The Effect of Perceived Socially Responsible HRM Practices on Employee’s Attitudes and the Moderator Role of Ethical Leadership in Saudi Arabia

The aim of the paper is to explore the perceptions of socially responsible human resources management practices and their impact on employee attitudes. Specifically, it will explore the moderating role of ethical leadership in the relationship between socially responsible HRM practices and the motivation, trust, and engagement of workers in the different sectors in Saudi Arabia. The methodology used in the study is a quantitative approach involving data collection from 535 employees through surveys from organizations in Riyadh’s different industries to examine the perceptions of SRHRM practices and employee motivation, trust, and engagement and explore the moderating role of ethical leadership. The findings of this study indicate that that SRHRM practices have a significant impact on employees’ motivation, influencing employee’s intrinsic motivation through a sense of purpose and alignment with organizational values, extrinsic motivation through fairness and equity, and prosocial motivation through the promotion of social responsibility. Ethical leadership moderates the SRHRM practices, organizational motivation, and employee engagement. SRHRM is also correlated positively with employee motivation, and engagement. Our findings also imply that ethical leadership may moderate the association between SRHRM practices and trust; nevertheless, more investigation is required to elucidate this link.