Green organizational culture, job satisfaction, and work engagement in enhancing sustainable performance

This study examines the effects of green organizational culture and job satisfaction on sustainable performance, positioning work engagement (WE) as both a mediator and moderator in private universities in Indonesia. Using purposive sampling, data were collected from 250 academic and administrative staff across eight private universities. PLS-SEM was used for hypothesis testing and complemented with unsupervised machine learning to extract deeper analytical insights. Specifically, clustering analysis revealed distinct staff engagement profiles that were not observable through traditional Likert-based interpretation alone, enabling a more nuanced understanding of how engagement patterns relate to sustainability outcomes. The results indicate that green organizational culture and job satisfaction significantly influence WE and sustainable performance. Although WE strengthen the relationships between the predictors and sustainable performance as a moderator, its direct effect on sustainable performance is not statistically significant clarifying the specific pathways through which WE operate in the model. WE also mediate the links connecting green organizational culture and job satisfaction with sustainable performance. The findings emphasize the importance of fostering supportive organizational practices to enhance engagement-driven sustainability outcomes. This study contributes to the literature by demonstrating WE’s differentiated mediating and moderating roles in a developing-country context and by illustrating the added analytical value of integrating unsupervised machine learning. Future studies may extend the model to public universities to broaden generalizability.