Employee Resistance as a Boundary Condition of Customer Focus Effectiveness in Post-LIMS Forensic Laboratory Productivity

HRMARS - This study examines employee resistance as a boundary condition shaping the effectiveness of customer focus on firm productivity after Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS) implementation in Sharjah Forensic Laboratory, UAE. Grounded in the Resource-Based View, customer focus is treated as an organizational quality resource that can improve productivity when service-user needs, feedback, and responsiveness are translated into daily laboratory practices. Employee resistance is examined as a behavioral condition that may alter the extent to which this customer-oriented capability becomes productive in a post-LIMS environment. A quantitative survey design was used with 121 usable responses from laboratory employees, and the data were analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) with bootstrapping. The selected constructs demonstrated strong reliability and validity: customer focus (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.927, composite reliability = 0.929, AVE = 0.734), employee resistance (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.916, composite reliability = 0.916, AVE = 0.707), and firm productivity (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.881, composite reliability = 0.885, AVE = 0.738). The results show that customer focus was positively and significantly related to firm productivity (beta = 0.421, t = 2.985, p = 0.001). More importantly, employee resistance significantly moderated this relationship (beta = 0.384, t = 2.415, p = 0.001), indicating that the productivity value of customer focus depends on employees’ acceptance of post-LIMS quality and service practices. The study contributes by showing that customer focus is not merely a service principle but a productivity resource whose effectiveness is behaviorally contingent in technology-enabled forensic laboratory settings.