From Digital Governance to Public Value: The Mediating Role of Digital HRM in Public Service Organizations

This study examines how digital governance (DG) contributes to public value (PV) in a large, service-intensive public organization and tests whether digitally enabled human resource management practices (DHRM) transmit this effect. Using a cross-sectional survey of employees in Egypt Post (n = 278), items were measured on a five-point Likert scale and analyzed with reliability diagnostics, validity assessments (CFA, CR, AVE, HTMT), and regression-based mediation with 5000 bootstrap resamples. All scales showed strong internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha: DG = 0.903, DHRM = 0.948, PV = 0.923) and convergent validity (AVE greater than 0.50). Discriminant validity was confirmed via HTMT (less than 0.85). The study finds that DG was positively associated with PV (beta = 0.773, p less than 0.001) and with DHRM (beta = 0.818, p less than 0.001). DHRM was also positively associated with PV when controlling for DG (beta = 0.332, p less than 0.001). Bootstrapping confirmed a significant indirect effect of DG on PV through DHRM (a times b = 0.281; 95% CI [0.156, 0.424]), indicating partial mediation. This study advances public value scholarship by specifying DHRM as a micro-foundation linking governance capacity to value outcomes, demonstrating the partial mediation mechanism in an under-researched Middle Eastern public-sector context, and providing empirical evidence that digital transformation yields higher public value when governance arrangements are translated into workforce routines and capabilities via digital HRM. Implications: The findings suggest that public managers should treat HR digitalization as a core implementation mechanism alongside governance reforms.