Online knowledge sharing in a multinational corporation: Chinese and American practices

The project presented in this dissertation addressed two research gaps regarding the area of cross-cultural knowledge sharing through online systems in organizational settings. The first gap is the "what" aspect, i.e. what is organizational members' online knowledge sharing behavior in cross-cultural contexts? The second gap is the "why" aspect, i.e. what factors impact organizational members' online knowledge sharing behavior in cross-cultural contexts?;This dissertation investigated Chinese and American employees' online knowledge sharing behavior within the ShareNet, a global knowledge sharing system adopted by Alpha, a Fortune 100 multinational corporation. The study used a mixed methodology and it was carried out in two stages. During Stage One, content and activity analysis was completed. The participants for this stage were 205 Chinese and 205 American ShareNet users. All of these participants' knowledge sharing behavior within the ShareNet during a specified one-year period of time was analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively in order to answer the first research question "What is American and Chinese users'knowledge sharing behavior in the ShareNet?" During Stage Two, in-depth interviews were conducted with 20 Chinese and 21 American ShareNet users in order to address the second research question "What factors influence American and Chinese users' knowledge sharing behavior in the ShareNet?" All the interviews were conducted with an interview instrument that was developed based on the conceptual framework in this study, which was built on the basis of the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT).;Findings from content and activity analysis show that on average Chinese users contributed knowledge much less frequently than Americans but these two groups were similarly active in terms of consuming knowledge. And in both cultural groups, the majority of users were just knowledge consumers and only a small percent were knowledge contributors. The major content shared in the ShareNet included project-related documents and question asking/answering.;The interview data indicate that national cultural differences, including language, diverse values rooted in collectivism/individualism, and different levels of uncertainty avoidance prevented some Chinese from contributing. Although having negative impact on Chinese users' willingness to contribute knowledge, these national cultural values didn't stop them from consuming knowledge. Organizational issues and online environments influenced both Chinese and American users in similar ways. Participants' knowledge sharing behavior was significantly impacted by organizational issues, including compatibility between knowledge sharing and felt job needs, value of knowledge sharing for advancing job performance, knowledge sharing culture and time pressure. Both Chinese and American users felt the advantages of knowledge sharing through online communities of practice as they took advantage of the strength of weak ties and harvested collective intelligence with minimum efforts. However, they also saw the limitations of merely depending on virtual communities to share knowledge and expressed the preference of turning to personal networks first for help.;This study has extended the current literature by providing empirical findings based on actual knowledge sharing behavior and moved knowledge sharing research toward understanding the complexity of technology-mediated knowledge sharing in cross-cultural contexts. One major contribution of this dissertation is that it has provided sound explanations for cross-cultural knowledge sharing patterns by synthesizing the factors from separate fields including national culture, organizational studies and online communities of practice. Another accomplishment of this study is expanding the UTAUT for future research in cross-cultural knowledge sharing through online media.