Green Human Resources Management

Today's leaders are showing an increased interest in the environment. This new interest has stemmed from several treaties to combat climate change. Therefore, organizations are searching for ways to reduce their environmental footprints. To accomplish this target while at the same time achieving profits, organizations must focus on social, environmental, economic, and financial factors.

Research such as Daily and Huang (2001), Porter and Kramer (2006), and Gürlek and Tuna (2018) has shown that organizations that succeed in achieving their environmental targets also enjoy a competitive advantage. In addition, an increasing number of employees are becoming more interested in ecological preservation and will be happy with an organization that endorses green initiatives. As a result, company leaders are including sustainability targets in their list of priorities and including "green" goals in their business mission, strategy, policies, and procedures.

To implement any corporate environmental program, several departments must be involved, including HR, Operations, Marketing, IT, and Finance. Many green initiatives can go beyond corporate social responsibility programs within HR management. Human resources can adapt, change, and transform to green human resources management (GRHM). While GHRM is considered a relatively new concept, it is becoming more and more popular throughout the corporate world.

There is no agreed-upon definition of GHRM as the term has different meanings to different people. Nevertheless, several attributes are shared between the various definitions. "Green" refers to making efforts to improve the climate, increase energy efficiency, or reduce pollution caused by business activities. The primary purpose of going green is to minimize the potential negative impact that energy consumption and pollution can have on the climate and environment. The term GRHM is mainly used to refer to the contribution of HR policies and practices towards the broader corporate environmental agenda. It also refers to using every employee to support sustainable practices and increase employee awareness and commitment on the issues of sustainability and climate change issues.

As previously mentioned, sustainability strategies are growing fast within the corporate world, and companies can play a vital part in the battle to prevent rapid climate change. Hence, human resources management and its different functions can help in this regard by adopting sustainable and climate change awareness practices such as the following:

Recruitment and selection:

GRHM can begin with redesigning job descriptions (JDs) for recruits that highlight tasks related to sustainability or evaluating the candidates' green behaviors. During an interview or a group dynamic that mixes a business case with sustainability issues, a common question about climate change can help understand a candidate's degree of ecological awareness.

Performance management:

Creating job descriptions that include "green" tasks such as having SMART key performance indicators aligned with the environmental aspirations and goals.

Learning and development:

Educating more employees about working methods that help reduce waste and save energy, such as recycling, turning lights off, or shutting down laptops, and encouraging employees to select sustainable training and development programs that can help them and the sustainability schema of their organization.

Compensation and benefits:

Recognizing the contribution of employees in the creation of a more sustainable company through three different types of rewards:

• Monetary-based rewards such as salary increases, cash incentives, and bonuses.
• Non-monetary rewards such as sabbaticals, special leaves, discounts, or gifts.
• Recognition-based rewards that highlight an employee's green contributions.

Employee relations:

This can happen by allowing employees to engage and contribute to the various environmental activities that the company is organizing or supporting, such as taking care of the public transportation costs for employees, providing them with free travel cards, encouraging internal car-sharing, or implementing working from home policies. In addition, companies can promote the use of reusable drinking cups at the office and prioritize electronic documents to steer clear of the waste of papers and its implication on nature, especially forests.

GHRM has a critical task: to work on a broader set of sustainable and environmental-friendly objectives, resulting in cost-savings, improving corporate social responsibility practices, and enhancing the attractiveness and reputation of the organization. GRHM also has the following benefits:

• It helps with employee retention and reduces labor turnover.
• It improves employer branding.
• It increases stakeholder engagement.
• It reduces a company's overall costs as its energy, water, and raw materials are used more efficiently.
• It helps reduce operational risks.
• It helps organizations in innovation by producing new green products and procedures.

As the corporate movement towards green business gains traction, HR leaders need to do more to ensure that GRHM finds its way into the company's mission, strategies, and policies. Even though the green drive is still in the infancy phase, green HR efforts can result in many advantages, including productivity improvements, cost savings, and increased employee retention. The effects of GHRM practices are multidimensional and require continuous supervision to understand their potential. The current generation of managers and HR managers has to increase awareness among employees of the need to preserve the environment for the forthcoming generations. By adopting environment-friendly management practices such as waste management, recycling, carbon emission reduction, and green products, companies can still profit while helping make the world a better place. Is that not a goal worth striving for?

References:

Daily, B. F., & Huang, S. C. (2001). Achieving sustainability through attention to human resource factors in environmental management. International Journal of operations & production management.

Gürlek, M., & Tuna, M. (2018). Reinforcing competitive advantage through green organizational culture and green innovation. The service industries journal, 38(7-8), 467-491.

Porter, M. E., & Kramer, M. R. (2006). The link between competitive advantage and corporate social responsibility. Harvard business review, 84(12), 78-92.