Green HRM and green creativity: mediating roles of dynamic capabilities and engagement

Riaz Ahmed, Qurat-Ul-Ain Mahmood, Muhammad Shakil Ahmad, Kate Davis and Neil Turner

International Journal of Manpower, 2026, vol. 47, issue 7, 937-952

Abstract: PurposeThis study aims to examine how green human resource management (GHRM) practices foster green creativity in an emerging-market telecommunications context. Responding to concerns that the GHRM-green creativity link remains insufficiently theorised, it develops an explanatory model in which external sustainability pressures are translated into green creativity through green dynamic capabilities and employee engagement.Design/methodology/approachSurvey data were collected in 3 waves from 374 employees working in 15 telecom firms in Pakistan. The time-lagged design was used to reduce common method bias. Hypotheses were tested using partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM), while hierarchical linear modelling (HLM) was used to examine cross-level effects.FindingsGHRM practices had a significant positive effect on green creativity. Green dynamic capabilities and employee engagement both significantly mediated this relationship, indicating that GHRM promotes green creativity by building adaptive environmental capabilities and strengthening employees' psychological investment in meaningful sustainability-related work. Innovative climate did not significantly moderate the direct relationship between GHRM and green creativity.Originality/valueThe study's originality lies in three refinements. First, it locates the research gap and research questions at the outset rather than treating them as a late literature-review summary. Second, it combines institutional theory with Teece's dynamic capabilities logic to explain both why firms adopt GHRM and how HR systems become green sensing, seizing and reconfiguring routines. Third, it tests capability-based and engagement-based mediating pathways in an emerging-market telecom sector where sustainability pressures, resource constraints and service innovation intersect.

Keywords: Green human resource management; Green creativity; Green dynamic capabilities; Employee engagement; Innovative climate; Institutional theory; Sustainability (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:ijmpps:ijm-09-2025-0785

DOI: 10.1108/IJM-09-2025-0785

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