The role of religion and social capital on employees’ performance: An empirical study post Indonesia’s Islamic bank merger

The rapid development technology and information competition resulted companies to switch their strategies and operations including merger to obtain competitive advantage. Despite, the most population is Muslim, compared to con- ventional bank, Islamic bank market share in Indonesia is still stagnant in 5%. This research investigates how employees’ religiosity influences the mediator variables, such as structural, cognitive, and relational social capital, which subsequently influences Indonesian Islamic banking performance post-merger. The sample con- sists of 675 Islamic bank employees. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to test the research hypotheses through three studies. The empirical results indicate that religiosity positively affects employees’ social capital, precisely when employ- ees have frequent communication and interaction, which also has a strong corre- lation to employees’ share language, value, trust, and reciprocity. Furthermore, mediator variables, such as structural, cognitive, and relational social capital, have a partial role in religiosity and employees’ performance. This study was limited to Indonesian Islamic bank employees. Therefore, future studies are needed to