A Critical View on HPWS and Employee Commitment-Form of Commitment Matters

• Author: Kaushik Chaudhuri
• Pages: 355-376

Kaushik Chaudhuri. Ph.D. candidate Chikuro Hiroike School of Graduate Studies, Reitaku University, Japan. The author sincerely acknowledges vital advises and comments from Prof. Oba Hiroyuki and Prof Nakano Chie of Reitaku University and also expresses sincere gratitude to Kambayashi Scholarship Foundation, Prof. Kambayashi. R (Hitotsubashi University) and Prof. Hiroike.M (Reitaku University) for their constant encouragements. Correspondence regarding the article may be addressed to Kaushik Chaudhuri, Chikuro Hiroike School of Graduate Studies, Reitaku University, 2-1-1 Hikarigaoka, Kashiwa, Chiba Prefecture, Japan-277-8686. Email:chaudhuri kaushik@yahoo.co.in or kchaudhu@cs.reitaku-u.ac.jp.

Page 355

Introduction

The author has raised questions on the implications of HPWS on employee - commitment and how job stress and job intensity as outcomes of HPWS will influence inter relationships between HPWS and different forms of Employee commitments. The paper consequently unfolds reasons and arguments leading to hypothesize relationships between HPWS, employee commitments, job stressors and job intensity. Working definition of employee commitment has been adapted as state psychological attachments that lead to ideally positive relationship between an actor (individual or employee) and entity (organization and occupation). The types of commitment conceptualized in this paper are derived from Meyer and Allen commitment(1991) theory of employees’ psychological attachment to their organization due to their emotional (Affective), costs or economical relationship(Continuous), obligation or duty (Normative) and occupational or job related attachment derived from Blau’ ‘s career commitment (1993).

A large number of US researchers made intensive studies of a newly emerging work system called high performance work systems (HPWS) from the nineties Cappelli and Rogovsky (1994); Osterman (1995); McDuffie and Kochan (1995) Arthur (1994), McDuffie (1995), Becker and Huselid,(1998),Huselid,(1995;) and this continued in the twenties like (Appelbaum et al, 2000, Bae and Lawler 2000, Guthrie 2001, Lepak and Snell 2002, Zachratos et al 2005, Takeuchi et al 2007) both in the Western and non-western settings and today also being widely followed inPage 356 different economies including that of the developing economies (Lawler et al 2000). HPWS, had its roots to HR practices related with the Japanese production systems, most significantly the lean system of Toyota, documented extensively in the book titled “the machine that changed the world” written by Womack, Jones and Roos in 1990. A number of terms had often been used interchangeably to describe HPWS– high performance work organization (Ashton and Sung, 2004), high involvement work systems (Felstead and Gallie, 2002), high performance employment systems (Brown and Reich, 1997) and high commitment management (Wood, 1999; Baird, 2002) or as high performance management HPM (Butler et al 2004).The development of new forms of work processes with the usage of high technology, the HRM practices under these high performance work systems become a critical factor for the organizational success. Such HR practices in HPWS were designed to elicit deep commitment of workers to fulfill the desired objectives of the organizations. In this respect, the concepts of human resource management and HPWS might be said to be largely similar in function and objectives.

HR practices and policies in HPWS

There had been considerable lack of consensus as to what constitutes HPWS like Becker and Gerhart (1996), Youndt et.al (1996) and the problem persisted till date (David Lepak et al 2006). There had been some conflicts in conceptualizations of the usages of same HR practices in different HR systems increasing confusions in reader’s mind. Most of these HR practices known as the soft approach or the Harvard model in HRM (Beer et al 1984) or the best practices or the commitment model (Johnson 2000) and “development humanism” (Guest (1999), were all conceptually found to be similar to Japanese people management systems. Huselid (1995) developed 13 best HR practices as “high performance work practices” and later Pfeffer (1998) outlined seven best practices similar to these practices which had a resemblance to the Harvard model. The commitment oriented HR systems consist of practices such as intensive training and development, socialization, promotion from within, high compensation, selective staffing to forge a stronger psychological connection between employees and organizations. (David Lepak et al 2006). Similarly authors like Osterman (1994), McDuffie (1995) Zacharatos, et al (2005) used high intensity oriented HR practices focusing the use of formal or self directed teams, employee involvement participatory groups, and product-related suggestions made and implemented by employees, job rotation and carrying out quality tasks. ‘flexible work systems’ employee problem-solving groups (or quality circles), and total quality management overall empowering employees through increased flow of information and devolution of decisions making power, leading to greater productivity. HPWS comprises both these high involvement and high commitment HR practices. Several researchers have used these conceptualizations interchangeably (Wood & de Menezes, 1998; Zacharatos et al. 2005). They had reached to a consensus that the ultimate objective of commitment, or involvement in high performance work system or some other HR systems are the same the productivity and profitability of the organization. Belanger et al (2002) have sought to justify some of the conceptual confusions surrounding high performance work system through a) Production management: which involves the greater use of flexible production systems with an emphasis of quality b) Work organization which involves the use of production processes based on knowledge and cognition, especially the use of teamwork and c) Employee relations: harnessing of employee commitment in the service of the organization. He theorized that high performance work systems practices were to be implemented in a “bundle” in order to get the maximum results. Without the supports of the similar practices the implementation of a single high performance practice may achieve little or may become counterproductiveMost referred HR practices in HPWS literatures can be tabulated below:-

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HR Policies, practices in HPWS	Authors (date of Publications)
Performance based pay	Guthrie (2001) Pil McDuffie(1996) Huselid; (1995) Wood (1996) Snell and Dean (1992); Guest (1999) Appelbaum (2000) Zacharatos et al; (2005)
Teams as a fundamental unit of; organization	Guthrie(2001) Pil McDuffie (1996) Wood (1996); Appelbaum (2000) Zacharatos (2005)
Employee participation programs	Guthrie(2001) Huselid (1995) Pil and McDuffie; (1996) Wood (1996) Guest (1999) Zacharatos et; al (2005)
Formal communication programs to; keep employees informed about the firm	Guthrie (2001) Huselid (1995) Guest (1999); Zacharatos et al (2005)
Regular use of employee attitudes; survey	Guthrie(2001), Huselid (1995) Guest (1999)
Employee job security policies such as; no compulsory redundancies.	Wood (1996) Guest (1999) Becker and; Huselid(1998) Zacharatos et al (2005)
Formal training as the indicator of; employers’ commitment to invest n; human capital	Huselid (1995) Snell and Dean (1992) Truss; (2001) Zacharatos et al (2005)
Reduced status differentials between; managers and employees (egalitarian)	Pil and McDuffie (1996); Wood (1996) Guest (1999) Zacharatos et al; (2005)
Internal promotions or selections to fill; vacant positions	Guthrie (2001) Huselid (1995) Guest (1999)
Formal performance appraisal	Huselid (1995) Wood (1996) Truss (2001)
Development appraisal	Whitener (2001) Snell and Dean (1992)
Formal grievance or complaint; resolution systems	Becker and Huselid (1998) Huselid (1995) Guest; (1999)
Targeted selections, recruitment	Truss (2001) Huselid (1995) Zacharatos et al; (2005)
Merit based promotions	Guthrie (2001)
Formal Job analysis (Job description); Job design, safety	Huselid (1995) Zacharatos et al (2005)

Adapted from David P. Lepak, et.al (2006) and Macky and Boxall (2007)

How HPWS relate to employee behavior in the work places?

“There are burgeoning researches on organizational outcomes but there is far less systematic data regarding employee experiences of HPM.”(Butler et al 2004) Most of authors believed HPWS would promote positive behavior in the employees. The HR practices normally used in HPWS has its sources from the soft Harvard model (Beer et al 1984) These HR practices were generally supposed to provide mutuality in all affairs of running business between employee – employer and the employees were significant stake holder in an organization. Guest (1999) in an analysis of a survey of 1,000 workers carried out for the Chartered Institute of Personnel andPage 358 Development (CIPD) in the UK, found that workers seemed to react positively to human resource management practices which he termed as “positive psychological contract” Arnold & Feldman (1982),Cotton & Tuttle(1986), Freeman and Kleiner (2000) also rated positive impact on the employees satisfaction and intention to stay in the company or increase morale of the employees as HPWS did increase the value of the human capital in the organization (Huselid 1995, Zacharatos et al 2005) Most...