The circular economy advantage: unpacking the effects of hotel employees' involvement in circular economy initiatives

Purpose Drawing from social cognitive theory (SCT), this study explains how active involvement in high value-retention (HVR) circular economy (CE) initiatives leads to increased hotel employees' perceptions of CE facilitating behavior and organizational commitment under the boundary conditions of environmental concerns. Design/methodology/approach A survey with 184 hotel employees involved in CE initiatives was conducted. SPSS v. 31 and Smart PLS-SEM 4 were used to analyze the data. Findings While the direct effect of HVR CE involvement on organizational commitment was not significant, the true value of the model emerges through its indirect mechanism. Specifically, facilitating behavior fully mediated the relationship between HVR CE involvement and organizational commitment. Furthermore, the moderated mediation effect was significant at mean and high levels of individual environmental concerns. Practical implications Practical implications include, but are not limited to, the importance of developing HVR CE initiatives. Hospitality organizations should position employees as core agents of change, supporting them through CE facilitating behaviors and an empowering work environment that enables employees to enact their pro-environmental values. Originality/value This study is among the first to empirically evaluate employees' involvement in HVR CE initiatives within hospitality research. Specifically, the micro-foundational cognitive mechanisms of employees' CE involvement are explained.