The impact of socially responsible human resource management on employees' organizational citizenship behaviour: the mediating role of organizational identification

Based on insights from social exchange and social identity theories, this paper examines the influence of three dimensions of socially responsible human resource management (SR-HRM), namely legal compliance HRM, employee-oriented HRM and general CSR facilitation HRM, on employees' organizational citizenship behaviour (OCB). Structural equation modelling of dyadic data collected from Chinese employees and their direct supervisors in three phases revealed that whilst organizational identification fully mediated the relationship between employee-oriented HRM and employee OCB, general CSR facilitation HRM had a direct effect on employee OCB. In contrast, legal compliance HRM neither influenced employee OCB directly, nor indirectly through organizational identification. The findings highlight the important but complex role played by SR-HRM in eliciting positive employee work outcomes, and contribute to our knowledge of the mechanisms underlying this relationship.