Performance in a Dual Distribution Irish Building Society: The Role of Human Resource Management and Leadership

Abstract

This thesis explores the subject of organisational performance in a partially franchised organisation, the EBS Building Society, a retail financial service business. It focuses on understanding why, in a dual distribution system, a franchised outlet outperforms a non-franchised outlet within the same organisation. In particular it examines the potential impact of Human Resource Management (HRM) and leadership practices at both the level of the individual and of the unit. Many studies have examined the link between HR practices and performance, however, few have studied the system of practices within a retail financial services network.

This thesis is concerned with the behaviours of the managers of franchised units of the EBS Building Society and how those behaviours may potentially explain why managers outperform their colleagues in the company manned branch network from a financial perspective. Specifically, the study will highlight the current performance measures that are pertinent to both franchised and non-franchised outlets and it will set out to connect these measures to the HRM practices and leadership styles of managers in EBS units. In particular, the study explores the nature of the linkages between HRM/leadership practices and behaviours, focusing in particular on three possibilities: Empowerment, Perceived Organisational Support (POS) and Work Intensification to understanding how HRM or leadership impacts on performance in organisations.

The Study found that, as anticipated, HRM had a positive indirect effect on employee service interaction behaviour with empowerment having the greatest consequence. There was also evidence that agency status within the EBS contributes to service quality, in part through the development of higher levels of unit-level employee service behaviours and unit level leadership.

The importance of the research lies in the fact that it offers, for the first time, some evidence on the impact of HRM and leadership practices within a hybrid franchised financial firm in Ireland. It also offers for the first time a comparison of the three different possibilities or mediators and their explanatory powers on HRM and leadership and their effects on organisation performance by adopting a multi-level approach.