A Study On The Impact Of Employee Guanxi Upon Knowledge Sharing

In the era of knowledge economy, the knowledge is playing an increasingly prominent role in social activities, and the knowledge of the enterprises is becoming the main resources to their success. Thus, the competition among the enterprises gradually turns to knowledge acquisition and usage. Comparing the difficulties and randomnesses to acquire knowledge from the outside, enterprises realized that they should manage and use their existing knowledge resources effectively in the first place, and promoting knowledge sharing among employees is considered as the key to achieve the goal. However, the theoretical research and practical experience show that, it is not easy to achieve knowledge sharing among employees, and not every employee is willing to share their knowledge with colleagues. Knowledge sharing among employees will be impacted by the ability of the knowledge subject, guanxi between knowledge subjects, social and organizational environment, and other factors.In Chinese society, guanxi has a major impact on thinking and behavior of Chinese. And in Chinese enterprise, when employees in face of whether share their knowledge to their colleagues, they will consider the guanxi between them first. Through the literature review, the current researches, which concern employee guanxi as well as the relation of employee guanxi and knowledge sharing, do not answer the following questions clearly, including:(1) What is the connotation and inner structure of employee guanxi? (2) What is the impact mechanism of employee guanxi upon knowledge sharing? (3) How the employee guanxi development stage impact the relation of employee guanxi and knowledge sharing? To answer these questions, this study takes the ordinary employees in the enterprise as the study object, and discusses the process of employee guanxi impacting knowledge sharing from the static and dynamic perspective separately. The entire study includes three stages, and the innovation points as well as main conclusions of each stage are as follows:First, this study develops the measurement scale of employee guanxi which has high reliability and validity. Specifically, after the literature review and semi-structural network questionnaire survey, this study defines employee guanxi as the judgment and understanding of the employee upon the special tie between he and his colleague according to the information from his own memory as well as the external environment. At the same time, this study divides employee guanxi into 4 dimensions, including:guanxi of affection, guanxi of instrument, guanxi of obligation and guanxi of etiquette, and this study develops the measurement scale of employee guanxi which consists of 4 dimensions and 15 items.Second, this study builds the study model:employee guanxi—knowledge sharing motivation—knowledge sharing, illustrates the relations among the three concepts, and tests the mediating effect of knowledge sharing motivation empirically. Specifically, based on Chinese social behavior theory, cognitive theory of motivation, and social exchange theory, this study builds the model of employee guanxi impacting knowledge sharing, and tests the model empirically. Analysis results show that employee guanxi impacts knowledge sharing through knowledge sharing motivation completely. And 4 dimensions of employee guanxi impact knowledge sharing differently on direction and strength. Guanxi of affection, guanxi of obligation and guanxi of etiquette have the positive impact on knowledge sharing, thereinto, guanxi of obligation has the maximum impact, and guanxi of etiquette has the minimum impact. Besides, guanxi of instrument has the negative impact on knowledge sharing.Third, this study builds the moderate effect model of employee guanxi development stage, and empirically tests the moderating effect of employee guanxi development stage in employee guanxi impacting knowledge sharing motivation. Specifically, on the basis of former relevant researches, this study divides employee guanxi development stage into 3 stages, which include stage of direction, stage of interactive contact and stage of stable communication. Then this study takes employee guanxi development stage as a moderating variable, and explores its moderating effect. Analysis results show that, as the development of employee guanxi, the impact of 4 dimensions of employee guanxi upon 4 dimensions of knowledge sharing motivation will change differently.In general, taking employee guanxi, knowledge sharing motivation and knowledge sharing as the core concepts, this study has some theoretical and practical significance. This study deepens the understanding of employee guanxi, expands and deepens the antecedent reserach of knowledge sharing, and enriches the research of employee guanxi impacting knowledge sharing from the dynamic perspective. This study will help the employees to behavior rationally; also will help the enterprises taking effective measures to promote knowledge sharing among employees. The conclusions of the study explain that:employees could only understand the guanxi with colleagues after collecting information widely; employees should pay attention to the multi-dimensional characteristic of guanxi in interpersonal interaction; enterprises could promote knowledge sharing among employees through adjusting employee guanxi;enterprises should formulate knowledge sharing incentive measures based on the characteristic of the guanxi among employees.