Sustainable Business Performance: Examining the Role of Green HRM Practices, Green Innovation and Responsible Leadership through the Lens of Pro-Environmental Behavior

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper is an empirical study of the impact of human resource management (HRM) and leadership on sustainable business performance in the Pakistanese banking industry.

The subject is important and timely. While there is a sizable literature on the relationship between certain organizational practices and business sustainability, this study highlights an original context. However, I have several major concerns:

1. As they are written, the empirical hypotheses look rather tautological. Wouldn't green HRM, responsible leadership, pro-environmental behavior, and green innovation foster sustainable business simply BY DEFINITION? The authors should rather focus on a specific practice (a reward system, a leadership style, say) and examine whether it has a significant positive impact on sustainability before calling this practice green or responsible.

2. Related to this point, the specific components of what is considered to be green HRM, responsible leadership and sustainable business performance should be clearly spelled out. Only referring to some 'scales' used in the literature, as the authors do in the last paragraph that precedes subsection 3.3, is at best unconvincing.  As far as the items of green HRM is concerned, the authors might consult a recent article by Sinclair-Desgagné, "Green Human Resource Management - A personnel economics perspective," Resource and Energy Economics 66, November 2021.

3.  Relating to the above two points, a standard issue to be raised here is the endogeneity between HRM and leadership practices, on the one hand, and business sustainability, on the other hand. Can't causality go the other way, with firms deemed to be sustainable then affording certain HRM and leadership practices (in recruitment and training, for instance)? The authors must address this issue explicitly if they want their empirical estimates and results to be credible.

4. The empirical results MUST be displayed in the way which is standard in the literature, with all control variables shown. An exhibit like Table 4.3 is unrigorous and, as such, unacceptable.  

5. Please also conduct robustness checks on your estimates.

Author Response

The paper is an empirical study of the impact of human resource management (HRM) and leadership on sustainable business performance in the Pakistanese banking industry.

The subject is important and timely. While there is a sizable literature on the relationship between certain organizational practices and business sustainability, this study highlights an original context. However, I have several major concerns:

1. As they are written, the empirical hypotheses look rather tautological. Wouldn't green HRM, responsible leadership, pro-environmental behavior, and green innovation foster sustainable business simply BY DEFINITION? The authors should rather focus on a specific practice (a reward system, a leadership style, say) and examine whether it has a significant positive impact on sustainability before calling this practice green or responsible.

Authors reply: Honorable Prof, with due respect, it is stated in your kind honor that we have focused on aggregate analysis in this paper. Whereas, it is one of the few studies conducted in banking sector of Pakistan. Therefore, we have taken variables such as responsible leadership, GHRM practices, Pro-environmental behavior, green innovation, and sustainable business practices.

2. Related to this point, the specific components of what is considered to be green HRM, responsible leadership and sustainable business performance should be clearly spelled out. Only referring to some 'scales' used in the literature, as the authors do in the last paragraph that precedes subsection 3.3, is at best unconvincing.  As far as the items of green HRM is concerned, the authors might consult a recent article by Sinclair-Desgagné, "Green Human Resource Management - A personnel economics perspective," Resource and Energy Economics 66, November 2021.

Researchers have implemented the valuable suggestions as following data is included in the paper.

Authors reply: In other words, GHRM includes integrating an organization's environmental management goals into the HR procedures, such as recruiting and selection, development and training, performance management and assessment, and incentives and acknowledgment. Green HRM practices are considered essential for boosting organizational performance as it is possible to effectively concentrate managerial attention by combining several human resource management strategies, such as staff selection and training, performance evaluation and rewards, employee autonomy, and enablement (Sinclair-Desgagné, 2021). Green innovation scale consists of four items (Singh et al., 2020). We used the green innovation scale, which has four components, to measure the innovation of green products. Responsible leadership scale consists of four items (Voegtlin, 2011). Responsible leadership can be measured through different scales and reserachers measured it through different dimensions. Responsible leadership can be measured through triple bottom approach in which a leader will only be considered as responsible leadership which he/she takes care economic, social, and environmental aspects simutenously (Siddiqui, Ijaz, Javeria, & Naz, 2023). Sustainable business performance scale has five items (Singh et al., 2020). Sustainable business practices can be measured through different scales developed by various authors. In the present study, reserachres have adopted the scale for measuring sustainable business practices.

3. Relating to the above two points, a standard issue to be raised here is the endogeneity between HRM and leadership practices, on the one hand, and business sustainability, on the other hand. Can't causality go the other way, with firms deemed to be sustainable then affording certain HRM and leadership practices (in recruitment and training, for instance)? The authors must address this issue explicitly if they want their empirical estimates and results to be credible.

Authors reply:  Endogeneity and selection are key problems for research on inequality. Technically, endogeneity occurs when a predictor variable (x) in a regression model is correlated with the error term (e) in the model. This can occur under a variety of conditions, but two cases are especially common in inequality research: (1) when important variables are omitted from the model (called “omitted variable bias”) and (2) when the outcome variable is a predictor of x and not simply a response to x (called “simultaneity bias”). Whereas, in the present paper, previously various studies conducted in different sectors to test the impact of responsible leadership, HRM practices, green innovation on sustainable business practices via intervening role of pro-environmental behavior. So, researchers have overcome the issue of endogeneity.

4. The empirical results MUST be displayed in the way which is standard in the literature, with all control variables shown. An exhibit like Table 4.3 is unrigorous and, as such, unacceptable.  

Authors reply: Honorable Prof. With due respect, it is submitted that in the table 4.3, complete details regarding Table 4.3: Mean, Standard Deviation, Validity, and Correlation given in the single table. This format is used in various impact factor journals. Therefore, in the present study, table 4.3 added with this format.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Many parts of the text may appear hard for the international audience to understand. I suggest hiring a native service to review the use of the English idiom.

In the abstract, please be more consistent. What is the research gap? What is the purpose of the study? What are the main implications? Please rewrite.

Please strictly follow the author´s guidelines for references.

In the end of the introduction you must clarify key points to the audience. What is the research gap? What is the purpose of the study? What is the research methodology?

At the beginning of the second section, you talk about Sustainable business performance. You should extend this concept to the entire supply chain, approaching for instance the so-called green supply chain management (GSCM) concerns.  I suggest consulting this reference to support a discussion on GSCM (https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/15/8127)

The justification for the use of the stakeholder theory is too weak. Enlarge it or remove any reference. I prefer the second option.

Each hypo must enclose at least one empirical previous study that shows its pertinence. This means that the statement under the hypo has been already verified in at least one previous study. The ref must follow the hypos.

H1: XXXXX ... [nn]

H2: XXXXX ... [nm]

... 

It would be very nice to the reader if you add a final table with the hypos and respective empirical studies that make them plausible.

Figure 2 is unacceptable

Demographic analysis is fine.

You MUST inform the questions in the body of the text. Please add a table with all questions, a keyword for each question, and previous empirical evidence that justifies the question's inclusion.

You have a severe fault in your measurement model. You do not verify cross-loading or weak loading. To amend this problem, you must conduct an EFA with SPSS and inform ALL scores in a table. Therefore, it will be possible to see that any indicator loads in the respective factor and ONLY in its factor, not in others. Additionally, you must verify that for all loads > 0.4, which means that no weak load is present. If so, the indicator must be removed, and the analysis must be repeated under the new basis. 

A CR > 0.95 means an excessive number of indicators, and at least one may be removed without losing content. Please observe this feature in the text and provide a ref (there are lots in the literature).

What means partially accepted? Such a definition requires a theoretical justification.

The conclusion must entail the implications of the study. What changes in the real world upon your study´s results?

.

Author Response

Many parts of the text may appear hard for the international audience to understand. I suggest hiring a native service to review the use of the English idiom.

In the abstract, please be more consistent. What is the research gap? What is the purpose of the study? What are the main implications? Please rewrite.

Authors reply: Rewritten

Please strictly follow the author´s guidelines for references.

In the end of the introduction you must clarify key points to the audience. What is the research gap? What is the purpose of the study? What is the research methodology?

Authors reply: Rewritten

At the beginning of the second section, you talk about Sustainable business performance. You should extend this concept to the entire supply chain, approaching for instance the so-called green supply chain management (GSCM) concerns.  I suggest consulting this reference to support a discussion on GSCM (https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/15/8127)

Authors reply: Added concept of GSCM in the literature section.

The justification for the use of the stakeholder theory is too weak. Enlarge it or remove any reference. I prefer the second option.

Authors reply: Section 2.1 related to stakeholder’s theory has been excluded.

Each hypo must enclose at least one empirical previous study that shows its pertinence. This means that the statement under the hypo has been already verified in at least one previous study. The ref must follow the hypos.

H1: XXXXX ... [nn]

H2: XXXXX ... [nm]

... 

It would be very nice to the reader if you add a final table with the hypos and respective empirical studies that make them plausible.

Authors reply: Table of hypothesis along with empirical studies reference included at the end of literature review section.

Figure 2 is unacceptable

Authors reply: Figure 2.1 uploaded as jpg format in the document.

Demographic analysis is fine.

You MUST inform the questions in the body of the text. Please add a table with all questions, a keyword for each question, and previous empirical evidence that justifies the question's inclusion.

You have a severe fault in your measurement model. You do not verify cross-loading or weak loading. To amend this problem, you must conduct an EFA with SPSS and inform ALL scores in a table. Therefore, it will be possible to see that any indicator loads in the respective factor and ONLY in its factor, not in others. Additionally, you must verify that for all loads > 0.4, which means that no weak load is present. If so, the indicator must be removed, and the analysis must be repeated under the new basis. 

Authors reply: Performed EFA analysis along with cross loadings in SPSS.

A CR > 0.95 means an excessive number of indicators, and at least one may be removed without losing content. Please observe this feature in the text and provide a ref (there are lots in the literature).

Authors reply: After performing EFA and cross loadings, CR value decreased without losing content validity.

What means partially accepted? Such a definition requires a theoretical justification.

Authors reply: Partial mediation is a case where indirect effect of mediation becomes less but not zero with insignificant value. Then results of mediation will be considered as partial mediation.

The conclusion must entail the implications of the study. What changes in the real world upon your study´s results?

Authors reply: Real world implications of the study addition extended in the implications section of the paper.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Ok, the Authors addressed most issues