The unexpected side of relational e-HRM. Developing trust in the HR department
| Published date | 27 May 2014 |
| Date | 27 May 2014 |
| Pages | 376-397 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/ER-07-2013-0078 |
| Author | Rita Bissola,Barbara Imperatori |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour,Industrial/labour relations |
The unexpected side of
relational e-HRM
Developing trust in the HR department
Rita Bissola and Barbara Imperatori
Department of Economic Sciences and Business Management,
Universita
`Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan, Italy
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the organizational redesign opportunities
currently offered by web-based technological innovations contribute to rebuilding and strengthening
the employee-HR department relationship, rendering personnel management policy criteria more
transparent, increasing perceived fairness and thus helping to instil trust in the HR department, albeit
in a diverse virtual context.
Design/methodology/approach – The authors designed a survey involving 526 Gen Y employees
and tested the hypotheses using structural equation modelling analyses.
Findings – The results confirm a positive relationship between relational e-HRM system adoption,
procedural justice and trust in the HR department.
Research limitations/implications – The results provide evidence that technology can support the
development of institutional trust in virtual environments and thus contribute to the growing e-HRM
literature, to the more consolidated strategic HRM research domain and to the debate on trust in
technology-mediated relationships.
Practical implications – The paper provides valuable and at times unexpected results on the new
potential role of the HR department in the current fluid and insecure labour market, thereby forming
the basis for defining some useful guidelines to design and implement the e-HRM architecture.
Originality/value – The paper focuses on understanding how relational e-HRM could impact on the
direct employee-HR department relationship, from the Gen Y employees perspective, that is almost
neglected in the growing literature. Moreover it suggests some unexpected insights on the role of
technology innovativeness in moderating the impact of e-HRM on trust in the HR depar tment.
Keywords E-HRM, Procedural justice, Employment relations, Relational HRM practices,
Techonology innovativeness, Trust in the HR department
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
In recent years, two phenomena have significantly affected employee trust in the HR
department, especially in Europe. On the one hand, the increased flexibility and
insecurity that characterize relations in the labour market and on the other, the internal
reorganization of the HR function oriented to achieving efficiency and the simultaneous
transformation of the function into business partners (Caldwell, 2008; Graham and
Tarbell, 2006).
New employees are becoming more flexible, but also more doubtful and sceptical
towards their employment relationships and employers (McLean Parks and Kidder,
1994; Svensson, 2012). New HR professionals are instead becoming more aware
and focused on strategic issues (Cascio, 2005; Caldwell, 2008), but are also more
isolated from employees due to outsourcing and the decentralization of HRM activities
(Belcourt, 2006; Sullivan, 2002).
These trends imply a weakening of the relationship between employees and the HR
department with a potential deterioration of tr ust in HR professionals (Graham and
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0142-5455.htm
Received 10 July 2013
Revised 30 October 2013
12 February 2014
26 February 2014
Accepted 6 March 2014
Employee Relations
Vol. 36 No. 4, 2014
pp. 376-397
rEmeraldGroup PublishingLimited
0142-5455
DOI 10.1108/ER-07-2013-0078
376
ER
36,4
Tarbell, 2006) and could entail negative consequences on the employment relationship,
such as lower employee commitment, job satisfaction and contextual performance
(Gould-Williams, 2003).
This paper aims to examine whether the organizational redesign opportunities
currently offered by web-based technological innovation contribute to rebuilding and
reinforcing the employee-HR department relationship, rendering personnel
management policy criteria more transparent, increasing perceived fair ness and thus
fostering trust in the HR department, albeit in a different virtual context. Specifically
we consider a new crop of young people in the work force, the so-called Gen Y
(Proserpio and Gioia, 2007; Alsop, 2008). They are talented, self-starting and,
especially, technologically oriented, but also still controversial about their work
relationship outcomes drivers (Wilson and Gerber, 2008). From a generational
perspective, they seem to be different from the previous Generation X, but there are
still a lot of grey areas concerning their working exp ectations and careers drivers
(Dries et al., 2008). It is still an enigma how to attract and retain them and how to design
effective organizational systems to manage their development paths (D’Amato and
Herzfeldt, 2008; Erickson, 2008; Erickson et al., 2009). The Generation Y is described as
always connected and innovative, the main assumption of this study is that the e-HRM
systems may be effective practices that companies can adopt to manage the
relationship with the young workforce who is gradually entering the labour market.
This aim is consistent with the increasing number of studies on the intersection
between web-based technology and HRM in relation to the so-called e-HRM practices.
This domain could be usefully enriched in two impo rtant respects: first, there is
evidence that e-HRM practices influence both the effectiveness and the efficiency of
HRM systems (Strohmeier, 2009), although little attention has been focused on
understanding how these affect the employee-HR department relationship. Second,
new e-HRM practices are considered particularly suited to the new Gen Y employees,
seemingly deeply embedded in technological issues. Although generation theory is at
times controversial, employee technology-readiness appears to be a relevant criterion
in effectively designing successful e-HRM practices (Richards, 2012).
Our paper aims to explore the possible strategic role of e-HRM sys tems to sustain
the employee-organization relationship with Gen Yer with particular reference to the
impact of the adoption of e-HRM practices on trust in the HRM depar tment conceived
as the organizational unit acting for the company in the relationship.
The remainder of the paper is organized as follows. The first part provides the
literature background and develops hypotheses on the poss ible effects of e-HRM
practices on the employment relation as perceived by employees. In the second part, we
present our research design, based on a survey among a sample of over 500 young Gen
Y employees. The third section presents the results of the structural equation model
analyses intended to identify the effects of relational e-HRM practices on trust in the
HR department, considering the perceived procedural justice as mediator and
technology innovativeness as moderator. In the final section, the results are discussed
and the theoretical and managerial implications for organization design are outlined.
The results are relevant for the HRM perspective , because they prove that the e-HRM
employment approach could be strategic in the sense that it is really joined to the new
talented Gen-Yer. They also contribute to the debate on trust in technology-mediated
relationships; they offer stimuli for the discussion on the role of technological
innovativeness and provide evidence that technology can contribute to the
development of institutional trust in virtual environments.
377
Relational
e-HRM
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