Yang et al. (2020)
In the first article, Yang et al. (2020) conducted a study to establish the relationship between ethical leadership (EL) and high-performance work system (HPWS) on creativity and performance of duties in a public company in Korea. EL refers to leaders’ use of social power to illustrate individual morality, communication, and rewards for ethical behaviour. On the other hand, HPWS is significant in the correlation between staff and supervisors, and it is the most famous human resource management (HRM) policy across the globe. In the first stage of the study, information was obtained from team members on their thoughts on EL and HPWS. Secondly, the researchers looked at the leaders’ analysis of team members’ creativity and performance.
In their findings, the researchers unearthed the effects of interaction between EL and HPWS. The effect of these two elements is negative on creativity and acts positively on the performance of duties. Yang et al. (2020) postulate that there are compensatory impacts of EL and HPWS on innovation. They find that HPWS is the most efficient tool in the performance of tasks through creativity when there is low EL. Additionally, with low EL level and when HPWS is enhanced, there are high instances of creativity, hence a high-performance level. Therefore, it is evident that creativity is directly proportional to HPWS and inversely proportional to EL. High performance is dependent on high levels of creativity that arises from high levels of HPWS and EL.
However, the authors’ findings are not entirely correct and applicable in all sectors. Ethical leadership still is a contributing factor to creativity. According to Javed et al. (2016), ethical leadership enhances employees’ creativity, with mental empowerment conciliating the impact of EL on creativity. These findings were obtained from examining the correlation between EL and staff innovation with the role of psychological motivation. Additionally, Tang et al. (2017) maintain that for creativity to arise from HPWS, there is a prerequisite, which is perceived organizational support. Substantially, the correlation between perceived organizational support and devolved management results in employees’ creativity.
Li et al. (2018)
The second article illustrates the link between innovation and employee-experienced high-involvement work system (HIWS). In the last ten years, the effect of human resource management (HRM) on innovation has pushed more attention to research. Li et al. (2018) argue that employee-experienced HIWS enhances creativity by bringing about collective aggregation and knowledge-sharing engagements. The authors also look into the new enabling modes promoting employee-experienced HIWS that eventually brings forth innovation in an organization.
The authors look into three specific emerging enablers that enhance the significant effect of HIWS on creativity. These three enablers are the blend of HIWS experiences as an internal process, the strategic significance of creativity as an external mode, and the churn and human capital as the temporal mode. The three enablers promote the positive impact of HIWS by molding the direction, concertedness, and the ability of collective engagements to engage. Using metrics from a national representative sample in Canadian workplaces, Wang and colleagues conducted a theoretical model test. The analysis of their results indicated a significant relation between employee-experienced HIWS and creativity. Additionally, the positive relationship was brought about by the enablers mentioned above.
However, the process of relating employee-experienced HIWS and innovation would be incomplete without knowledge sharing. According to Cao et al. (2021), knowledge sharing is a positive mediator between employee-experienced HIWS as an HRM practice and innovation. Tacit and explicit knowledge sharing cements the relationship between HIWS in HRM and innovation through the aspects of product and process. Therefore, employee-experienced HIWS is a valid process in achieving innovation in HRM. However, there has to be knowledge sharing that would appropriately mediate and cement the links between HIWS and innovation, given an organizational level.
Field and Chan (2018)
The third article illustrates the change in the relationship between life and work of current knowledge workers. It also illustrates how this change has affected knowledge work human resources management. Field and Chan (2018) demonstrate that knowledge workers have changed how they work and live, as affected by the increasingly mobile communication advancements. The authors indicate an increase in double-income couples, a change in parenthood outcomes, and increased flexibility of working arrangements.
The authors identified the general interface theories between work and life in their article. They singled out the negative aspect of the work-life interface, which includes role strain that arises from the quality and combination of roles. Secondly, they identified the positive aspect of the work-life interface. The advantage is that many roles are more rewarding and that individuals who handled more roles accrued more resources. In their study of Australian knowledge workers in information technology, Field and Chan (2018) maintain that the work-life interface is fading away and is becoming boundaryless for the case of knowledge workers. In perspective, knowledge workers have, in the past decade, been empowered but at the same time enslaved by mobile equipment that makes them work at home and still engage with family while at work. The authors maintain that the differences between work and life are no longer noticeable for flexible workers and that human resource managers should consider implementing new approaches for knowledge workers.
While it is essential to maintain the boundary between work and life or family, knowledge workers should not be restricted from choosing what works for them, given the circumstances a worker would be. Alipour et al. (2021) argue that working from home (WFH) protects workers from short-time work, is firm from effects of pandemics such as COVID-19, and reduces the chances of infection in case of such a pandemic. At a company level, enhancing WFH minimises the chance of opting for short-time work by a significant 72%. WFH also minimises the chance that a pandemic would negatively affect the company by up to 75%. Therefore, it is prudent to identify the essence and benefits of working from home. As much as the situation narrows the boundary between work and life, specific times require WFH as an intervention.
References
Alipour, J. V., Fadinger, H., & Schymik, J. (2021). My home is my castle–The benefits of working from home during a pandemic crisis. Journal of Public Economics, 196, 104373. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpubeco.2021.104373
Cao, T. T., Le, P. B., & Nguyen, N. T. M. (2021). Impacts of high-involvement HRM practices on organizational innovation capability: the mediating mechanism of tacit and explicit knowledge sharing. International Journal of Innovation Science. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJIS-05-2021-0091
Field, J. C., & Chan, X. W. (2018). Contemporary knowledge workers and the boundaryless work-life interface: Implications for the human resource management of the knowledge workforce. Frontiers in Psychology, 2414. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02414
Javed, B., Khan, A. A., Bashir, S., & Arjoon, S. (2017). Impact of ethical leadership on creativity: the role of psychological empowerment. Current Issues in Tourism, 20(8), 839-851. https://doi.org/10.1080/13683500.2016.1188894
Li, Y., Wang, M., Van Jaarsveld, D. D., Lee, G. K., & Ma, D. G. (2018). From employee-experienced high-involvement work system to innovation: An emergence-based human resource management framework. Academy of Management Journal, 61(5), 2000-2019. https://doi.org/10.5465/amj.2015.1101
Tang, G., Yu, B., Cooke, F. L., & Chen, Y. (2017). High-performance work system and employee creativity: The roles of perceived organizational support and devolved management. Personnel Review. https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/PR-09-2016-0235/full/html
Yang, I., Seung, J., & Hong, D. (2020). The Indirect Effects of Ethical Leadership and High Performance Work System on Task Performance through Creativity. Journal of Asian Sociology, 49 (3), 351-370. http://www.ezproxy.lib.rmit.edu.au/login?url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26940214
write