Abstract
Purpose Drawing on the signaling theory and technology acceptance model, the main purpose of this study was to predict prospective employees' intentions to apply for jobs in a firm, with a special focus on the mediating role of attitudes toward corporate websites and the moderating role of perceived value fit. Design/methodology/approach Collecting data from a convenient sample of 318 prospective job candidates, the research hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling (SEM) with AMOS (version 24) and SPSS Process Macro (version 3.4). Findings The test results revealed that prospective employees' attitudes toward corporate websites partially mediate the association of corporate reputations, perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness with their intentions to apply for jobs in an organization. Noticeably, perceived value fit moderated the perceived usefulness–application intentions link in such a way that the impact of perceived usefulness on intentions to apply appears higher for individuals with a low level (than a high level) of perceived value fit. Research limitations/implications Consistent with the research findings, a notable theoretical contribution and practical implications for HR professionals have been discussed. This paper ends with outlining some limitations and future research directions. Originality/value Despite having the salient buffering effects of perceived value fit on the applicant attraction process, empirical study on this theoretical phenomenon is still sparse in a pre-employment context. This may be the first study that demonstrates under what circumstances prospective employees' job pursuit intentions could be optimized in respect of their perceived value fit within a single framework comprised of two theories.
Highlights
What is the major challenge for a human resource (HR) manager? It is undeniable that demographic and economic changes over the last couple of years have led the organizations to fierce competition for attracting qualified candidates (Uggerslev et al, 2012)
5.1 Interpretation of results The main purpose of this study was to examine prospective employees’ intentions to apply for jobs in an organization by integrating signaling theory and technology acceptance model (TAM) into a single framework, Variables
It is due to the fact that all the coefficients (β) of direct and indirect paths from the independent variables to the dependent variables were found to be significant in the research model
Summary
What is the major challenge for a human resource (HR) manager? It is undeniable that demographic and economic changes over the last couple of years have led the organizations to fierce competition for attracting qualified candidates (Uggerslev et al, 2012). Though there are various sources of recruitment, in this digital era, traditional recruitment efforts have been replaced by web-based recruitment (Banerjee and Gupta, 2019) In this respect, a substantial body of research has examined the role of potential antecedents in predicting applicants’ intentions to apply for jobs in a firm (Chowdhury and Kang, 2021). In line with the importance of signaling theory in recruitment literature, Tsai et al (2015) noted that signaling theory has the potential to determine the predictors of job seekers’ intentions to apply for jobs in an organization. In the recruitment context, the signaling theory suggests that job seekers very often have limited information about the Perceived Value Fit (PVF)
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