Moderating Effect of Industry 4.0 on the Performance of Enterprises in the Constrains Related to COVID-19 in the Perception of Employees in Slovakia

Abstract

Organizational performance, as well as the performance of industrial enterprises, is affected by changes caused by technological progress and the overall societal situation. Industry 4.0 affords the transformation of the industrial economy to the digital economy. In addition to the mentioned important technological initiative, the organizational performance is determined by the pandemic situation related to the disease COVID-19, which shook the economy of many countries. Society-wide measures accelerated the implementation of Industry 4.0 elements in the management of organizations. The main aim of the presented research was to examine the employees’ perception of the impact of the Industry 4.0 implementation (digitalization) on the enterprise’s performance during the COVID-19 pandemic. The results confirmed that employees in various job positions perceive that Industry 4.0 positively affected the organization’s performance during the pandemic. The employees themselves contribute significantly to the enterprise’s performance, but their performance is limited by the number of tasks that the employer can assign to them during pandemic measures. Enterprise performance will be subsequently reflected in the financial condition, which is limiting for many areas of human resource management. Notably, satisfaction with compensation is an area that is a significant predictor of perceived corporate performance. The results also showed that the pandemic had a negatively perceived impact on employee compensation. For the sustainable management of human resources, the perception of remuneration by employees and the appropriate remuneration itself is an important challenge regarding the relationship between employees and the organization.