Digital Leadership and Sustainable Human Resource Management Practices: Evidence from Emerging Asian Enterprises

DOI

10.2991/978-94-6239-624-1_42How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Digital leadership; Sustainable HRM; Organizational performance; Digital transformation; Emerging Asia; Human capital sustainability

Abstract

Purpose:

This paper investigates how digital leadership (DL) enables sustainable human resource management (SHRM) and, in turn, improves organizational performance (OP) in emerging Asian enterprises. It aims to provide mixed-method, cross-country evidence on the DL–SHRM–OP pathway.

Design/methodology/approach:

A sequential mixed-method design was employed across Vietnam, Thailand, and Malaysia. Phase 1 comprised 10 semi-structured interviews with HR and digital transformation leaders to identify mechanisms and contextual nuances of SHRM implementation. Phase 2 surveyed 210 managers and tested the conceptual model using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) with bootstrapped mediation analysis. Qualitative themes were used to triangulate and interpret SEM results, including cross-country differences.

Findings:

SEM results indicate that DL positively influences SHRM (β = 0.61, p < 0.001) and SHRM positively affects OP (β = 0.53, p < 0.001). The direct DL → OP path remains significant (β = 0.18, p = 0.011), confirming SHRM as a partial mediator. Interview insights further explain how digital learning, employee well-being, and ethical governance translate leadership capabilities into measurable performance outcomes under varying institutional contexts.

Practical implications:

The findings provide a practical playbook for ASEAN enterprises: build leadership capabilities for agility and digital ethics, institutionalize SHRM through measurable HR sustainability KPIs, and use HR analytics with appropriate governance to strengthen performance and resilience.

Originality/value:

This study advances digital leadership and SHRM research by offering mixed-method, cross-country evidence from emerging Asian enterprises and by clarifying SHRM’s mediating role in linking DL to performance outcomes.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Thu Hong Võ
AU  - Thiên Thông Minh Hồ
AU  - Hiếu Trung Nguyễn Vũ
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/04/06
TI  - Digital Leadership and Sustainable Human Resource Management Practices: Evidence from Emerging Asian Enterprises
BT  - Proceedings of the International Conference on Sustainable Economics and Finance in the Digital Business Transformation (INCOSEF 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 573
EP  - 584
SN  - 2352-5428
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6239-624-1_42
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6239-624-1_42
ID  - Võ2026
ER  -