Green Human Resource Management: A Systematic Literature Review and Future Research Directions

Abstract

This study addressed three basic questions regarding GHRM: the first - which green human resources management practices have or have not obtained better attention in organizations?; the second question - what are the contributing factors to the effective implementation of green human resource management in organizations? And the third what are the major barriers to the practical implementation of green human resource practices in organizations? The research employed a systematic review strategy for the questions indicated above. In this respect, clear inclusion and exclusion criteria were employed to select 51 relevant articles from 417 GHRM articles obtained from various databases for analysis purposes. In addition, other research methods were used in the study, such as the collected data being analyzed via content analysis and presented descriptively using descriptive research design. The study results indicated that selection and requirement, training and development, and discipline management GHRM practices have obtained better attention in organizations; on the contrary, socialization, participation and working relationships, and retention practices acquired the least attention and still not yet getting sufficient emphasis. With regard to effective factors to implement GHRM, social responsibility, green missions, strategies, goals and policies, citizenship behavior, financial and non-financial motivation, green training, and teamwork are playing major roles; conversely, lack of knowledge and awareness, lack of training/technical support, lack of organizational leadership support, lack of a comprehensive plan to implement green human resource management, and lack of green culture, are the major barriers.