The moderating role of HR practices on the association of employee engagement and job performance

Abstract

The purpose of the present research was to examine the relationship between employee engagement and job performance in the context of Private Sector Universities of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. It examines the moderating role of human resource practices for the purpose to test the strength of the relationship of employee engagement and job performance. The study specifically focuses upon three human resource practices as moderators. They include: employee’s perception about training, compensation and performance appraisal. Moreover, employee engagement was taken as independent variable, and job performance dimensions (contextual performance, task performance and counterproductive work behavior) were taken as dependent variables. The study followed a survey design and was conducted in the Private Sector Universities of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Simple random sampling with a formula of finite population was used to select a sample size of 293 academic staff serving at ten Private Sector Universities. Both descriptive and inferential statistical techniques were applied to analyze the data. Findings suggest that employee engagement is vital to employees and indeed influence employees’ job performance of academic staff in the Private Sector Universities. Whereas, training, compensation and performance appraisal have a moderating effect on the relationship between employee engagement and job performance. To improve employee’s job performance in Private Sector Universities of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, it is recommended that the Universities must pay more attention to its employees’ engagement and human resources practices, so that they can achieve the individual as well as organizational strategic objectives.