Empowering management's capacities for improved knowledge sharing-a moderating effect of grit
Description
The unpredictable business environment presents companies with various challenges. Stable companies are able to react quickly thanks to a successful knowledge sharing. To motivate employees to actively participate in knowledge sharing, managers should act as transformational and authentic leaders who synergistically form the basis for knowledge-oriented leadership. Previous studies have shown that these two leadership styles have a positive impact on knowledge sharing when practiced by leaders and managers, although the modalities of how these positive effects can be transferred to employees are still relatively unexplored. Grit, which manifests as passion and perseverance in the pursuit of long-term goals, could enable managers to transfer their positive behavior to employees and thus improve the share of organizational knowledge. The survey data was collected from 208 employees of European higher education institutions who are members of nine CEEPUS mobility networks and are actively involved in research activities and international projects. The general idea of this network is to promote the exchange of students and academics in order to enhance learning and cooperation in international projects of benefit to the real sector. The target groups were randomly selected from the higher education institutions active in seven networks, including Croatia (Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Macedonia, Monte Negro, Poland, Serbia, Romania, Slovenia and Slovakia). A moderated mediation model was tested to check whether grit improves the ability of managers to share explicit and tacit knowledge with employees. Due to the nature of the study and the potential risk of common method bias, several measures were taken to minimalize this problem. Data were collected from individuals representing both academic and non-academic staff, and the questionnaire contained clear and concise questions. Furthermore, additional analyses were conducted to investigate the potential risk of CMB. Several variables were used as control variables, including: gender, age, work experience and management position. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted to determine the factor structure and calculate the measurement model. After checking the normality of the distributions, the data were also checked to see whether they fulfil the essential requirements for carrying out a factor analysis. To test the construct validity of the research model, a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was carried out using the Lavaan statistical program. The results confirmed that gritty managers achieve better results only when sharing tacit knowledge. Since tacit knowledge is more complex than explicit knowledge and therefore requires more time and effort on the part of managers, HR can develop practices to enable managers to practice grit in sharing tacit knowledge and thus enable rational use of the organization’s knowledge.
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The cross-sectional data was collected from 208 of totally of 825 employees included (response rate 25 %).The respondents come from thirteen CEEPUS countries with the majority coming from Croatia (43 respondents – 20%), Hungary (34 respondents – 16%), Slovakia (28 respondents – 13%), Serbia (26 respondents – 12%) and the Czech Republic (22 respondents – 10%). The proportion of female and male respondents was 60 and 40% respectively. The majority of respondents were between 40-49 years old (35%), and had between 10 and 20 years of service (38%), having a doctorate degree (163 respondents – 78%), and holding a management position (52%). Most of the institutions surveyed are medium-sized (111 institutions – 53%) and are administered by the state (176 institutions – 84%). Several variables were used as control variables, including: gender, age, work experience and management position. Due to the nature of the study and the potential risk of common method bias, several measures were taken to minimalize this problem. Data were collected from individuals representing both academic and non-academic staff, and the questionnaire contained clear and concise questions. Furthermore, additional analyses were conducted to investigate the potential risk of CMB. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted for all three main factors: Grit, Knowledge sharing and Management support. Based on the existing CFA models, new CFA models were created by using the CFA model with good data fit as a basis for creating new CFA models that included an additional factor – a new factor representing CMB. The CMB factor was created and linked to each manifest variable to measure Grit, Knowledge sharing and Management support. In this way, each model included a hypothesized factor that explained the covariance between all items covered by the main factors. A CFA model that included CMB was not identified, which means that it was not possible to assess too many parameters included in the input variance covariance matrix. The results confirmed a positive and statistically significant correlation between explicit and tacit knowledge sharing and management support (Hypothesis 1). The results also confirmed a positive and statistically significant correlation between perseverance as a dimension of grit and management support, which manifests itself in openness and mentoring (Hypothesis 2). To test Hypothesis 3, which states that grit increases management support for tacit and explicit knowledge sharing, a moderated mediation model was tested by conducting two independent analyses. The first model, which examined the influence of grit on tacit knowledge sharing, included the following predictors: management support, grit, interaction between passion and management support, and interaction between management support and perseverance. The second model analyzed the influence of grit on explicit knowledge sharing with the same two predictors: grit and management support.