Fiona Edgar, Nancy M. Blaker and André M. Everett
For some years, human resource management (HRM) scholars have sought to understand how the high performance work system (HPWS) impacts performance. Recently, attention has turned…
Abstract
Purpose
For some years, human resource management (HRM) scholars have sought to understand how the high performance work system (HPWS) impacts performance. Recently, attention has turned to developing knowledge about the more micro-level aspects of this relationship, with the ability–motivation–opportunity (AMO) framework providing a useful lens. Empirically, these studies have produced mixed results. This study explores whether context is useful in explaining these anomalous findings.
Design/methodology/approach
This study considered the effects of context across two levels – the descriptive (situated demography–gender) and the analytical (societal–national culture) – on employees' behaviour in the HPWS–job performance relationship using survey data obtained from a sample of New Zealand organisations.
Findings
Results indicate that the employee demographic of gender may play an influential role, with ability found to be the most significant predictor of job performance for males and opportunity the strongest predictor of job performance for females. Given the importance of cultural context when examining employees' gendered behaviours, this study also considers the influence of New Zealand's national culture.
Practical implications
By describing the interaction between trait expressive work behaviours and job features, this study dispels the myth of universalism. In line with a contingency view, practitioners are encouraged to ensure alignment between features of their organisational context and the behavioural outcomes sought from their HPWS.
Originality/value
This study suggests HPWS research designs would benefit from analysing the full effects of contextual variables, rather than considering them purely as controls.
Fiona Edgar, Jing A. Zhang and Nancy M. Blaker
Drawing on the dynamic model of ability, motivation, opportunity (AMO) for human resource research, this study aims to examine how organizational system-level (i.e. the…
Abstract
Purpose
Drawing on the dynamic model of ability, motivation, opportunity (AMO) for human resource research, this study aims to examine how organizational system-level (i.e. the high-performance work system (HPWS)) and individual-level AMO affect employees' performance. Specifically, this paper proposes that employee task performance is resultant from the integration of system- and individual-level AMO factors with employee contextual performance.
Design/methodology/approach
A survey design is employed with data collected from 250 employees working in New Zealand's service sector.
Findings
This study finds both organizational system (HPWS) and individual AMO dimensions have positive associations with employees' performance. At the system level, the supportive role played by contextual performance is highlighted with pro-social behaviors fully mediating the relationship between the HPWS and task performance. At the individual level, contextual performance is found to partially mediate the relationship between ability and task performance and fully mediate the relationship between motivation and task performance. Opportunity, on the other hand, is significantly associated with task but not contextual performance.
Originality/value
In acknowledging there are a plurality of factors that impact performance, this study enriches our understanding of AMO's influence in the context of people management.
Details
Keywords
The authors based their study on the findings of attribution theory, which suggests some people attribute experiences at work to external factors, and others to internal factors…
Abstract
Purpose
The authors based their study on the findings of attribution theory, which suggests some people attribute experiences at work to external factors, and others to internal factors. Their theory was that women and men made different attributions and this affected the impact of HPWS.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors sent out a questionnaire that tested whether ability was the main factor for male performance. And it tested if the main predictor of job performance for female employees was opportunity. The authors also considered the influence of national culture. The authors collected data from a purposive sample of service sector organizations in New Zealand.
Findings
All four of their hypotheses were supported showing that ability was the main predictor for males and external factors were the main predictor for women. In addition, the study found a mediating role existed for ability for males and opportunity for females in the HPWS-job performance relationship.
Originality/value
The authors said the main contribution of the research was to show the relevance of context in studies of employees. They said the research could contribute to understanding why motivation, as an AMO element, does not feature much in studies. In addition, highlighting the role of national culture helped to explain the formation of gendered behaviour. The authors felt it was reasonable to speculate that the results were impacted by New Zealand’s national culture.
Details
Keywords
MID‐OCTOBER sees the activities of the library world in full swing. Meetings, committee discussions, schools at work, students busy with December and May examinations in view, and…
Abstract
MID‐OCTOBER sees the activities of the library world in full swing. Meetings, committee discussions, schools at work, students busy with December and May examinations in view, and a host of occupations for the library worker. This year—for in a sense the library year begins in October—will be a busy one. For the Library Association Council there will be the onerous business of preparing a report on State Control; for libraries there will be the effort to retain readers in a land of increasing employment and reduced leisure; and for the students, as we have remarked in earlier issues, preparations for the new syllabus of examinations which becomes operative in 1938. It is a good month, too, to consider some phases of library work with children, “which,” to quote the L.A. Resolutions of 1917, “ought to be the basis of all other library work.”