IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v17y2025i18p8347-d1751656.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Decoding the Green Code: Digital Technology, Talent Re-Structuring, and the Path to Green Innovation Efficiency

Author

Listed:
  • Xiaochuan Guo

    (School of Management, Shanghai University, Shanghai 200444, China)

  • La Tao

    (School of Management, Shanghai University, Shanghai 200444, China)

  • You Chen

    (School of Management, Shanghai University, Shanghai 200444, China)

Abstract

The manufacturing sector’s pursuit of green transformation amidst the digital revolution presents a critical challenge. Using a comprehensive panel dataset from 2012 to 2022, we analyze how digital technology, through its influence on a firm’s human capital structure, impacts green innovation. Our findings show that digital technology significantly boosts a firm’s green innovation efficiency. We identify two distinct mechanisms: digitalization indirectly enhances efficiency by reconfiguring the workforce to decrease the proportion of production personnel, while it directly drives innovation by increasing the share of sales and technical staff. The analysis also reveals a dual effect of an expanding internal compensation gap, which intensifies the displacement of production workers while weakening the firm’s ability to attract and retain core talent. Further heterogeneity analysis reveals that the impact of digital technology on green innovation efficiency is more significant in high-tech industries, non-capital-intensive industries, and non-heavily polluting industries. These findings provide a deeper understanding of the interdependent mechanisms linking digital transformation to sustainable innovation, offering valuable insights for managers and policymakers aiming to strategically align digital, human, and organizational factors for green development.

Suggested Citation

  • Xiaochuan Guo & La Tao & You Chen, 2025. "Decoding the Green Code: Digital Technology, Talent Re-Structuring, and the Path to Green Innovation Efficiency," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(18), pages 1-29, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:18:p:8347-:d:1751656
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/18/8347/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/18/8347/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:18:p:8347-:d:1751656. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.