HR Frontiers with Senyo M Adjabeng: The importance of Green HRM and Sustainable people practices

The modern organisation stands at a crossroads, one pumped with ESG reports and stakeholder capitalism, shadowed by the looming spectre of climate urgency.

For decades, sustainability was the purview of facility managers and CSR officers, a matter of efficient lighting and annual volunteer days.  Yet, a profound and necessary evolution is here, shifting the locus of ecological responsibility into the very heart of organisational people strategy.

This is the domain of Green Human Resource Management (Green HRM), a transformative paradigm that reconceives the employee lifecycle, from recruitment to retirement, through a lens of environmental stewardship and long-term viability.

It represents not merely a set of tactical ‘green’ initiatives but a fundamental re-alignment of the psychological contract between the individual, the organisation, and the planet.  To view Green HRM as a peripheral concern is to misunderstand the nature of the contemporary business crisis – it is, in fact, the critical lever for building resilient, future-fit organisations that can thrive within ecological boundaries while fostering human flourishing.

The conceptual underpinnings of Green HRM extend beyond simple cost-saving through reduced paper consumption.  It is a strategic approach that integrates environmental management goals with HR systems to motivate, enable, and empower employees to enact sustainable behaviours.

Its scope is comprehensive, permeating every traditional HR function.  It begins with the employer brand, where a genuine commitment to sustainability attracts a growing cohort of talent, particularly Millennials and Gen Z, for whom organisational values are a primary determinant of employment choice.

Job descriptions and person specifications now increasingly include competencies related to environmental awareness and sustainable thinking, seeking not just accountants but accountants who can assess carbon accounting, not just marketers but marketers versed in the principles of circular economy messaging.

The selection process itself becomes a sieve for values, with behavioural interview questions designed to uncover a candidate’s inherent orientation toward resource conservation and systemic thinking.

Once through the organisational gates, the employee’s induction serves as the first critical touchpoint for embedding a green culture.  Orientation moves beyond fire exits and pension plans to include the company’s sustainability vision, its key environmental performance indicators, and the individual’s role in achieving them.

This foundational knowledge is then deepened through targeted training and development.  Green HRM champions continuous learning ecosystems that equip employees at all levels with the literacy to understand environmental impacts.

This ranges from basic awareness workshops on waste segregation and energy conservation to advanced leadership programmes focused on sustainable innovation, lifecycle analysis, and integrating ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) factors into strategic decision-making.  Development becomes a tool for empowerment, transforming every employee, from the mailroom to the boardroom, into an agent of sustainable change.

Performance Management and Green HRM

The performance management system, often a rigid engine of financial targets, is recalibrated under Green HRM to reflect a triple-bottom-line focus. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and objectives are expanded to include measurable environmental metrics.

A procurement manager might be evaluated partly on the percentage of sustainably sourced materials; a logistics head on fleet emissions reductions, a product designer on the reparability and recyclability of new offerings.  This alignment of appraisal and reward structures with sustainability goals is pivotal, it signals strategic seriousness and ensures that green aspirations translate into accountable actions.

Compensation and benefits packages evolve in tandem. ‘Green bonuses’ for achieving team-based sustainability targets, subsidies for public transport or electric vehicle purchases, and rewards for employee-led eco-innovation projects create direct financial incentives.  Benefits portfolios increasingly feature green options, such as cycle-to-work schemes, renewable energy tariffs for home workers, or partnerships with ethical retailers.

To view Green HRM as a peripheral concern is to misunderstand the nature of the contemporary business crisis – it is, in fact, the critical lever for building resilient, future-fit organisations that can thrive within ecological boundaries while fostering human flourishing.

At the core of Green HRM’s transformative potential is its capacity to foster employee engagement and green behaviour.  Engaged employees are the lifeblood of any cultural shift, and sustainability offers a powerful, purpose-driven rallying point.

When employees believe their work contributes to a healthier planet, it transcends transactional labour, fostering intrinsic motivation, pride, and a deeper sense of organisational commitment.  Green HRM facilitates this by creating channels for participation, forming green teams or sustainability committees that harness grassroots ideas, implementing suggestion schemes with recognition for cost-saving or waste-reducing proposals, and supporting volunteerism in local environmental restoration projects.  This participative model democratises sustainability, moving it from a top-down mandate to a shared organisational value co-created by its people.

Role of Leadership

The role of leadership in modelling these values cannot be overstated.  When executives visibly champion sustainable practices, foregoing unnecessary travel, prioritising virtual meetings, or engaging in the same waste reduction programmes as all staff, it legitimises the entire endeavour, creating a culture of authenticity rather than empty rhetoric.

The physical and digital work environment itself becomes a canvas for Green HRM principles. H R, in collaboration with facilities management, drives policies for green workplaces – energy-efficient buildings, robust recycling and composting systems, the elimination of single-use plastics, and sustainable catering.

The seismic shift towards remote and hybrid work models, accelerated by the pandemic, presents a double-edged sword.  While it can dramatically reduce scope 2 and 3 emissions from commuting and office energy use, it decentralises environmental impact to employees’ homes.

Green HRM thus expands its remit, supporting employees in creating eco-efficient home offices through guidance and resources, while carefully weighing the carbon footprint of dispersed work against the benefits of reduced central office space.

The ultimate expression of Green HRM is its role in building a sustainable organisational culture, one where ecological and social awareness and mindfulness is as instinctive as financial prudence.  This culture manifests in daily routines – default double-sided printing, ‘switch-off’ campaigns, virtual document sharing

over hard copies, and sustainable choices in corporate gifting and event management.  It fosters a mindset of resourcefulness, where waste is seen as a design flaw and every decision is considered for its extended environmental consequences.  This cultural bedrock is what enables innovation, driving the development of green products and services that open new markets and build competitive advantage.  Companies known for authentic green cultures not only attract and retain top talent but also enjoy enhanced reputation, stronger customer loyalty, and greater resilience in the face of regulatory changes and resource scarcities.

Persuasive Advocacy

Nevertheless, the path to integrating Green HRM is fraught with challenges.  The most pervasive is the perception of a trade-off between sustainability and profitability, a relic of short-termist thinking.  Convincing sceptical stakeholders of the long-term value, in risk mitigation, brand equity, talent retention, and operational efficiency, requires robust data and persuasive advocacy.

Measuring the return on investment (ROI) of Green HRM initiatives can be complex, moving beyond simple utility savings to encompass intangible assets like employer brand strength and innovation capacity.

There is also the risk of ‘greenwashing’, the superficial, cosmetic changes deployed for marketing effect without substantive behavioural or systemic change.  Green HRM, when executed poorly, can be perceived as a box-ticking exercise, leading to employee cynicism and disengagement. To be credible, it must be woven into the strategic fabric of the organisation, with clear accountability, transparent reporting, and leadership that walks the talk.

The future horizon of Green HRM is expansive and increasingly integrated with technology and broader societal trends.  Artificial Intelligence and people analytics will enable more sophisticated tracking of sustainability-linked performance and the carbon footprint of different work patterns.

The concept of the ‘green skills’ revolution is central, as HR functions will be tasked with massive reskilling efforts to prepare workforces for the low-carbon economy.  Furthermore, Green HRM is naturally extending into Social HRM, recognising the indivisible link between planetary and social health.  This holistic view encompasses employee wellbeing, diversity and inclusion, ethical supply chain labour practices, and community impact, understanding that a stressed, inequitable, or unjust workplace cannot be truly sustainable.

Green Human Resource Management is far from a peripheral trend or a discretionary add-on to conventional people practice.  It redefines the purpose of the HR function from mere administrative support to being the chief architect of organisational sustainability.

By aligning talent strategy with ecological limits, Green HRM cultivates a workforce that is not only productive and engaged but also ecologically literate and responsible.  It builds companies that are fit for the future, companies that do not just extract value from the world but contribute to its regeneration.  The corporate garden we must tend is both metaphorical and literal; – it is the culture of our organisations and the planetary ecosystem upon which all commerce ultimately depends.

Through the deliberate, thoughtful, and comprehensive application of Green HRM principles, we can nurture both, ensuring that our businesses are not just successful today, but are legacies that endure and enrich for generations to come.  The question for leaders is no longer whether to adopt these practices, but how swiftly and sincerely they can be embedded into the DNA of their people management practices, for in that integration lies true, enduring resilience.

For more Reading:

¹ Renwick, D. W., Redman, T., & Maguire, S. (2013). Green Human Resource Management: A Review and Research Agenda. International Journal of Management Reviews, 15(1), 1-14.

² Jackson, S. E., Renwick, D. W., Jabbour, C. J., & Muller-Camen, M. (2011). State-of-the-Art and Future Directions for Green Human Resource Management: Introduction to the Special Issue. German Journal of Human Resource Management, 25(2), 99-116.

³ Paillé, P., Chen, Y., Boiral, O., & Jin, J. (2014). The Impact of Human Resource Management on Environmental Performance: An Employee-Level Study. Journal of Business Ethics, 121(3), 451-466.

⁴ O’Brien, W., & Aliabadi, F. Y. (2022). Does telecommuting save energy? A critical review of quantitative studies and their research methods. Energy and Buildings, 225, 110298.

⁵ World Economic Forum. (2023). The Future of Jobs Report 2023. Geneva: World Economic Forum.

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