“Mediation of human resource management in the linkage between performance and culture in an emerging economy”

The linkages between corporate culture, corporate performance, and human resource management (HRM) practice have been broadly investigated, but, none of the previous studieshave analyzeda mediation mechanism in the relevant research models. This article aimed to analyze the complicated linkages among corporate culture, performance, and HRM practice. Especially, it aimed to underline the mediation of HRM in the research model. The research data were collected in Vietnam as one of the quickly developing countries, receiving a humble amount of research on that issue. Multiple regression analyses were employed to scrutinize the causal correlation from corporate culture to performance, while the mediating procedures were applied to investigate the mediating mechanism. The research findings reveal that clan, adhocracy, and market cultures likely improve corporate performance, whereas hierarchy culture nega- tively influences corporate performance. Furthermore, HRM practice was evidenced to partially mediate the effects of clan, market, and hierarchy culture on performance. Nevertheless, it fully mediates the influence of adhocracy culture on performance. This research is one of the first to link HRM practice to the relationship between corpo- rate culture and performance, and then explore HRM mediation. The empirical results could help researchers and business managers in developing economies more deeply understand the complicated links among corporate culture, performance in business, and the mediation of HRM practice to make better decisions on corporate culture and HRM for their enterprises. Ultimately, they can gain better corporate performance.


INTRODUCTION
Recently, enterprises have been struggling to survive and develop in tremendously dynamic business environments (Fekete & Bocskei, 2011). To maintain and achieve success in such turbulent, complicated and uncertain business environments, enterprises have to augment their capability to notice variant in business environments in time and to respond suitably and quickly so that can take promising business opportunities, obtaining competitive advantages (Felipe, Roldán, & Leal-Rodríguez, 2017). Furthermore, various factors improve corporate performance, one of which is corporate culture proposed by Yesil and Kaya (2013). Corporate culture is a combination of common beliefs and assumptions normally shared and effectively held by an enterprise's employees, indicating what is suitable to do (Zhao, Teng, & Wu, 2018). These corporate culture patterns will shape the way the employees behave and adapt to gain the best possible performance.
Corporate culture has been widely deemed extremely important and significant to individuals and enterprises; therefore, a large amount of attention has been paid to this area (Yesil & Kaya, 2013). The causal relationship between corporate culture and performance has been greatly investigated in developed countries (Yusoff, 2011). However, most of the studies have not offered the expected findings. This could be partly because of a lack of important factors in the research model on corporate culture. Numerous previous studies have discussed and investigated the influences of different components of firm culture on performance (Yusoff, 2011; Ali, Said, Abdullah, & Daud, 2017; Kim, 2004;Zhao et al., 2018;Yesil & Kaya, 2013). However, most of them only paid attention to the association from firm culture to performance in a separate model. Almost none of them have taken into account the omission of other factors in the research model of corporate performance and culture, such as HRM practice. Several enterprises located in developing countries, including Vietnam, have been doing their best to compete directly with their rivals in developed economies. To obtain the best successful outcomes, they are obligated to employ the efficient practice of HRM that could be essential effectiveness-improving determinants in responding fast and positively to extremely dynamic business environments. F. Lee, T. Lee, and Wu (2010) revealed there had been an established positive effect of the effective practice of HRM on corporate competitive advantages, leading to higher corporate performance. Based on the contingency viewpoint on HRM, Li, Qin, Jiang, Zhang, and Gao (2015) explained that the relationships among the practice of HRM, job, and corporate performance are conditional upon various other variables. Empirical studies on this point of view have indicated that HRM's effectiveness is contingent on corporate characteristics, including corporate culture.
Besides, a recent review of research by Ali et al. (2017) on the causal relationship between corporate culture and performance discovered that the empirical findings from prior research on this relationship are inconclusive, so suggested more study should be performed to clarify that issue. Whereas Yusoff (2011) illustrated all the four elements of corporate culture that are "clan," "adhocracy," "market," and "hierarchy" affect corporate performance, only one of them positively affects corporate performance. Furthermore, Yesil and Kaya (2013) indicated insignificant evidence on the causal relationship between corporate culture and performance. In contrast, Lee and Kim (2017) explicated all four corporate culture dimensions to significantly influence corporate performance. Potential clarifications for this heterogeneity can be based on missing vital elements in the research model (Surroca, Tribó, &Waddock, 2010). Anchored in the discussions mentioned above, it could propose that when investigating the causal relationship between corporate culture and performance, it should address the identification of missing imperative elements, such as the practice of HRM; and the research should be conducted in an emerging country such as Vietnam.
The next section of this study is the section "Literature review" that will review the related literature, followed by the section "Aim" that emphasizes the research's main purpose. The section "Hypotheses" will propose the research hypotheses. Subsequently, the section "Methods" establishes how to measure the variables used in the research and how the data will be collected. The next section, "Results," tries to explain the findings. Then, the section "Discussion" will give some discussions on the empirical results. Finally, the section "Conclusion" provides a summary of the research.

Causal relationship between corporate culture and performance
According to Al Mamun and Hasan (2017), good corporate culture is recognized as one of the important driving forces, enabling the workers to linger in the enterprise. Therefore, enterprises could draw and stimulate workers by adopting the sound corporate culture, which likely results in improved job performance and so the enterprises can obtain the best possible corporate performance. Lee and Kim (2017) classified corporate culture in four components, which are "clan," "adhocracy," "market," and "hierarchy." As Yesil and Kaya (2013) argued, clan culture refers to an affable workplace for the whole family to work collectively to obtain a common goal. The character-istics of clan culture consist of self-esteem, oath, convention, teamwork, cooperation, involvement, harmony, personality development, and loyalty. Lee and Kim (2017) believed that clan culture highlights agility and flexible power, concentrating on comparative relations within the enterprise where collaboration and involvement are more imperative than formal regulations. This is because clan culture pursues sustainable HRM advantages in high coherence, which is one of the driving forces of firm performance. Previous research affirmed that clan culture likely improves corporate performance since commitment, loyalty, and confidence in the enterprise are the fundamental causes behind the positive linkage between clan culture and corporate performance (Fekete & Bocskei, 2011). Because of the concentration on the association among family members, enterprises in which clan culture occurs may underline the importance of workers' improvement to maintain sustainable competitive advantage and gain the best possible corporate performance (Lee & Kim, 2017). Furthermore, clan culture could generate employees' positive thoughts on the enterprise and engage them in business activities, leading to better organizational performance (Wilkins & Ouchi, 1983).
Grounded on previous researches (Yesil & Kaya, 2013), adhocracy culture is epitomized as a self-motivated, industrial, ingenious, and innovative place of work, which underlines the development of new goods and services, flexibility, expansion, adjustment, effectiveness, and experimentation within the enterprise. Additionally, the adhocracy attribute is recognized as one of the elements of corporate culture reflecting external tendency, that is innovative and reacting better to turbulence in business markets, which help the enterprise to establish a new business, make new products and services, and so achieve superior competitive advantages (Lee & Kim, 2017). An enterprise where adhocracy culture is prevalent tends to adapt itself to turbulence in external business environments, faces uncertainty, and seeks to attain finance and human resources to sustain its growth. As Kim, Lee, and Yu (2004) recommended, adhocracy culture emphasizes the significance of instant and deliberate reactions of workers to external business turbulence, making enterprises notice development to attain their main goal of obtaining competitive advantages. Besides, Yesil and Kaya (2013) revealed that an enterprise with an adhocracy culture would consider changes as business opportunities, stimulating it to succeed. Similarly, J. Iivari and N. Iivari (2011) discovered organizational dynamism is related to adaptableness and suppleness, which is considered the ability of enterprises to adapt to uncertainty in the business environment, helping to achieve the best possible corporate performance. Overall, it could suggest adhocracy culture is a driving force of the corporate performance.
The market culture emphasizes the accomplishment of objectives and the domination of markets, which are oriented to obtain the highest achievement (Yesil & Kaya, 2013). Keeping closer to the client is an important factor for the enterprise to acquire useful market-related information, achieving competitive advantages over its rivals (Waterman & Peters, 1982). The corporate culture oriented to the market could create competitive advantages for the enterprise, resulting in positive corporate performance (Felipe et al., 2017). The external orientation of market culture, such as dedication to forecasting, responding quickly to the market's requests, and aggressive changes can lead to access to a wide set of precious knowledge outside the enterprise. In this line, Worley and Lawler (2010) assented market culture can developexternally oriented attributes that may support workers' uninterrupted relations with other stakeholders. Therefore, it is easier for the enterprise to obtain valued information related to markets, making better business decisions. Standards innate to corporate culture's market attributes are connected to the efficiency and good achievement of objectives (J. Iivari & N. Iivari, 2011). Market culture is an important driving force of firm performance because this kind of culture could help facilitate organizational innovation and flexibility. Generally, the arguments mentioned above suggest that market culture highlights external contexts and the importance of helpfulness, competence, and competitiveness to enhance corporate performance.
Hierarchy culture underlines solidity, power, and internal preservation through rules, which support inescapability, competence, and exactness (Lee & Kim, 2017). Similarly, formal and fixed regulations, well-established procedures, and smooth-running processes within an enterprise are usually viewed as the key attributes of a hierarchy culture (Yesil & Kaya, 2013). This kind of culture tends toimpede knowledge sharing within an enterprise since it is extremely formal and conditional on working measures, regulations, prescribed guides, and rules used to make business decisions (Felipe et al., 2017). Insignificant judgment in business and retaining with care topdown contact, consistency, standardization, and well-arranged measures are considered the internal characteristics of hierarchy culture (Cameron & Quinn, 2011). Such characteristics enable the enterprise to be slowly reacting to turbulence in the business environment because hierarchy culture is inclined to maintain the existing business situation unchanged by retaining regulations and orders instead of adapting itself to the variation in business environments. Fekete and Bocskei (2011) found a negative influence of the hierarchy characteristics of corporate culture on performance. Too much formalization of a hierarchy culture might result in temporary success for an enterprise because it puts enormous emphasis on corporate performance in the short term. However, in the long term, employees and clients become less disturbed and less reactive to corporate growth (Lee &Kim, 2017). Executives who used to work in a hierarchical structure often find it hard to quickly react to changes in business environments to lack flexibility in enhancing their corporate performance (Crocitto & Youssef, 2003). Furthermore, Lee and Kim (2017) provided statistical evidence that corporate culture's hierarchy type negatively determines corporate performance.

AIM
The current paper aims to analyze the mediating role of HRM as a missing linkage in the relationship between corporate culture and performance in Vietnamese businesses. The research also investigates how corporate culture can affect corporate performance.

HYPOTHESES
Grounded on the discussions mentioned above related to the effects of corporate culture on corporate performance, it can lead to the following hypotheses: H1: Clan culture likely has a positive effect on corporate performance.
H2: Adhocracy culture likely has a positive effect on corporate performance.
H3: Market culture likely has a positive effect on corporate performance.
H4: Hierarchy culture likely has a negative effect on corporate performance.
As the arguments mentioned above stressed, corporate culture affects both corporate performance and HRM practice, which influences corporate performance. Based on Baron and Kenny (1986), it could argue that HRM practice likely interferes in the causal relationship between corporate culture and performance, and it can transmit the effect of corporate culture partially or totally through it into corporate performance. These discussions could come to the following hypotheses: H5: The practice of HRM likely mediates the causal relationship between clan culture and corporate performance.
H6: The practice of HRM likely mediates the causal relationship between adhocracy culture and corporate performance.
H7: The practice of HRM likely mediates the causal relationship between market culture and corporate performance.
H8: The practice of HRM likely mediates the causal relationship between hierarchy culture and corporate performance.  (4) "hierarchy" -HI consists of three elements. Drawing on the measurements used in previous studies (Huselid, 1995;Becker & Gerhart, 1996), this research concentrates on the four principal dimensions of "the practice of HRM" -HR that are "training and development," "participation," "payment," and "performance evaluation."Each of the dimensions is calculated with a single element. Corporate performance is evaluated on two items (ROA and ROE), adapted from Lee and Roh (2012)

Data collection
Southeast Asia is one of the most turbulent economic areas. Vietnam is one of the most rapidly developing countries in Southeast Asia; accordingly, enterprises operating there (an emerging economy) are supposed to apply as many sound managerial practices as possible to struggle squarely with the competitors in developed nations. Nevertheless, only a little research on such efficient managerial tools has been analyzed in emerging economies ( The procedures of simple random sampling were undertaken to decide on 600 out of the 1,749 enterprises. The early solicitations were conducted to acquire answers from major informants related to management at the enterprises. One manager involved in management for each of the targeted enterprises was selected to answer the survey questionnaire. Of the 600 questionnaires delivered out, there were only 409 useful responses with satisfactory information, meeting the sample size requirement as Hair, Black,Babin,Anderson, and Tatham (2012) stipulated.

Assessment of instrumental reliability
To analyze the stability of elements within the scales, Cronbach's α analysis was performed, which produced the outcomes in Table  1. According to Hair et al. (2012), the estimates of Cronbach's α should obtain the values of larger than 0.6 to be acceptable, and over 0.7 to be good.
The item-total correlations should get the values of more than 0.5 to be accepted. Moreover, the estimates of Cronbach's α if the item is deleted should be less than their total Cronbach's α to be considered good. As Table 1 shows, the coefficients of Cronbach's α all achieve the values of nearly or over 0.7, and all of the item-total correlations are greater than the 0.5 level. To organize the elements to their latent factors, the exploratory analysis of factors for the variables formed from multiple items was undertaken, the findings of which are presented in Table 2.
The explanatory analysis of factors is a statistical method applied to classify the relations among the variables in the research model, offering a group of items based on the strength of relationships by employing the sample data. The validity analyses of convergence and discriminant were carried out to determine the validity of scales. As Hair et al. (2012) claimed, the validity of convergence is the extent to which several items are consistent with one another. If the factor loadings and communalities exceed the 0.5 level, the data are convergent.
Besides, the validity of convergence is also conditional on the estimates of AVE (Average Variance Extracted) and CR (Construct Reliabilities). The validity of discriminant is the extent to which items in different groups are divergent from one another. If the cross-loadings exceed the 0.3 level, the data is divergent.
According to

Assessment of the causal relationship
To statistically investigate the causal hypotheses, multiple regression analyses were applied to estimate Models 1 and 2, the results of which are exhibited in Table 4

Assessment of mediation
To statistically explore the mediating hypotheses H5-H8, the current research estimated Models 3-5, the outcomes presented in Table 5. The statistical significance for testing mediating effects was estimated using previous research (Goodman, 1960;Krull & MacKinnon, 1999). As shown in Table 5  Note: SD: Standard deviation; M: Mean, ***, **, * show significance at the l%, 5%, and 10% levels (2-tailed); N = 409.   Similar procedures were employed for ROE (see Models 1 and 5). It can propose a mediating effect of HR on the causal relationship between CL, AD, MA, HI and ROE. Subsequently, this research applied procedures proposed by Krull and MacKinnon (1999) and Goodman (1960) to analyze the mediating influences' statistical significance. The analytic procedures generated the results in Table 6. As the figures reveal in The research results are in support of the positive influence of clan culture on firm performance. Clan culture is evidenced as the most important factor in improving corporate performance. This finding indicates that an enterprise where employees share commonalities, behave as part of a big family, try to be active and involved could obtain the best possible corporate performance. On the contrary, adhocracy culture is documented as the least important factor in corporate performance and positively affects corporate performance. Adhocracy culture's lack of complication and bureaucratization makes the enterprises more flexible, which helps respond more quickly to changes in business environments to gain superior corporate performance. This finding contradicts that of Lee and Kim (2017) who discovered a negative influence of adhocracy culture on corporate performance, explaining the great extent of the adhocracy type of culture likely lessens corporate performance. This could be explained that adhocracy culture may promote good attributes in emerging business environments, including Vietnam, in contrast to developed business environments, including Korea, where Lee and Kim (2017) undertook their research.
This research also supports the positive impact of market culture on corporate performance and indicates that it is the second most imperative factor after clan culture to corporate performance. A market culture characterized by the dynamics of competition enables the enterprise to obtain certain performance.
The empirical findings indicate the negative influence of hierarchy culture on firm performance, demonstrating the type of culture based on structure and control likely obstruct organizational growth, leading to worse performance. This result is inconsistent with that by Felipe et al. (2017) who did not discover a negative effect of hierarchy culture on organizational agility as expected; explicating some hierarchy culture attributes might result in more agility. This contradiction can be elucidated that hierarchy culture likely fits better in Vietnam's business environment as an emerging economy than Korea's business environment as a developed economy.
Finally, this research reveals statistical evidence on the mediation the practice of HRM plays in the causal relationship from the elements of corporate culture to the components of corporate performance. If included in the research model of corporate culture and performance, HRM practice will transmit a part of the effects of clan, market, and hierarchy cultures on corporate performance; however, it will transmit the whole influence of adhocracy culture on corporate performance.

CONCLUSION
This research aims to provide directors and researchers with valuable insight into the compound linkages among corporate culture, the practice of HRM, and corporate performance, in which it highlights the mediating function of HRM. The practice of HRM can transmit a part or the whole of corporate culture's effects into corporate performance. Entered into the research model, HRM practice will transmit a part of the effects of clan, market, and hierarchy cultures into corporate performance. Conversely, it will transmit the whole effect of adhocracy culture into corporate performance. These findings could make this research one of the first to link HRM practice to the relationship between corporate culture and performance and then discover the mediating role of HRM in the research model.
The findings are helpful for executive directors in Vietnam and other emerging economies, in general, to make better business decisions on the types of corporate culture that an enterprise should adopt and the styles of HRM it should implement. There are some limitations to the research. First, a single respondent for each enterprise could lead to a bias problem. Future projects should employ other ap-