Job Crafting Translates High-Performance Work Systems into Employee Extra-Role Service Behavior

Abstract

With the rapid development of service economy, employees’ extra-role service behaviors have become major competitive advantages of service organizations, thus how to trigger such behaviors has received increasing scholarly attention in HR research. This study intends to address this issue from a system perspective and an “employee-centered” view. Specifically, we examed whether service-oriented high performance work system (SHPWS) drive employee extra-role service behavior, and if yes, how and when employees take roles in such a process. Drawing on signaling theory, we speculate that employees, particularly when highly identified with their service professions, will positively respond to SHPWS by crafting their job and further demonstrating extra-role behaviors toward customers. We conducted the study in a healthcare context and tested hypotheses using data from 284 hospital nurses and their matched 568 patients. As with our predictions, results indicated that SHPWS is effective in eliciting job crafting among higher professional identifiers, which in turn leads to extra-role service behaviors. Taken together, these findings suggest an integrated HR system conductive to employee extra-role service behavior and showcase the roles of employee in the process. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.