,
2005). Such a firm-centric approach has, however, been criticized for neglecting that the
employers and employees can have conflicting interests (Van De Voorde et al., 2012; Wood
et al., 2012), and HPWS can result in negative outcomes for employees (Delaney and Godard,
2002; Godard, 2004; Harley, 2002; Ramsay et al., 2000). Moreover, how HPWS affect
employees is likely to be a complex issue (Drummond and Stone, 2007) because different
employees can react differently to HPWS (García-Chas et al., 2016; Heffernan and Dundon,
2016). Consequently, several publications have called for more research on how HPWS and
HRM affect employees (Giauque et al., 2010; Grant et al., 2007; Grant and Shields, 2002;
Heery, 2008; Kalleberg et al., 2006; Paauwe, 2009; Paauwe and Boselie, 2005; Van De Voorde
et al., 2012), stressing the importance of restoring “employees’experience of work to the
heart of HRM research and practice”(Boselie et al., 2005, p. 82).
Affective commitment (AC) has been identified as a key dimension of employee
well-being (Horn et al., 2004; Iles et al., 1990; Rothmann, 2008) and a key objective of HPWS
is to increase AC (Qiao et al., 2009; Takeuchi et al., 2009). AC is defined as “the degree to
which an employee feels loyalty to a particular organization”(Currivan, 1999, p. 497) and
has been used in several studies on HPWS (Gong et al., 2010; Messersmith et al., 2011;
Takeuchi et al., 2009). Thus, examining the relationship between HPWS and employees’
AC is an important area to explore.
Most studies use social exchange theory (Blau, 1964; Emerson, 1976) to hypothesize a
positive relationship between HPWS and AC (Peccei and Van De Voorde, 2019). According
to social exchange theory (Blau, 1964), the commitment for employees that is supposed to
characterize HPWS-oriented organizations is expected to be reciprocated by employees in
terms of increased AC (Chang and Chen, 2011). However, any assumption that all employees
react in a similar manner to HPWS, as assumed in social exchange theory, may be an
oversimplification of reality (Peccei and Van De Voorde, 2019). Instead, an individual’s social
identification with an organization will determine how he or she responds to the exchange
relationship (Hogg et al., 2005). Thus individuals will differ in what Tavares et al. (2016) refer
to as their currency of exchange. For example, whereas most individuals are likely to be
more committed to an organization that provides extensive training (a key dimension of
HPWS), not all individuals are likely to appreciate training to the same extent. Thus,
employees will vary in how much they value the training provided by the employer. In order
to consider this, the present study will use social identification theory (SIT) (Tajfel, 1982;
Tajfel and Turner, 1985) to examine the relationship between HPWS and AC. According to
SIT, individuals seek to identify themselves with various social entities (Turner and Oakes,
1986) in order to reduce uncertainty or enhance their status (Goldberg et al., 2010). Because
HPWS are influential to employees’working conditions, being able to socially identify with
such policies and practices is likely to influence employees’AC. From an organizational
approach on SIT, individuals’social identification with an organization leads to “activities
that are congruent with the identity”and “support for institutions that embody the identity”
(Ashforth and Mael, 1989, p. 20). Thus, if employees can socially identify with HPWS, their
AC will likely be enhanced in terms of support for the HPWS-oriented organization.
Social identification with an organization is strongly influenced by other social identities
(Amiot et al.,2007), making it relevant to examinehow HPWS affect differentsocial categories
in various contexts. According toSluss and Ashforth (2007), a socialidentity is determined by
an interplay between the collective category and individual and interpersonal levels.
Moreover, Sluss and Ashforth (2007) argue that in an organizational setting, interpersonal
relationshipsmainly concern whether or not the individual hasa managerial position; gender
is a key social category at the level of the individual and the organization constitute the
collective category. Therefore, in the present study the relationship between management
position, gender and organizational characteristics in terms of HPWS will be examined.
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performance
work systems
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