High performance work system and performance: Opening the black box through the organizational ambidexterity and human resource flexibility

Abstract

This paper contributes to the growing research about Human Resource Management (HRM) by examining the interrelationships between High Performance Work System (HPWS) and their effects on firm performance in the hotel industry. Recent studies stress the need to delve deeper into this link considering the role that may be played by certain dynamic capabilities as mediating variables (Patel, Messersmith, & Lepak, 2013; Prieto-Pastor & Martin-Perez, 2014).The current study proposes a multiple mediating model and tests the mediation. More specifically, this research establishes that human resource flexibility (HRF) and organizational ambidexterity (OA) play a mediating role in the HPWS-performance relationship.A variance-based structural equation modeling (Partial Least Squares) has been applied to a sample of Spanish hotel firms. The results obtained support the mediation hypotheses according to which HRF and OA play a critical mediating role in the HPWS-performance relationship.