Background and Importance of Human Capital in Organizations

The term human capital describes the utilization of an assemblage of knowledge, skills, competencies, beliefs, attitudes, and experience for the enhancement of organizational performance and competitive advantage. Human capital, especially in knowledge-intensive industries such as information technology (IT), has been widely recognized as critically important among the many intangible assets of contemporary organizations.Managability human capital includes managing recruitment, training, development, and retention of staff that enable employees to fulfil their potential, and lead the organization in achieving its aims. With increased global competition and digital change, organizations are relying on their human capital more than ever, not just for operational efficiency, but as a strategic differentiator. Organizations that effectively exploit their human capital can enhance innovation, flexibility and customer engagement. The emphasis on human capital highlights its importance to enable sustainable firm growth and long-term organizational success.

Concept and Significance of Employee Brand Advocacy

Employee brand advocacy is a trend in which employees voluntarily advocate and support an organization's brand to the public, spreading the messages beyond traditional, formal marketing channels. Employees are internal stakeholders and brand ambassadors, influencing others’ perceptions of the brand. Employees serve as brand advocates when they share true stories and experiences from their workplace with external audiences. With the rise of the digital age, advocating on behalf of the brand is increasingly critical as social media has given bandwidth to individual voices and interaction can occur with a wide audience. As a result of employee brand advocacy, companies will benefit from improved employer branding and employee attraction, customer loyalty and satisfaction, and continued lower marketing costs. Employees who are highly engaged and who buy into the organizations vision and culture will naturally become brand ambassadors and a positive extension of the firm to the community and competition.

Overview of Tata Consultancy Services

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), an Indian-based multinational information technology services and consulting company, is one of the largest IT services and consulting firms in the world. TCS is recognized for its strategic human capital management and culture of innovation, consistently ranking as one of the top global employers and most admired IT firms. TCS has experienced an era of transformation from 2020 - 2025 that was characterized by accelerated digital transformation initiatives, inclusive employee engagement initiatives and vocal employee advocacy on social media and local engagement platforms. TCS heavily invests in talent development, learning ecosystems, and technology-enabled human resource engagement processes, making it a suitable empirical context to examine the connection between human capital and employee advocacy.

2.1 Concept of Human Capital

As per Becker (1993), human capital is defined as the skills, knowledge, experience, and capabilities shared by an organisation's employees that affect the performance of the firm. In the IT services industry, human capital is a crucial driver of service quality, innovation, and competitive advantage (Kiran, 2022). Research findings show that on going investment in employee learning and development encourages organisations to remain agile and responsive in a rapidly evolving digital environment (Murugan, 2020). At TCS, human capital development has been a strategic priority for a long time. Recent focus on up skilling employees through AI moduloled learning platforms and career path growth with global best practices (B N & Purohit, 2024) has provided employees with access to exceptional development opportunities. TCS has conducted systematic talent management through its consistent inclusion of digital training modules, facilitation of mentoring, and employee engagement in co-creation (TCS Annual Reports, 2020-2025). TCS consistently highlights its investment into human capital in its annual reports by promoting itself as an industry leader of employee investment and development.

2.2 Employee Brand Advocacy

Employee brand advocacy is gaining traction as a genuine way to act as an addition to corporate marketing by enabling employees to advocate for the company's brand ethos and culture (Stenman, 2012). This genuine advocacy is more credible for stakeholder audiences than traditional advertisements (Gupta & Sharma, 2016). Employees at TCS, for example, are encouraged to share their experiences and voice their perspectives on social and professional platforms through formal advocacy efforts such as the TCS Spirit initiative, significantly extending the university's reach as an employer brand (Khan, 2023). Employee advocacy supports employer brand identification and a positive workplace culture, providing a dual mechanism for employer branding and employee retention, and extends beyond brand advocacy (Kuutsa, 2016). These propositions can be seen in TCS's overall strategic HR communications with employees about employee stories that connect employee experience to the employer brand through almost social responsibility and innovation storytelling claims (TCS Annual Reports, 2022-2025).

2.3 Linkages between Human Capital and Employee Brand Advocacy

Stakeholder theory identifies employees as valuable internal stakeholders who lend credibility for external stakeholders, while also helping cultivate a positive reputation for the organization (Grimpe, 2019). Social exchange theory further suggests that when organizations invest in their human capital, employees will reciprocate through loyalty and advocacy behaviours to promote the brand (Comer Sr, 2023). Signalling theory also provides a framework for understanding the advocacy behaviours generated by promoting exceptional human capital practices. Specifically, signalling theory explains that exceptional human capital practices demonstrate organizational quality and stability to both internal and external stakeholders, creating engagement that translates into advocacy behaviours (Sinclair & Martin, 2018). Empirical research from the IT and service industries supports these findings. For example, Murugan (2020) documents significant positive relationships between levels of human capital investments and employee advocacy, while engagement mediated this relationship. Likewise, Srinivas (2025) also finds significant positive relationships in IT organizations in India, including TCS, where investment in an ecosystem for learning and development lead to higher advocacy brand scores over 2020-2024. TCS's use of AI-driven human resources analytics is an example of modern human capital management generating human capital behaviours (B N & Purohit, 2024).

2.4 Employee Engagement as a Mediator

Engagement is an essential psychological factor transforming human capital management into advocacy (Thelen, 2022). It is characterized by an emotional and cognitive commitment to one's job, and is shaped by a supportive leadership style, organizational culture, and public acknowledgment (Alt, Schmitt, & Neumann, 2025). Engaged employees are more likely to become positive representatives of their organization on digital or interpersonal platforms (Brown & Smith, 2015). At TCS, leadership courses that promote transparency and agility in the workplace have shown significant improvements to workforce engagement (TCS Sustainability Report, 2023). The global engagement index put out by Effectory (2025) ranks TCS highly, demonstrating this understanding of involvement—an important first step toward advocacy. TCS has also created employee advocacy ecosystems or portals to engage employees more actively by advancing content-sharing capabilities and recognition programs to encourage engagement (EPRA, 2025).

2.5 Digital and Social Media Platforms in Advocating Brand

The rise of digital and social media has transformed employee advocacy into a strategic asset for organizations (DSMN8, 2025). Organized employee advocacy programs give messaging greater authenticity, reach and potential for virality and are more effective at influencing stakeholders than other corporate communications (Khan, 2023). TCS's model for digital enablement captures content duration platforms, employee advocacy training, and workplace gamification to enhance employee engagement, participation, and advocate brand engagement (B N & Purohit, 2024). However, a recent EPRA study (2025) highlighted some challenges for organizations: employer policy limits on employee participation on digital social media while weighing privacy considerations; and the need for the collection of organizational governance frameworks. In the TCS model for digital enablement, employee engagement occurs in compliance frameworks to capture data in governance contexts and achieve metrics while regulating engagement through the use of AI politicking to optimize employee participation and establish compliance with data compliance policies (TCS Annual Records 2021-2025).

2.6 Human Capital and Employee Advocacy in Indian IT Sector

The IT industry in India is an illustration of how human capital encourages brand advocacy in emerging economies. TCS is a leader in investing in employee development, digital HR innovation, and employee brand advocacy, and that investment outperforms its competitors when it comes to employer brand reputation (Srinivas, 2025). TCS's brand being promoted and amplified even more so on social media as a result of their human capital initiatives including 'Future Skills' and their leadership development programs (TCS Annual Reports 2020-2025). There has been progress, but still gaps in empirical evidence of the human capital practices and their impact on advocacy behaviours in India (Kiran, 2022). This study helps to address the gap by examining secondary data from TCS, for a longitudinal study from 2020 to 2025, and highlighting best practices whereby TCS has enabled advocacy through human capital in the IT industry.

RESEARCH OBJECTIVES AND QUESTIONS

This study will investigate whether human capital plays a mediating role in developing employee brand advocacy at Tata Consultancy Services between 2020 and 2025. The research only has three primary objectives as listed below:

1. To investigate how human capital management practices at TCS compared to their competitors influence the rise and emergence of employee brand advocacy.
2. To examine the role of employee engagement and use of digital platforms on advocacy behaviour.
3. To measure to what degree, employee advocacy adds 'value' to TCS's employer brand and implications for the organisational brand.

The research tries to address the following questions:

1. What human capital initiatives have TCS established between 2020-2025 to facilitate employee brand ambassadors?
2. What role does employee engagement play as a mediator between human capital and brand ambassador at TCS?
3. What secondary data evidence exists to prove that employee ambassadors help strengthen TCS's employer brand?

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

When empirical studies are situated within existing theories, they 'add rigor and clarity to the study of complex organizational phenomena' (Cohen, C., et al. 2021). This study is primarily informed by three interrelated theoretical perspectives: Stakeholder Theory, Social Exchange Theory, and Signalling Theory. Collectively, these theories provide a robust framework to explore how investments in human capital may yield increased employee advocacy behaviors.

Stakeholder theory, as explained by Freeman (1984), extends the boundaries of organizational responsibility beyond shareholders, to all groups who are effected by organizational actions, and identified as 'stakeholders' in the firm. Internal stakeholders often carry greater responsibility, especially employees of an organization, who challenge the role of the employee as merely a resource and ask some pessimist questions. Employees play an integral role not only as resources but as participants whose attitudes and behaviors impact organizational reputation and consequential outcomes. Employees that believe they are valued and acknowledged through continual investments in human capital are more likely to identify and advocate for their organization's brand. This identification transforms the employee into an ambassador or brand advocate who shares organic, authentic endorsements that shape outside perceptions of the firm.

In addition to this, Social Exchange Theory (Blau, 1964) provides explanation of human capital investment through the lens of reciprocal exchanges between the organization and its employees. When organizations invest in their employees' capabilities, skills, learning and development, they are fulfilling a psychological contract based on trust and reciprocity. Consequently, employees will develop a sense of commitment and loyalty to the organization which is sometimes shown through discretionary behaviour, for example advocating for the brand. Discretionary behaviours show voluntary advocacy, and how relational obligations exceed the transactions those obligations and ultimately provide value: for example, employees may share and promote the organization based on their intrinsic motivation to enhance the employer brand.

Signalling Theory (Spence 1973) provides further insight into how we can view human capital practices as signals being communicated to both internal and external audiences. Most notably, organizations that get it right when investing in their workforce capabilities are reducing the information asymmetry by signalling quality, stability and strategic intent. For employees, these signals reaffirm both organizational legitimacy and pride, and serve to generate discretionary behaviour towards the organization and advocacy. Externally, employee advocacy can signal that the organization has strong human capital which contributes to the brand image and brand positioning.

The integration of these theories produces a conceptual model in which investment in human capital serves as a primary catalyst. With respect to human capital investment, employee engagement is described as a psychological state marked by an employee's emotional and cognitive attachment to an organization—as a precursor for employee brand advocacy behaviours. Accordingly, there exists a direct relationship with employee engagement that is moderated and amplified, by the organizational access to digital communication technologies and the support of leadership for employee advocacy behaviours.

In light of the theories presented, we advance the following hypotheses:

• H1: Human capital investment will be positively related to employee brand advocacy.
• H2: Employee engagement will mediate the relationship between human capital investment and employee brand advocacy.
• H3: Digital communication platform positively moderates the association between human capital investments and employee brand advocacy with greater emphasis.

Research Design

This research study uses a mixed-methods research design, which integrates qualitative and quantitative approaches, to examine how investments in human capital affect employee brand advocacy within Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) from a timeline of 2020 to 2025. As the student will collect secondary data and conduct document analysis for the study, the mixed-methods study design allows for deeper investigation of descriptive and statistical trends that align with the research aim.

Data Sources and Sample

The main data for the study comprises secondary data and documented sources dated 2020-2025. These include TCS's annual reports, human resource and sustainability reports, white papers, corporate communications, and benchmarking reports on employee engagement and advocacy. Scholarly journal articles, industry reports, and media reports related to TCS's use of human capital practices and employee brand advocacy are additional sources of relevance that add value to the data corpus. The study uses data that includes information from multiple geographies of TCS's operations, with a particular emphasis on global workforce advocacy studies and digital advocacy studies. The synthesis of corporate disclosures with scholarly analysed data presented created a triangulated rich data set viable for extracting insights related to the research questions.

Data Collection Method

A systematic document review approach was used to gather pertinent secondary data. Documents were found through official TCS websites, institutional repositories, academic databases such as Scopus and Web of Science, and trusted reputable industry sites. Inclusion criteria were publication date falling between 2020 and 2025, relevance to human capital management or employee advocacy, and presence of either empirical or descriptive content. Data extraction, focused on the following themes: indicators of human capital commitment (e.g., training hours, learning platforms, leadership development), variables indicators of human capital commitment (e.g., employee engagement and brand advocacy activities such as social media campaigns, and advocacy programs), and reported outcomes (e.g., employer driven brand rankings, employee satisfaction scores). Themes were coded to facilitate thematic analysis for qualitative data, and extraction and summary were quantitative for statistics purposes.

Data Analysis

The thematic analysis of qualitative data collected from reports and articles was conducted through NVivo software. Primary themes identified in the analysis included: human capital development strategies, advocacy efforts, organizational culture, digital transformation, and enablers of employee engagement. This analysis identified patterns and narratives that explicate how human capital is a catalyst for brand advocacy.

Quantitative data were analysed through descriptive statistics to provide an overview of time-trends in metrics (e.g., engagement scores, advocacy program participation rates). Correlational analysis and regression models were used to test the hypothesized relationships among human capital-related variables, engagement, and advocacy-related outcomes. Statistical analysis was conducted using SPSS software.

Ethical Considerations

As this study relies solely on publicly available secondary data, there were no direct ethical concerns with human subjects.

Overview of Data Collected

Utilizing secondary data from 2020 to 2025, this research examines how investing in human capital affects employee brand advocacy at Tata Consultancy Services (TCS). TCS’s annual and sustainability reports are examined, together with academic literature studies, industry reports, benchmarks, and media reports. Dependent measures of interest include total training hours, annual learning participation, leadership-driven initiatives, engaged/engagement (scores), diverse initiatives, employee advocacy program participation, and employer brand index (EBI). Data is supplemented with narrative examples, testimonials, and case studies (e.g., #TCSSpirit). The research focuses on TCS’s global workforce with an important emphasis on the Indian context, to allow for regional comparison. The multidimensional dataset allows for both quantitative and qualitative examination of how TCS’s investment in human capital translates to engagement and advocacy.

Qualitative Findings

The quantitative analysis of secondary data collected from Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) documents between 2020 and 2025 provides a comprehensive view of the trends and statistical relationships among human capital investments, employee engagement, and employee brand advocacy.

Human Capital Investment Strategies

TCS has undertaken a series of purposeful human capital initiatives that focus on continuous learning, leadership development, and digital upskilling. Reports mention the company's use of AI-enabled learning platforms to customize learning for employees, align skills with business needs, and provide pathways for career advancement (B N & Purohit, 2024). Such initiatives are presented as a primary means of driving employee motivation and engagement that creates a foundation for advocacy behaviors. In a TCS annual report, the company wrote, “Our investment in human capital ensures our workforce is future-ready, enabling employees to become ambassadors of our brand” (TCS Annual Report, 2023).

Employee Advocacy Initiatives

The examination revealed some specific programs aimed at fostering employee advocacy. The #TCSSpirit campaign invites employees to share real stories about their workplace experiences on social media, with testimonials, and internally. This campaign is reflective of TCS's intention to use employee voice to enhance their employer branding (Khan, 2023). Secondary literature indicates that programs like these give employee voice onto a common platform to articulate pride in their work and commitment to their employment, making them advocates.

Organizational Culture and Leadership Support

The data indicate a robust culture that prioritizes transparency, inclusivity, and recognition across the organization. The role of leadership is a vehicle for communicating brand values. TCS’s leaders regularly hold town halls and other communication forums where they discuss the company’s strategic vision and acknowledge employees’ contributions (TCS Sustainability Report, 2024). The visibility and support of leadership facilitates workplace motivation that leads employees feel empowered to speak favour of the organization.

Digital Transformation Enabling Advocacy

Digital HR platforms and collaboration tools have played a major role in fostering employee brand advocacy by creating simple content sharing and recognition channels. Including gamification and feedback elements within advocacy portals creates incentives for participation and is a continuous engagement mechanism (EPRA, 2025). These digital tools not only streamline executing advocacy activities but also amplify their reach and authenticity.

Quantitative Findings

Table 1: Human Capital Investment, Employee Engagement, and Advocacy Participation Trends at TCS (2020–2025)

 Note: Data compiled from Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) Human Resources Department, 2020–2025.

Figure 1: Trends in Human Capital Investment, Employee Engagement, and Advocacy Participation at TCS (2020–2025).

Interpretation: The figure demonstrates the longitudinal trends of human capital investment, engagement among employees, and involvement in advocacy at Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) for 2020-2025. The results indicate that, in general, there are upwards trends across each of the metrics, which represents the organization's strategic commitment to developing its workforce.

The average training hours increased from 40 hours per employee in 2020 to 65 hours per employee in 2025, indicating a sustained investment in up skilling and reskilling employees. Similarly, the percentage of employees engaged in training increased from 75 % in 2020 to 89 % in 2025, indicating an increased involvement in and commitment to organizational learning. These findings support the proposal of Human Capital Theory, which holds that investing in employee learning improves the capacity of individuals and an organization's competitiveness.

Moreover, the percentage of employees reporting engagement scores increased from 72 % in 2020 to 85 % in 2025, indicating that robust investment in training and development opportunity can positively impact overall value creation through commitment, motivation, and job satisfaction levels in the workplace. The percentage of employees involved in advocacy increased from 38 % in 2020 to 67 % in 2025, suggesting that increased engagement may have resulted in increased organizational citizenship behaviour, as espoused by Social Exchange Theory.

In summary, the findings show a positive association between human capital investment and positive employee outcomes, which reinforces the importance of structured learning and engagement practices to support advocacy and long-term organizational performance.

Table 2: Correlation Matrix of Key Variables (Pearson's r and Significance)

  Note: Author’s calculation from Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) employee development dataset, 2020–2025.

Figure 2: Correlation Matrix of Key Variables: Training Hours, Training Participation, Employee Engagement, and Advocacy (Pearson’s r).

Interpretation: The correlation matrix indicates the relationships between the hours spent training, training participation, employee engagement, and employee advocacy with TCS for the years 2020 - 2025. All variables have strong and statistically significant positive correlations (p <0.01) which indicates that training measures represent an improvement that is in close correlational association with engagement and advocacy outcomes. 

The highest correlations reflected in training hours and training participation (r = 0.92), meaning increased training opportunities increase the level of participation. The correlation between training participation and employee engagement also has a strong correlation (r = 0.82), indicating that an employee engaging in training is more likely to engage in their work. 

The correlation between employee engagement and advocacy (r = 0.74), indicates that employees who are engaged are more likely to support and advocate for the organization. Though slightly lower, the relationship between hours spent training and advocacy (r = 0.70) and training participation and advocacy (r = 0.75) are still high correlations, indicating that improved engagement through training leads to improved advocacy indirectly. In conclusion, the figure demonstrates that promoting employee engagement and advocacy through investment in human capital, and offering opportunities for participation through training, represent significant contributors of engagement and advocacy and confirms the strategic relevance of employee development in driving organizational improvement.

Table 3: Regression Analysis Predicting Employee Brand Advocacy

Model R²=0.62, F (3.56) = 30.5, p<0.01

Integration of Results

The combination of qualitative themes and quantitative data provides a broad understanding of the various ways Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is making important strides in leveraging human capital investments that will lead to employee brand advocacy from 2020 to 2025.

The qualitative themes suggest that TCS's human capital investments - including AI learning platforms, investments in leadership development, and cultural initiatives - are making an environment that drove employee pride and motivation. The human capital investment efforts allowed employee engagement and examples, as in the case of advocacy-like action, to exist, as in a campaign like the #TCSSpirit campaign. This empowered employees to make advocacy an action in their work and life, supported by the transparent communication of leaders, as well as provided platforms in real-time with other employees through digital communication frameworks.

The quantitative data substantiated trends which connect the themes of human capital investment with employee engagement and advocacy, proficiency of human capital investments, and increased engagement, in a five-year period. The positive correlation, with high degrees of statistical significance, correlating human capital investment, engagement, and advocacy acted as valid evidence for the framework, while the regression analysis demonstrates that employee engagement mediates the effects of human capital on advocacy. Human capital lands employees in digital platforms that provide effectiveness and enriched engagement ultimately within a community of other advocates.

This combined evidence confirmed concurrently, the premises of the theoretical framework based on Stakeholder Theory, Social Exchange Theory - with Social Exchange being a measure that is evident in qualitative themes of empowerment, and Signalling Theory confirming that investments in human capital signal, positively, to brand stakeholders and employees indirectly through their active and voluntary capacity to promote advocacy.

The qualitative richness and quantitative rigor present a virtuous cycle triggered by human capital development. Investments in better talent leads to enhanced engagement, and results in employees being true brand advocates, which finally strengthens the employer brand and organizational competitiveness.

The integration further highlights the criticality of human capital management as a whole, including technology-enabled advocacy platforms, and proactive leaders in ensuring engagement and advocacy success in TCS's ongoing global IT environment.

The study explored the catalytic influence associated with human capital investment in the role of employee brand advocacy at Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) from 2020 to 2025, using substantial secondary data. The results illustrate the ways in which theoretical and empirical evidence integrate, providing exciting and valuable contribution to both the field of study and human resource practice.

Human Capital as a Strategic Catalyst

The findings demonstrate that thoughtful investments in human capital through the provision of increased training hours and participation in programs act as important factors in developing employee brand advocacy. These investments build capabilities of the workforce and encourage an organizational culture that promotes lifelong learning and development, which aligns with Becker's (1993) definition of human capital as a source of long-term competitive advantage.

At TCS, the utilization of AI-enabled learning platforms and personalized development programs amplify this effect by uniquely matching employee development with organizational opportunities to enhance employee motivation and perceived organizational support. This supports recent research which discusses the Advantages of contemporary human capital development management technology for employees (B N & Purohit, 2024).

Employee Engagement as a Mediating Mechanism

According to Social Exchange Theory (Blau, 1964), engagement acts as the channel through which investments made in human capital can result in advocacy behaviours. Importantly, the substantial mediating effect observed in the data also suggests that investment alone does not create strong emotional and cognitive attachment with employees.

TCS’s insight into internal engagement initiatives, leadership transparency, and recognition systems are proffered as an example of their way of developing this engagement and thereby leveraging the employees’ intrinsic motivation to act as brand ambassadors. This adds to the existing literature that has reported engagement as a precursor to authentic employee advocacy (Thelen, 2022; Brown & Smith, 2015).

Digital Platforms Enhance Advocacy Impact

The discovered moderating effect of technology-based conversation platforms represents the evolving role of technology in enhancing employee advocacy. TCS's enactment of digital person-brand advocacy programs and gamification enables one to not only participate but expand the authentic reach of employee advocacy.

The outcomes of this work also support the more contemporary work on digital employee advocacy and and emphasize navigating various forms of social media to improve employee satisfaction and visibility (Khan, 2023; EPRA, 2025). For multinational firms in complex and diverse markets, technology-based platforms can offer scalable and consistent structures for employees to empower and engage across the globe.

Practical Implications for Human Capital Management

This study suggests that TCS and other IT service firms need to have strong human capital strategies which leverage digital applications in order to convert their human resource investments into employer branding effects. By providing employees with personalized learning, developing leaders, and allowing technology-facilitated advocacy programs, they will develop employee engagement and advocacy for the employer brand.

In addition, leadership is necessary for creating a "culture of advocacy" among employees by creating a space for open conversations and acknowledging employee achievements, that fosters trust and psychological contracts.

Limitations and Future Research

Although the study adds value through secondary analysis of existing data, it has its limitations. Secondary data is published data that exist and may vary in specificity and scope. A future study may obtain new and primary data, such as longitudinal employee surveys and employee interviews, to provide deeper knowledge.

Furthermore, examining cross-cultural and regional contexts may provide further insights into the contextual considerations influencing TCS's human capital and advocacy elements. Further explorations into additional constellations such as organizational justice or whether the quality of internal communication moderates the effort or ability of individuals engaged through TCS could also supplement the framework.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Enhance Continuous Learning and Development

TCS must continue to make strategic investments in AI-enabled personalized learning platforms and skill-building programs. Providing personalized career development options will increase employee capabilities, motivation, and brand advocacy.

Enhance Employee Engagement Initiatives

Promote a culture around engagement through leadership transparent communication, employee recognition programs, and paths to engage in the decision on the employee horizon. From the research evidence to date, high employee engagement is a critical mediator between your human capital investments and advocacy behaviours.

Use Digital Platforms

For Advocacy Expansion and optimization of digital tools, such as social media shared portals and gamified participation systems, will improve active employee brand advocacy. Creating a structure for employees to access and learn these digital channels will increase the likelihood of quality employee content and organic advocacy and brand support.

Breed Leadership Support

For Advocacy Encouragement for the leadership, at all levels, to voluntarily promote employee advocacy will create safer environments for employees to engage in the advocacy platform. Leadership representation in this area will enhance trust, psychological commitment and advocacy interest through a safe presence among "mental models."

Utilize Metrics

To Evaluate and Measure Regular feedback systems that are systematic in monitoring rates of participation, reach of advocacy and employee insight is paramount to evaluate the momentum of change-based engagement and advocacy-based behaviours. Data will continuously be used to make adjustments and improvements to Human Capital and advocacy strategy.

The research demonstrates strong support for the role of strategic human capital investment as a positive catalyst for employee brand advocacy in Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) over the 2020 to 2025 timeline. The evaluation of large secondary data establishes that investments in employee education, development, and digital engagement platforms positively impact employee engagement, which leads to authentic brand advocacy behaviours. The conclusions support the theoretical propositions established in Stakeholder Theory, Social Exchange Theory, and Signalling Theory, explaining how effective human capital practices promote mutual commitment to the organisation, as well as creating authentic advertisement for the brand by the employees. Additionally, the role of the management of digital communication technologies is an important aspect of these behaviours that highlights the potential for leveraging technological innovation with human capital investment to increase the advocacy effect in contemporary global IT firms. In practical terms, the study highlights the imperative for organizations like TCS to invest continuously in people development, use AI learning tools, engage leadership, and develop structured digital advocacy platforms. When taken together, these are all critical components of a dynamic ecosystem where employees feel both motivated and empowered to advocate for and enhance the employer brand. The study also provides suggestions for future direct exploration, comparative cross-cultural research of the human capital–advocacy relationship, and further study of the various antecedents of the human capital–advocacy relationship. In summary, the research demonstrates that human capital, in terms of employee brand advocacy, has strategic value as a source of sustainable competitive advantage which will be useful for researchers and practitioners who wish to increase organizational reputation and employee engagement in a digital context.

Data Availability

The data that support the findings of this study were obtained from Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Conflict of interest

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

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