The Research On The Antecedents And Consequences For Human Resource Manager’s Professional Identification In Enterpises

With the economic development and social changes, the working and living environment in China has become fully variability and uncertainty. The people living in the uncertain world have to seek for the sense of belonging and self-importance, and to construct the self-identity.The construction of self-identity is foremost based on the diverse identities, and individuals will identify and validate their self-identity base on a variety of categories (such as gender, occupation, nation-states, etc.), and thus forming the sense of belonging, meaning and a positive self-concept. The work-related identities (including organizational membership, professional status, etc.) are especially important for the construction of individual self-identity, and the identification based on organizational membership refer to organizational identification, the identification based on professional status refer to professional identification. Because there is an increasing emphasis on the development of employees’employability as well as the trend of more and more occupations become professionalism, which also include human resource management occupation, professional identity issues become increasingly prominent. Against this background, the study determined to focus on the issues of professional identity and choose human resource managers (abbreviation HR) as the object.Professional identification referred to the positive evaluation on the profession, which assessed the importance of the professional role in individual’s self-identity. Study the issues of HR professional identification were necessary and important. This is because, Firstly, the profession of human resources management swung between professional and non-professional, on the one hand, professional HRs were described as (performance) specialists,(compensation) experts,(strategic) consultants, professional managers, on the other hand, non-professional HRs were satire as "one size fits all".Secondly, the profession of human resources management filled with puzzles and challenges, such as the confirmation of the value of human resource management, namely whether bring value or how much value by human resource management. Another example is the balancing puzzle of the interests between organization and employees, which known as the "sandwiched" situation. Thirdly, the profession of human resources management full of attachment to the organization, namely the objectives and functions of human resource management must be dependent on the organizational platform.These professional features bring HRs not only challenges, making them confusing and draw-back, but also opportunities, making them substantial and endeavor. One of the key, was the HR professional identification, namely the cognition, emotion and evaluation to human resource management profession.Around the theme, combined with professional features of human resource management, the study identified the following three research questions:1. The antecedents of HR professional identification?2. The consequences of HR professional identification?3. The role of organizational identification played in the relationship of HR professional identification and theirs’ work output?In response to these research questions, the study used several methods, such as literature research, in-depth interviews, grounded theory, questionnaires, and so on.In the literature section, recommended the fundamental theory of professional identification, including symbolic interaction theory, social identity theory and self-categorization theory. Reviewed the agenda of professional identification, especially emphasized the researches on teachers’ and nurses’ professional identificationBased on the qualitative data from12interviews, the study using the methods of open coding, axial coding and selective coding of grounded theory, formed twenty seven sub-categories, seven main-categories, and two kinds of relations between these categories. Then, constructed the conceptual model of the antecedents and consequences of HR professional identification. At last, forced the empirical theory framework with literature analysis.Through the process of the previous-survey (N=102) and the formal survey (N=226), using the questionnaire method and the software of SPSS, AMOS, drew the following conclusions:1. The antecedents of HR professional identification.1) Comparing with the HR that with non-professional education background, the HR with professional education background had higher professional identification significantly. Comparing with the HR that without qualification certification, the HR hold qualification certification had higher professional identification significantly. Comparing with the HR that as general staff, the HR as a manager had higher professional identification significantly.2) General self-efficacy, interpersonal self-efficacy and social work value impacted HR professional identification significantly and positively; and General self-efficacy influenced HR professional identification through interpersonal self-efficacy partly.3) Perception of the public profession image, perception of personal profession image impacted HR professional identification significantly and positively; and perception of the public profession image influenced HR professional identification through perception of personal profession image partly.2. The consequence of HR professional identification.1) HR professional identification impacted task performance and innovative performance positively.2) HR professional identification impacted the intention of leaving organization and the intention of leaving profession negatively.3. The moderate effect of organization identification.1) Organization identification moderated the relationship between HR professional identification and innovative performance. In the context of higher organization identification, HR professional identification impacted innovative performance positively, and in the context of lower organization identification, HR professional identification impacted innovative performance negatively.2) Organization identification moderated the relationship between HR professional identification and the intention of leaving organization. In the context of higher organization identification, HR professional identification impacted the intention of leaving organization negatively, and in the context of lower organization identification, HR professional identification impacted the intention of leaving organization positively.These findings can be used to guide the practice of upgrading HR professional identification. Its innovation is reflected in:First, expanded the occupational areas in professional identification research, and extended to the quasi professions such as HR. Second, recognized the two special factors that impact HR professional identification, which were the interpersonal self-efficacy and the social work value. Third, discriminated the moderate effect of organization identification in the relationship of HR professional identification and theirs’ work output, including the moderate effect in the relationship between HR professional identification and innovative performance, and the relationship between HR professional identification and the intention of leaving organization.