The impact of human resource management practices on export performance: an empirical investigation of Chinese firms

Abstract

Due to the increasing importance of the Chinese economy to the world, more researchers have been attracted to study the underlying reasons of the success of the Chinese economy. Export growth was considered to be one of the great contributors to this success. A few reforms brought about the rapid export expansion. One of them was a general adaptation of modern human resource management in Chinese firms. Modern human resource management has improved effectiveness and productivity in Chinese export firms since the economic reforms in 1979. This research has been the first one to put focus on how modern human resource management influenced export performance in Chinese firms through some common types of human resource management practices (i.e., staffing, training, reward system and performance appraisal system).

Internationalization is a complex process. Consequently, a large number of factors have been found to influence export performance at firm levels. However, little research has been done based on less developed countries to test the generality of the models in international marketing field. Few empirical studies have been done to test the theories in human resource management field. Thus, this research has attempted to contribute both international marketing and human resource management literature by testing the effects of human resource management practices on firm-level export performance in Chinese export firms, after controlling a few other determinants of export performance (i.e., firm characteristics, firm competency and export marketing strategies).

The research found that human resource management practices had unique impact on export performances in Chinese firms. In Chinese export firms, staffing and reward system had improved export growth, whereas training was only negatively related to export growth and both training and performance appraisal system had negative effects on the level of involvement in exporting. Meanwhile, firm size brought about high export growth rate and large export sales. Firm competency and export marketing strategies gave negative effects on export growth but positively influenced export sales. These findings indicate that modern human resource management is significant to export performance in Chinese firms. Chinese exporters should pay more attention to widely adopting modern human resource management practices to enhance their long-term export performance.