A Study On The Effect Of High-Performance Work Systems On Employee Job Performance And Emotional Exhaustion

Human capital has the potential to serve as a source of competitive advantages, which are gained through appropriate HR systems. As the systems of HR, high-performance work systems (HPWS) involve a series of policies and activities of recruitment, utilization, training, stimulation and retention. Therefore, there is direct impact of HPWS on human capital. This dissertation takes Chinese enterprise employees as sample, adopts empirical method to explore mechanisms and boundary conditions of HPWS influences employee job performance and emotional exhaustion, which not only complements previous research, but also helps to offer some management implications to foster employees of high performance and sound health for organizations.In the first part, I reviewed and summarized the literatures relating to HPWS and its influences on employee job performance and emotional exhaustion. More specifically, I reviewed the definition and operationalization of HPWS, its antecedents and outcomes. Secondly, the literature relevant to the mechanisms of HPWS was reviewed. Thirdly, the literatures associated with the gap of perceived HPWS among organizational members were reviewed. Part four reviewed the extant empirical research regarding the effects of HPWS on employee job performance and emotional exhaustion. Finally, several theoretical gaps in the previous research and the purposes of this dissertation were also identified.Should sound systems be perceived by employees? This question was the first objective of this study needs to answer. Employees should perceive HPWS enacted by organization. Otherwise, it is difficult to play positive impact on organizational performance. In the first study, a sample of19HR managers,81department supervisors, and399employees were used to examine the consistency among organization-level HPWS, department-level HPWS and employee perceived HPWS, and the moderating role of department supervisor’s HR responsibility, department supervisor’s perception of goal congruence, and employee power distance. The results of the hierarchical linear modeling revealed that the impact of organization-level HPWS on department-level HPWS was contingent on department supervisor’s HR responsibility and department supervisor’s perception of goal congruence, such that when department supervisor’s HR responsibility was high, or department supervisor’s perception of goal congruence was high, the relationship between organization-level HPWS and department-level HPWS was stronger than when they were low. In addition, department-level HPWS was positively related to employee perceived HPWS. Employee power distance moderated the relationship between department-level HPWS and employee perceived HPWS, such that the relationship was stronger when employee power distance was low than when it was high. Furthermore, employee perceived HPWS was positively related to employee job performance.The first study explored how employees perceived HPWS enacted by organization, since employees perceived HPWS, the next question was how HPWS influences employee behaviors and attitudes. The second study examined the mediating role of organization-based self-esteem (OBSE) in HPWS-employee job performance linkage from the perspective of self concept. In addition, I tested the moderating role of HPWS differentiation (DHPWS) playing in the linkage between HPWS and employee OBSE. I examined the hypotheses proposed with matched field data collected from83department supervisors and388employees. The results of the hierarchical linear modeling revealed that OBSE mediated the relationship between HPWS and employee job performance. Moreover, DHPWS moderated the relationship between HPWS and employee OBSE, such that the relationship was stronger for departments with low DHPWS than for departments with high DHPWS.Previous researches showed that HPWS intended to employee job performance and emotional exhaustion. In the third study, a sample of84department supervisors and382employees were used to examine differential mechanisms of HPWS on employee job performance and emotional exhaustion. The results of the hierarchical linear modeling revealed that transformational leadership enhanced the relationship between HPWS and social exchange, and thus promoted employee job performance and reduced employee emotional exhaustion. Transactional leadership augmented the relationship between HPWS and economic exchange, and therefore increased employee emotional exhaustion.In the final part of the dissertation, I summarized the conclusions of this research, the limitations of the present study and the directions for future study were also discussed.