To what extent is corporate social responsibility part of human resource management in the Chinese context? A review of literature and future research directions

Digitalization and job stress: exploring the mediating roles of job and personal aversion risk with gender as a moderator

Background

This time-lagged study delves into the impact of digitalization on job stress. Digitalization is defined as the incorporation of digital technologies into various aspects of work life, fundamentally transforming processes, interactions, and decision-making.

Aim

The present research focuses on the mediating roles of job-related risk and personal risk, and the moderating effect of gender. We hypothesized that employees’ aversion to risks, both in their professional and personal facets, mediates the relationship between the rapid digitalization of their work environment and the resultant job stress. Regarding gender as a moderator, recent research suggests that gender can influence the experience of workplace stress, with women often experiencing higher levels of stress than men in certain situations. This indicates that gender might also moderate the relationship between digital living, risk perception, and job-related stress. This approach allows for an examination of the ways in which digital technology adoption influences workplace stress, considering the temporally spaced data.

Methods

Conducted over three waves of data collection among 795 Chinese employees, the research utilizes Hayes’s Model 8, adept at revealing the dynamics of digitalization’s influence in the workplace and its effects on individual well-being.

Results

The study corroborates Hypothesis 1 by establishing a significant, albeit less pronounced, relationship between digital living and job stress. The findings also support Hypothesis 2 by demonstrating that both job risk and personal risk mediate this relationship. The study’s results also validate Hypothesis 3, indicating that gender moderates the relationship between digital living, job risk, personal risk, and job stress. Finally, the significant interaction effects found in the study, particularly the stronger conditional negative effect of digital living on perceptions of job and personal risks for males, despite the absence of statistical significance failed to support Hypothesis 4.

Implications

This study sheds light on the dynamics of job stress in the context of a digitalizing work environment. The results have important implications for designing workplace strategies and interventions that are sensitive to risk perceptions and gender differences in the digital era.

Production and reception of human resource management practices for health promotion

Organizations thrive when there is a healthy relationship between people, i.e., where there is high social capital. Human resource management practices (HRMP) contribute to promoting social capital and mental health in organizations. However, there remains a gap in the literature on practices to promote mental health, as well as on the difference in perception of the function of the practices between those who promote them and those who receive them. Thus, this study aimed to identify what HRMP oriented toward mental health promotions are, how they are perceived, and whether there is variation among these perceptions. Twenty managers and 11 subordinates were interviewed. To achieve the first two objectives, a content analysis was performed, and for the last, a lexical analysis. In the content analysis, the following categories emerged for both groups: work organization and idiosyncratic deals and affective social support. Only in the managers did the categories of informational support, communication, and maintaining good interpersonal relationships emerge. The lexical analysis suggested that managers perceive task-related practices as promoting mental health, while teams attribute importance to affective social support practices. HRMP psychological principles were described. Social support practices should be adopted as human resource protective strategies for mental health.

Corporate social responsibility and workplace health promotion: A systematic review

The complex situation that global society is facing as a result of COVID-19 has highlighted the importance of companies committing to the principles of social responsibility. Among the internal initiatives, those related to the health of workers are, obviously, highly topical. The objective of our research is to provide concise knowledge of the relationship between workplace health promotion (WHP) and corporate social responsibility (CSR) so that the relevant specialized research was gathered in a single document that lays the foundations of its applicability. A systematic review, following the PRISMA method, has been carried out. Twenty-seven articles have been selected from the main scientific databases. Their qualitative analysis concludes that CSR and WHP are linked, have beneficial reciprocal effects, need committed leadership respectful of autonomy and voluntariness, and require the establishment of specific goals within the framework of the organizations' sustainability policies. Future studies should establish the impact of the pandemic on these aspects.

Employee psychological reactions to micro-corporate social responsibility and societal behavior: A structural equation modeling analysis

Employee psychological reactions to micro-corporate social responsibility (CSR) have recently been expanded in interdisciplinary management science research. The shreds of evidence in this regard are inconclusive, fragmented, and underdeveloped about how employee cognitive, behavioral, and affective dimensions of attitudes toward micro-CSR relate to each other and shape employee societal behavior (SB). In application of dual-process theories of attitude-behavior relations, we investigate the intra-relationships of perceived CSR-community (PCSRC; cognitive dimension of attitude), CSR engagement (CSRE; behavioral dimension of attitude), CSR positivity (CSRP; affective dimension of attitude). Also, we explore how these variables influence employee SB with a moderated-mediated model. Based on the opinions of 440 Bangladeshi employees as respondents, a structural equation modeling analysis confirmed the positive links from PCSRC to SB, PCSRC to CSRE, CSRE to SB, PCSRC to CSRP, CSRP to SB, and CSRP to CSRE. It also reported that CSRE mediated the relation between PCSRC and SB. It further examined that CSRP did not moderate the direct relation between PCSRC and SB, and the indirect relation between PCSRC and SB via CSRE at low, medium, or high employee CSRP. There are very crystal study implications that address policymakers to adopt CSR policy and its implementation strategies, accordingly, to employees' psychological reactions to micro-CSR.

Turning Crisis into Opportunities: How a Firm Can Enrich Its Business Operations Using Artificial Intelligence and Big Data during COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has severe impacts on global health and social and economic safety. The present study discusses strategies for turning the COVID-19 crisis into opportunities to use artificial intelligence (AI) and big data in business operations. Based on the shared experience and theoretical ground, researchers identified five major business challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic: production and supply-chain disruption, appropriate business model selection, inventory management, budget planning, and workforce management. These five challenges were outlined with eight business cases as examples of companies that had already utilized AI and big data for their business operations during the COVID-19 pandemic. The outcomes of this study provide valuable insights into contemporary social science research and business management with AI and big data applications as a business response to any crisis in the future.

Cleaner production practices at company level enhance the desire of employees to have a significant positive impact on society through work

Implementation of cleaner production practices (CPP), service quality (SQ) and corporate social responsibility (CSR) is often studied at organizational level. A number of studies on trio have reported it's significant impact on overall organizational performance and profitability across the globe. However, not much is studied about the individual level micro influence of these constructs on employee engagement (EE), organizational pride (OP), organizational identification (OI) and "desire to have a significant impact through work" (DSIW). Therefore, this study presents a comprehensive framework for assessing the impact of the implementation of CPP, SQ and CSR on EE, OP, OI and DSIW. Data collected from 320 non-managerial staff members employed at a garments manufacturing company in Pakistan was analyzed using partial least square (PLS) approach. Findings revealed that the implementation of CPP, SQ and CSR plays an important role in shaping EE, OP, OI and DSIW in the garments manufacturing industry. Further, it is found that the implementation of CPP has a non-significant impact on SQ. Additionally, results of the importance-performance map analysis (IPMA) have also confirmed that the implementation of CPP at company level has shown a highest importance and performance amongst all the latent constructs proposed as predictors of DSIW in the garments manufacturing industry. These findings are a step forward and unique contribution of this study in the domain of CPP, SQ, CSR, EE, OP, OI and DSIW.

Dual-Mediation Paths Linking Corporate Social Responsibility to Employee's Job Performance: A Multilevel Approach

This study attempts to examine the direct impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives on employees' job performance and the indirect relationships between CSR initiatives on employees' job performance via industrial relations climate and psychological contract fulfillment. Data were collected from 764 supervisor-subordinate dyads and 271 middle managers from 85 companies. Using a multilevel approach, the results showed that organizational-level CSR was positively related to employees' job performance. Moreover, the industrial relations climate and psychological contract fulfillment played mediating effects between CSR initiatives and job performance. This study provides novel theoretical evidence for why and how CSR initiatives improve job performance. Theoretical and practical implications for implementing CSR initiatives are discussed.

High-Commitment Work Practices and the Social Responsibility Issue: Interaction and Benefits

Human Resource Management (HRM) has a potentially vital role to play in addressing the new challenges that companies have to face and in delivering initiatives in the framework of corporate sustainability. Our work attempts to shed light on the strategic role of High-Commitment Work Practices (HCWP) as a Corporate Sustainability (CS) partner and, more specifically, to analyze the implications of their integration on the competitiveness of the firm. With this purpose, we apply a qualitative methodology, using a single case study, to explore and explain why and how the interaction between HCWP and CS takes place. The results show how this interaction encourages the formulation and implementation of new socially responsible organizational initiatives that help the firm to improve its competitive position in the market through the development of employees’ innovative behavior. HCWP integrate with CS initiatives when CS values form part of the mission and strategy of the firm. Also, HCWP support CS deployment, primarily in its internal dimension. In addition, our work reveals that cultural factors such as organizational values and management style, and structural factors like empowerment and teamwork must be jointly considered when adopting a CS strategy aimed at developing innovative behavior and competitive advantage.