Research On Knowledge Team Members' Knowledge Hiding

In the era of the knowledge-based economy,knowledge workers have become the leading roles in this era.It has become a common practice for modern organizations to build knowledge teams in order to manage their knowledge workers.Although the initial purpose of building knowledge team is to integrate knowledge workers' special and heterogeneous knowledge and skills so that companies could develop knowledge-intensive product or provide knowledge-intensive service,knowledge workers are often hostile to share knowledge.Knowledge team members often hide knowledge from each other.Recent surveys and studies have shown that 76 percent of Northern American knowledge workers and 46 percent of Chinese knowledge workers have hidden knowledge from their coworkers.Approximately 10 percent of everyday knowledge transfer events within teams contain knowledge hiding.Knowledge hiding among knowledge team members has negative effects on both individuals and teams.Therefore,why do knowledge team members hide knowledge from each other? What factors are likely to induce knowledge team members to hide knowledge? What are the consequences of knowledge team members' knowledge hiding? This paper focuses on the antecedents and consequences of knowledge team members' knowledge hiding.It is hoped that this study could not only help practitioners to prevent and reduce knowledge team members' knowledge hiding beforehand,but also eliminate and control the negative consequences of knowledge team members' knowledge hiding afterwards.This study has significant theoretical and practical implications for improving performance and creativity of knowledge teams.Firstly,using the grounded theory qualitative research method,collecting data through in-depth interviews,and drawing upon the theoretical views of Wuli-ShiliRenli System Approach,this study systematically sums up the influencing factors of knowledge team members' knowledge hiding into three main categroies,namely “Wuli Factors”(knowledge attributes factors),“Shili Factors”(team level factors)and “Renli Factors”(knowledge interaction dyadic factors).It finds that the paths from the three main categories to knowledge hiding are different.Then,this study constructs an integrated model of knowledge team members' knowledge hiding influencing factors(Wuli/Shili/Renli-Knowledge Hiding integrated model,abbreviated as WSR-KH).Secondly,based on knowledge power theory,this study investigates the impact mechanism of the knowledge social attribute “perceived ownership of knowledge” from the “Wuli Factors” main category on knowledge team members' knowledge hiding.Multiple linear regression,bootstrapping method,and hierarchical linear modeling were employed to empirically analyze the data gathered by surveys.The results show that: perceived self ownership of knowledge has significantly positive impact on knowledge team members' knowledge hiding;perceived organizational ownership of knowledge has significantly negative impact on knowledge team members' knowledge hiding;knowledge power loss mediates the relationship between perceived ownership of knowledge and knowledge hiding;team performance climate strengthens the positive impact of knowledge power loss on knowledge hiding;team mastery climate weakens the positive impact of knowledge power loss on knowledge hiding.Thirdly,drawing on regulatory focus theory,this study examines the impact mechanism of the “team political climate” from the “Shili Factors” main category on knowledge team members' knowledge hiding.Hierarchical linear modeling was employed to empirically analyze the data gathered by surveys.The results show that: team political climate has significantly positive impact on knowledge team members' knowledge hiding;team members' preventional situational focus mediates the relationship between team political climate and knowledge hiding.Fourthly,based on psychological contract theory,this study investigates the impact mechanism of the knowledge owner's personality traits “the dark triad” from the “Renli Factors” main category on knowledge team members' knowledge hiding.Structural equation model method was employed to empirically analyze the data gathered by surveys.The results show that: the dark triad of personality traits(Machiavellianism,narcissism,and psychopathy)have significantly positive impact on knowledge team members' knowledge hiding;Machiavellians are more likely to adopt evasive hiding strategy;narcissists are more likely to adopt rationalized strategy;psychopaths are more likely to adopt playing dumb strategy;transactional psychological contract mediates the relationship between the dark triad of personality traits and knowledge hiding;gender moderates the relationships between narcissism and psychopathy with transactional psychological contract such that the narcissismtransactional psychological contract and psychopathy-transactional psychological contract relationships are stronger for men than for women;gender also moderates the indirect relationships between narcissism and psychopathy with knowledge hiding via transactional psychological contract such that the indirect relaitonships are stronger for men than for women.Finally,drawing on affective events theory,this study examines the formation mechanism of “knowledge hiding vicious circle” which is one of the most serious consequences of knowledge team members' knowledge hiding.Multiple linear regression and bootstrapping method were employed to empirically analyze the data gathered by surveys.The results show that: knowledge seekers' perceived playing dumb and perceived evasive hiding have significantly positive impact on future knowledge hiding targeted at the initial hiders,thus it could trigger the knowledge hiding vicious circle;whereas knowledge seekers' perceived rationalized hiding has no significantly impact on future knowledge hiding targeted at the initial hiders,thus it could not trigger the knowledge hiding vicious circle;knowledge seekers' negative affect mediates the relationships between perceived playing dumb and perceived evasive hiding with future knowledge hiding targeted at initial hiders;knowledge seekers' perspective taking moderates the relationships between perceived playing dumb and perceived evasive hiding with negative affect,which could help to break the knowledge team members' knowledge hiding vicious circle.