International Journal of Economy, Management and Social Sciences, 2(10) October 2013, Pages: 814-819

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International Journal of Economy, Management and Social Sciences

ISSN
2306-7276

www.tijournals.com

The Relationships between e-HRM and Staff Empowerment:

A Case Study of Amir Al-Moemenin Hospital in Iran
Davood Mehrjoo *1, Mehdi Noursina 2
1
2

M.S student, Department of Management, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Naragh, Iran.
Faculty Member, Department of Management, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Naragh, Iran.

AR TIC LE INF O

AB STR AC T

Keywords:

Today, many organizations are concerned with human resources and with the question how
information technology can be used in human resource management. The aim of this study was to
evaluate the effectiveness of electronic human resource management (independent variable) in
terms of education services, health services, and research services, on empowering staff (dependent
variable) in Amir Al-Moemenin Hospital of Arak city in Iran. In The study survey method has
been used which was supported by a library research. The population consisted of all nurses
working in Amir Al-Moemenin hospital in Arak city. The data collected through the questionnaire
and for final confirmation, it was presented to a number of experts and professors and validity of
Study was confirmed, and also for its reliability, Cronbach's alpha was used. SPSS software was
used for data analysis and hypothesis testing. Multivariate regression showed that e-HRM has an
impact on empowerment of Manpower in terms of education, health services, and research
services.

Electronic management
Information technology
Human resource empowerment

2013 Int. j. econ. manag. soc. sci. All rights reserved for TI Journals.

1.

Introduction

Today, information technology has penetrated all parts of the organization and even organization's most important resource which is human
resources. Information technology has led organizations to have a comprehensive view of their resources, especially human resources.
Using this system, we can improve authority levels of staff and give them complete and required information In order to accomplish their
task in the best way. On the other hand, development of activities and tasks of managers in the field of human resource management and
continuous interaction between these activities, and the need for coordinated planning of the absorption, improvement, maintenance and
effective use of human resources, As a key strategic resource in any organization, have made it necessary to create a system that fits the
data and updating information systems in large organizations. Several organizations in North America and Europe have benefited from the
latest findings in this field and have entered E-HR system into the market. Feature of this system is its flexibility in different organizations.
Many organizations have carried numerous studies in this field and by human resource upgrading; have helped the effectiveness of human
resource management activities. Today, one of the knowledge essential for managing human organizations is human resource management
That is, the development of applications that by using them, to improve the capacity of human resources and achieve personnel and
organizational goals. In fact, human resource management is developing, training and retaining the human capital objectives. Since all
managers of an organization attain their goals by efforts of others, they should have sufficient knowledge and understanding of human
resource management. Without knowledge of HR management, efficiency goals cannot be achieved and we cannot lead humans in the
growth and excellence. So one of knowledge each manager needs to be familiar with, is human resource management. [1]
Today, human resource management is one of the knowledge needed to guide staff and perhaps, the most important skill for all managers in
organizations and Group efforts. In response to the needs of today's knowledge-based economy, companies must improve the strength and
abilities of their employees which is the work of human resource management in general, and e-HRM in particular. Information technology
has led organizations to have a comprehensive vision to their resources, especially human resources. Human resource management is an
opportunity for human resource professionals to be relieved of many routine jobs and have an opportunity to focus more on strategic
aspects. The characteristic of Electronic of human resource management system is its flexibility in different organizations. The system
helps to turn traditional paper-based activities into quick response. It is expected that with the use of information technology, human
resources departments will get rid of administrative restrictive activities will focus on social and intellectual capital management. [7]
Experts have cited five reasons for the necessity of implementation of e-HRM:
1)
2)

Electronic system of e-HRM can significantly improve the efficiency of the increasing human resource and thus, it will improve a
minimum of knowledge and skills of an organization and enable it for competitive environment.
E-HRM can enter the company into a new space in which the number and variety of reports related to human resource issues is very
remarkable.

* Corresponding author.
Email address: mehrjoo.davood@yahoo.com

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Internat ional Jour nal of Economy, Mana ge ment and Social Sciences , 2(10) October 2013

3)

4)
5)

E-HRM, for managers in this unit, provides an opportunity to attract their attention from their daily transaction processing to strategic
human resource management processes. Since routine and repetitive processes of human resources is done automatically with minimal
human intervention by e-HRM and related electronic systems, the need for Analysts to be able to work in human resources and in
accordance with the plans and goals of the organization are increased.
Many systems by using the booth of saff provide the ability for employees to be part of the department of Human Resources
themselves and be able to amend or update processes related to their data entry.
Since the components of a electronic HRM system are fully integrated with each other, it makes possible for companies to design
Their human resources department activities easily, and delegate the task of performing many of the things, previously performed by
employees of the human resources, to electronic systems.[8]

Health systems as one of the leading agencies in the implementation of various management systems and obtaining several certificates in
providing services to clients are planning to make their activities electronic, especially in human resource department and to investigate its
effect on empowerment of their human power. On the other hand, the use of these technologies in these centers improves the quality of
healthcare services. In this paper, the researcher wants to study the effectiveness of electronic human resource management, in terms of
education, health services, and research services, on Empowerment of Manpower in Amir Al-Moemenin Hospital of Arak city located in
Iran.

2.

Materials

2.1. Electronic Human Resource Management (e-HRM)

Since this term is closely associated with prefix e that stands for Electronic, it brings to mind those activities which are not right. Since eHRM acts as a specific form about the use of term NET, Online HRM can be a proper term. Though it is a completely Web-based e-HRM,
a complete e-HRM system may include Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), HRM shared service centers, voice response systems,
managers and staff portals and web-based applications. It should be noted that in the beginning, prefix e was assumed as electronic services
while they are specifically referring to the virtual world. Strohmeier (2007) defined e-HRM as: The application of information technology
to create and support a network of at least two people or a set of factors in a shared space for human resource management activities. He
considered it that in e-HRM; Technology both plays either a role as a mediator and a connector between individual factors or the means to
execute specific tasks in HRM. Experts believe that e-HRM has the potential of reducing management costs, increasing productivity,
accelerating the response time, improving customer service and developing decision-making process. And thus helps HRM to be more
strategic, more flexible and more economical in terms of cost. [2]
2.2. Objectives of trends to e-HRM
Zeliak and Ansel indicate four pressure factors on virtual human resources which can be noted as the Objectives of tendency toward the eHRM:

Human Resource departments are asked to focus on strategic questions

These units need to be flexible in terms of policy and measures
HR departments should be more efficient and cost-conscious
HR departments must be constantly strategy-oriented, flexible, efficient and customer-oriented. [9]

2.3. Using e-HRM

Objectives of using e-HRM can be summarized in the following four aspects:

Improving efficiency
Improving administrative processes
Improving customer service
Improving the strategic role of HR. [5]

2.4. e-HR functions

Staff training

Hiring processes

More communication and staff management

Archival records

Everyday activities of human resources. [4]

2.5. Implementation stages of e-HRM
The importance of e-HRM Discuss and its benefits, many managers are looking to implement it in their organization. For this, the
following steps should be taken:
1)
2)
3)
4)

Identifying key HRM strategies and policies, regarding the organization's strategies
Considering the goals of e-HRM
Getting familiar with Electronic HRM using each of them with respect to goals of the organization and HRM
Monitoring the measures taken and achieving e-HRM results. [10]

Davood Mehrjoo and Mehdi Noursina

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Int ernational Journal of Economy, Mana ge ment and Soci al Sci ences , 2(10) October 2013

3.

Previous research

The term e-HRM for the first time was used in1990 and referred to human resource management activities using Internet or Intranet.
Strohmeier and Kabst in their article about Factors influencing adoption of e-HRM, by study of 2336 organizations in 23 European
countries reached the conclusion that In most organizations, according to competitive environment and globalization, e-HRM has been
implemented and Several factors played a role in the adoption and effective implementation, including the size of the organization, staff
training, supporting by senior manager, the age of employee and organizational structure. [12]. Lujan et al studied the Impact of e-HRM
strategies and Concluded that a correct understanding and effective implementation of e-HRM, according to today's competitive situation
and globalization, can provide a competitive advantage for organizations. They also found those factors such as level of education, social
status, financial status of the organization and the competitive environment are effective on the use and implementation of e-HRM
strategies [13].Zafar et al (2010) in their research sought to know How the Banks benefit from of Information Technology in the fields of
human resources and improving human and in the end concluded that the use of information technology in HR can improve services,
efficiency, and effects of human resources. Stoneand and Lukaszewski in their research found that Factors such as recruiting talented and
motivated employees to achieve organizational goals, job security, Enterprise Resource, and the importance of job the factors affecting the
acceptance and effectiveness of electronic HRM in organizations. [14]

4.
H1.
H2.
H3.

5.

Hypotheses
There is a significant relationship between e-HRM, in terms of education, and empowering staff
There is a significant relationship between e-HRM in terms of research services, and empowering staff
There is a significant relationship between e-HRM, in terms of health services, and empowering staff

Research method

The present study, according to its objective which is an applicable and using Descriptive - correlation method with qualitative variables is
a cross- Sectional survey. The population of Survey was all 179 nurses working in Amir Al-Momenin hospitals in Arak city, including 120
women and 59 men. In this study, we used an available non-probability sampling method and nurses working in Amir Al-Momenin
hospital in Arak were selected as samples. Since questions in the questionnaire is Multi - valued with interval scale, to estimate the value of
sample the following equation was used: [6]

Where:
Z (a 2/2) is the size of variable in a normal distribution with a confidence level of 0.90 which is equivalent to 1.645.
is the maximum error that can be accepted by the researcher which in this research is estimated 0.1.
is the standard deviation and in a 5-choice Likert spectrum is estimated as follows:

In this scale, the largest value is 5 and the smallest is 1 so the standard deviation is equal 0.67. Consequently, the minimum value of
samples to reach desired accuracy was 120. To compensate for incomplete questionnaires, 150 questionnaires were distributed.
In this survey the field study was been used to collect data. Selecting the type of tool depends on several factors, including the concepts and
methods. Resources used in the design of the questionnaire are listed in Table 1. Dependent variable in this study (Empowering staff)
consists of 7 dimensions (sub-scales): leadership, motivation, policies, Degree of influence, Partnership, Learning, Creativity and
Innovation.
Table 1. Resources used in designing questionnaire
Variable (s) under consideration
Independent
variables

Dependent
variables

Education Management
Research Management
Healthcare Management
Leadership
Motivation
Policies
Degree of influence
Participation
Learning
Innovation

Number of
questions
6
5
6
3
3
3
3
3
3
5

Resource
scholars and experts - professionals
scholars and experts - professionals
scholars and experts - professionals
According to Smith et al.(2004)
According to Nunnelly(1978)
According to O'Reilly (1996)
According to Nunnelly(1978)
According to O'Reilly (1996)
According to Smith etal.(2004)
According to Smith et al.(2004)

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Internat ional Jour nal of Economy, Mana ge ment and Social Sciences , 2(10) October 2013

The questionnaire contains 40 questions all designed according to 5-choice Likert spectrum from Very low to very high degree and the
numerical values from 1 to 5 were selected for options: (1= Disagree Strongly, 2= Disagree Slightly, 3= Undecided, 4= Agree Slightly, 5=
agree Strongly) This scale includes a set of questions whose all visions and values are considered to be equal.[3]
To investigate the relationship between the three independent variables of the study and Empowering staff the regression analysis was used
which was calculated by using SPSS software and the significance of the regression model was calculated by using level of error (PVALUE).So, if Sig. level is less than 0.05, the regression model will be significance. Moreover, to study the correlation between errors
DurbinWatson test was used.
To determine the validity of the questionnaire, pilot was conducted in which 47 Preliminary questionnaires were distributed among a
number of sample people for answering. During the implementation and completion, the accuracy of some items was identified and
improvements were made on them, and some items were removed. To determine the validity of each scale, construct validity using factor
analysis method was used and the reliability of each variable was measured by Cronbach's alpha. Adequacy of the sample size was
determined using the Bartlett test of sphericity and kmo which are shown in Table 2. Since Kmo in all cases is greater than 0.7, the
correlation between the data is suitable for factor analysis. In addition, Cronbach's alpha for all variables is greater than 0.7, so the
reliability is acceptable. Chi square index of Bartlett's test of sphericity for all constructs is less than 0.001 (P <0.001), which is statistically
significant.
Table 2. Results of factor analysis and Cronbach's alpha for research variables
Variable
Leadership
Motivation
Policies
Degree of influence
Partnership
Learning
Creativity and Innovation
Educational Management
Research Management
Health Management

KMO

Bartlett's test of sphericity

Explained variance

Cronbach's alpha

0.719
0.782
0.913
0.761
0.671
0.891
0.714
0.761
0.854
0.782

0.000
0.000
0.000
0.000
0.000
0.000
0.000
0.000
0.000
0.000

37.67
29.02
53.82
47.19
13.54
56.65
19.93
38.34
51.67
43.01

0.767
0.953
0.73
0.091
0.853
0.844
0.731
0.735
0.731
0.858

Before regression analysis, we need to ensure about accuracy of assumptions which is necessary in the use of regression analysis. One of
the assumptions is considered in the analysis, independence of errors (the difference between the actual values and the values predicted by
the regression equation) of each other. To determine the independence of each error, Durbin - Watson test was used. The value of the test
statistic is in the range of 0 to 4, and if it is in the range between 1.5 or 2.5, The correlation of test errors will be unacceptable; Otherwise,
there is a correlation between errors. The value of this test is 1.577, which is above the range, and therefore, there is no correlation between
errors. Table 3 shows the standard deviation, adjusted coefficient of determination, coefficient of determination, multiple correlation
coefficients. Given adjusted coefficient of determination obtained from test output, 0.256 of the variability is explained by the independent
variables included in the model.
Table 3. Regression Analysis for Variables of education, research, health and empowerment
Durbin - Watson test

SD

adjusted coefficient of
determination

coefficient of
determination

multiple correlation coefficient

1.577

0.626

0.256

0.271

0.52

One of the assumptions considered in the regression is that errors should be normally distributed with mean zero. Obviously, if it is not the
default setting, the regression can be used. Figure 1 shows the normality of errors, as one of the assumptions of regression. Under this
assumption, the errors should be normally distributed with mean zero or 0, std.Dev 1.as seen in figure 1, Mean value is close to
zero and standard deviation is close to 1 (0.99). According to this graph (fig.1), Assumption of normality of error for the variable is
confirmed.
In continue, variables are entered in the regression. Table 4 contains the regression analysis to investigate the possibility that regression
coefficients are zero. In other words, this test examines the linear relationship between dependent and independent variables. Statistical
hypotheses of test for significance of the regression model are as follows:
H0 : All regression coefficients are equal to zero.
H1: At least one of the coefficients is NOT zero.

Davood Mehrjoo and Mehdi Noursina

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Int ernational Journal of Economy, Mana ge ment and Soci al Sci ences , 2(10) October 2013

Figure 1.Normalized histogram of the errors

Table 4. Regression analysis of the dependent and independent variables

Model
Variability of the independent variable
Variability of the random factors
Total

Sum of squares
21.279
57.276
78.555

df
3
146
149

Mean square
7.093
0.392
-

p-value

18.080

0.000

As seen in table 4, the significance level is with an error level of less than 0.95 (sig = 0.000 < 0.05), so the assumption H1 and The
relationship between the dependent and independent variables is confirmed.
5.2. Testing hypotheses
In table 5, in column () constant values and the coefficients of the independent variables are presented, respectively. The table contains
two sets of coefficients, Standardized coefficients of beta and non- Standardized coefficients of beta. In the second set, Scale of variables
are not equal to each other but in first set of coefficients it is equal and there is the possibility to compare variables; Therefore, to compare
the effects of independent variables on the dependent variable, standardized coefficients are used. The three hypotheses of this study were
examined using the below regression equation:
Empowerment = a + B1 (Education)+B2 (Research)+B3 (Healthcare)
The regression output is shown in Table 5.
Table 5. 3-variable regression coefficients associated with the empowerment of staff
Model
Constant value
Education
Research
Healthcare

Non-standardized coefficients
B
0.916
0.185
0.187
0.222

SD error
0.254
0.064
0.094
0.083

Standardized
coefficients
Beta
0.243
0.182
0.224

Sig. Level

Result

3.603
2.909
1.986
2.667

0.000
0.004
0.049
0.009

Confirmed
Confirmed
Confirmed

According to table 5, independent variable of education has regression coefficient of =0.243 .This means that every one-unit change in the
independent variable of education increases empowerment for 0.243 unit. Since t=2.909 and Significance Level, calculated by SPSS, is
0.004 which is less than 0.05, regression coefficient is significant at a 95 percent confidence level; Hence there is a significance relationship
between e-HRM, in terms of education, and empowering staff.
Another independent variable of the research is human resource management in terms of research. Its regression coefficient (t) is 1.986, 2
=0.182 and significance level= 0.049.since it is less than 0.05, so, there is a significant relation between human resource management in
terms of research and empowering staff.
The final independent variable of study is e-HRM in terms of healthcare. Its regression coefficient (t) 2.667, 3 =0.224 and significance
level is 0.009 which is less than error level of 0.05; Thus, there is a significance relationship between e-HRM, in terms of health services,
and empowering staff.
According to table 5 and calculated coefficient for independent variables in this table, research model is shown in figure 2.

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Internat ional Jour nal of Economy, Mana ge ment and Social Sciences , 2(10) October 2013

Figure 2. Research model

6.

Conclusion

Increasing and development of human knowledge, information technology and emerging topics such as virtualization, timely
communication, e-government and e-commerce caused organizations to see more changes at their entities. These factors have caused the
world to become a network of electronic interactions and subsequently, a multitude of approaches changed their nature to resource
management. Regarding this, discussion of the most important resources of an organization i.e. e-HRM, have attracted the attention of
many investigators. This article had three hypotheses tested by multivariate regression .First hypothesis (relationship between e-HRM, in
terms of education, and empowering staff) was accepted. One example of this training is LMS= Learning Management System, a software
that record and track the activities of the trainees. These types of systems could facilitate executive management training programs within
an organization and enable learners to engage in partnerships with peer learners. Using e-Learning management reduce transportation and
workshop tools, reduce training time, train A large number of students in a short period, reduce urinary problems associated with
registration and course selection process and subsequently, decrease costs and supply all supplemental educational materials without having
to visit the library, and more.
Second hypothesis of the study (relation between human resource management, in terms of research, and empowering staff )was also
accepted. The use of electronic research services reduce costs of research, increase research speed, capacity and skills in information
acquisition, and have chat rooms available for sharing background research and interacting among researchers, regardless of spatial
dimension. In this regard, human resource management from the perspective of the electronics can help many problems and can lead to the
empowerment of human resources.
Final hypothesis, whose dependent variable was e-HRM in terms of health services, was also accepted. One example of this is Electronic
filing for Patients. Following increasing pressure to reduce costs and improve the quality and effectiveness of services, The need for health
care is felt more than ever; In a way that other paper records and manual system are not enough to meet the needs of today's modern
medicine. Here, the electronic records are used as a tool to meet the challenges of the medical centers. In this regard, e-HRM in term of
health services, can empower human resources in service sector.

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