|
|
A multilevel analysis of impacts of knowledge governance on individual knowledge sharing behavior
Zhang Shengtai, Wang Yazhou, Zhang Yongyun, Pei Yanlin
2015, 36(2):
133-144.
The Knowledge governance is the system guarantee of the knowledge management activities. Knowledge governance guides, incentives and constraints knowledge behaviors at a system level. It balances the interests of the parties of knowledge activities, and promotes the benefit optimization of knowledge activities. The knowledge sharing behaviors under the influence of knowledge management are a kind of behavior process and also the result of an organization system arrangement. Many scholars study the influence of knowledge management on knowledge sharing behavior from different sides. But the conclusion is instable due to influential factors, relation variables and constraining conditions. In addition, the inner affect mechanism of the knowledge management on knowledge sharing need further deeply explored. Finally, from organizational level, knowledge governance is the organizational level variables. Individual knowledge sharing is the individual level variables. Existing literature that analyze the affect mechanism of knowledge governance on knowledge sharing less use hierarchical analysis method that integrate organization and individual two aspects. So the research conclusions need to test and verify. Therefore, based on the shortage of the existing literature research, this paper analyzes the relationship of knowledge management on knowledge share behavior through introducing Perceived organizational support as intermediary variable. According to the literature review on knowledge governance, Perceived organizational support and individual knowledge sharing behavior, this study proposed four hypotheses as below:(1) Formal knowledge governance is positively related to informal knowledge governance;(2) Formal knowledge governance is positively related to individual knowledge sharing behavior;(3) Informal knowledge governance is positively related to individual knowledge sharing behavior;(4) Formal knowledge governance is positively related to perceived organizational support;(5) Informal knowledge governance is positively related to perceived organizational support;(6) Perceived organizational support is positively related to individual knowledge sharing behavior;(7) Perceived organizational support mediate the relationship between formal knowledge governance and individual knowledge sharing behavior;(8) Perceived organizational support mediate the relationship between Informal knowledge governance and individual knowledge sharing behavior. In order to verify the effectiveness of these hypotheses, Data were obtained from 621 employees in 140 knowledge groups of North China. Of the sample, 53.62% were male, 89.05% were bachelor degree or above, 76.97% have 5 years or more length of service, 87.76% were junior staff. As for the measurement of different variables, this study depended on a series of mature scales. Specifically, Formal knowledge management and informal knowledge management were measured using the measurement of the governance of formal and informal knowledge governance knowledge scale developed by Cao (2012); perceived organizational support using the questionnaire compiled by Eisenberger; the knowledge sharing behavior using a set of effective and reliable knowledge sharing behavior scale developed by Yi. The Coefficient alpha values of all the scales indicated that they were appropriate to aggregate the data. Based on the credibility and validity of the questionnaire, this study conducted the descriptive statistics and correlations for all variables as well as hierarchical linear model between organization and individual member to test all hypotheses above. Our result indicated that, as expected, (1) in the field of knowledge management, perceived organizations support was the bridge between organizational knowledge governance and individual knowledge sharing behavior. Knowledge management activities of Organizational level influence knowledge sharing behavior of employees through the formal knowledge governance on one hand, but more important is to indirectly influence to employee knowledge sharing behavior through perceived organizational support. (2) The influence of the organizational knowledge governance on individual knowledge sharing behavior was the result of multi-level interactions and complex process. Formal knowledge governance of Organizational level affect individual knowledge sharing behavior through three ways as follow: direct effect, indirect effects through informal knowledge governance and indirect effects through perceived organizational support. Informal knowledge governance influences the individual knowledge sharing behavior in single way indirect through perceived organizational support. Our study thus contributes to a better understanding of the 'black box' phenomenon that links organizational knowledge governance to individual knowledge sharing behavior and enriches knowledge of the knowledge management theory. The results from this study have practical implications for enterprise knowledge management. First, enterprises need to effectively create perfect knowledge governance mechanism. Second, the leader should pay more attention to employee's perceived organizational support. Although this study makes a number of contributions to the extant literature, there are limitations that must be highlighted. The first limitation is the samples data collected is limited in region and industry. The Second limitation is the division of knowledge governance needs further research. Another limitation is that the intermediary variable, effect path and mechanism need further exploration. The above three questions will be the direction of future research and improvement.
References |
Related Articles |
Metrics
|
