A Self-Regulation Perspective on the Double-Edged Sword Effects of the Performance-Oriented HRS

Abstract

The performance-oriented human resource system (HRS) brings both opportunities and challenges to employees. Prior studies mainly report the positive impact of high-performance work on organizational and employee performance, ignoring the negative impact on employee’s behavior. Based on self-regulation theory, this paper discusses the double-edged sword effects of the performance-oriented HRS on employees. A total of 253 employees were studied in three waves, and the linear model was used to analyze the data. The results indicates that the perceived performance-oriented HRS not only can positively predict employees' concerns with performance and improve their willingness of self-development but also may lead to resource depletion and lower employees' moral awareness, which increases the risk of employees' unethical behavior. Employees' self-control is a regulator of the negative effect of a performance-oriented HRS. That is, when employees’ self-control is low, the performance-oriented HRS has a stronger influence on unethical behavior through moral awareness than when it high. The above results can broaden our understanding of the effects of the performance-oriented HRS on employees, and provide some new insights for intervening the effects of performance-oriented HRS in organizational human resource practices.