A comparison of the impact of high-performance work practices in Pakistan and the UK

Two key debates in the High-Performance Work Practices (HPWPs) literature relate to the comparison of HPWPs and High-Performance Work Systems (HPWSs), and the cultural effectiveness of these practices. This study contributes to both these discussions through examining the impact of HPWPs and HPWSs on individual and organisational level outcomes in Pakistan and the UK. The study is based on multi-level models on primary data from 3460 employees nested in 222 organisations in Pakistan, and secondary data from 21,981 employees nested in 1923 organisations from the British Workplace Employment Relations Survey (WERS) in the UK. Overall, individual practices explained greater variance in desired outcomes than HPWSs in both countries, suggesting that HPWSs do not necessarily work effectively. Furthermore, complexity is added in terms of understanding the effectiveness of practices when used across cultures, as results indicate differences in the impact of various HPWPs between the two countries.