Tacit knowledge sharing between IT workers: The role of organizational culture, personality, and social environment

Abstract

Purpose

The transmission of tacit knowledge is crucial to organizations to ensure that individual expertise will be passed throughout a team or department, rather than centred in one employee. It is especially important among information technology (IT) professionals because, in addition to technical knowledge, they deal considerably with a combination of cognition and previous experience to solve daily problems, and implement and develop new systems. The purpose of this paper is to examine how organizational, individual, and environmental factors influence tacit knowledge sharing among IT professionals.

Design/methodology/approach

In this study, the author examines how organizational, individual, and environmental factors influence tacit knowledge sharing among IT professionals. To test the hypotheses, the survey method was chosen and a standard questionnaire was applied. The author obtained a sample of 143 respondents and employed a partial least squares (PLS) analysis to assess the structural and confirmatory models.

Findings

The results indicate that hardworking, responsible, and introverted employees tend to share their tacit knowledge when they feel they are in a supportive and team‐oriented environment, are not overly threatened by competitiveness, and experience good social interactions in the workplace.

Research limitations/implications

The main limitation of this study is its small sample size, which may not capture all relationships. Future research can overcome this limitation and consider the role of organizational commitment and trust as possible mediators.

Originality/value

To practitioners, this study offers information on how organizations can encourage employees to share tacit knowledge. This research provides some support for the assumption that IT professionals should be managed under particular organizational rules by proposing that IT workers have a strategic role regarding the transmission of tacit knowledge.

Citation

Borges, R. (2013), "Tacit knowledge sharing between IT workers: The role of organizational culture, personality, and social environment", Management Research Review, Vol. 36 No. 1, pp. 89-108. https://doi.org/10.1108/01409171311284602