Impact of Knowledge Sharing on Organizational Development by Mediating Role of Employees’ Self-efficacy

Document Type : Articles

Author

• Amin Nikpour

Kerman Branch, Islamic Azad University

https://doi.org/10.22067/pmt.v11i2.76138

Abstract

1- INTRODUCTION
The present is the age of rapid changes and uncertainty about the future, and if the organizations are not well adapted to, it may destroy them. Today, organizational development is considered by most management experts as a solution to overcome problems and confront this changing environment. It is a way to improve the organization’s performance and is basically founded on the education process and changing the values and attitudes of all organization members. However, the administrative system of the country is faced with serious problems in terms of organizational development which is confirmed by pathological studies. Thus, the main issue for Iranian organizations is how to deal with areas that should be improved and the needed tools to do so. Accordingly, it is essential to identify the factors associated with organizational development most important of which is the level of the organization’s knowledge sharing and the amount of its employees’ self-efficacy. According to the above, the purpose of this research is to investigate the direct effect of knowledge sharing on organizational development and its indirect effect through the mediation of employees’ self-efficacy.
2- THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
This research has studied knowledge sharing as an independent, organizational development as a dependent, and employees’ self-efficacy as a mediator variable. In doing so, the variable of knowledge sharing is operationally defined based on Dixon's (2000), employees’ self-efficacy based on Bandura's (1997), and organizational development based on Spitz's (2007) model.
3- METHODOLOGY
This research is a descriptive-correlational study accomplished based on survey data. The research statistical population is comprised of employees working in the branches of social security organization in Kerman city that had a college degree and 5-year work experience. At the time of the survey, the number of employees was 211 from which a sample size of 136 was selected using Cochran’s formula. Research data was collected by a questionnaire made up of three established measures anchored on a 5-point Likert-type scale. The first 15-item measure is 5-dimensional representing the dimensions of sequential (3 items), explicit (5 items), tacit (3 items) strategic (2 items), and expert (2 items) knowledge sharing. The second 16-item measure is adapted from the general self-efficacy questionnaire that measures each of the dimensions of mastery experience, vicarious experience, social persuasion, and physiological states with four items. And the third measure has 30 items and five dimensions including system openness, trust to others, internal and external feedback, participating with others, training and informing, and flat organizational structure each of which measured by 5 items. The validity of the used measures was evaluated and confirmed. Their reliability was also investigated and confirmed by Cronbach’s alpha (0.958, 0.930, and 0.858, respectively) and composite reliability (0.963, 0.939, and 0.878, respectively). This research conducted the structural equation modeling technique in Smart-PLS software to test the proposed model and hypotheses.
4- RESULTS
The Goodness of Fit index (GOF) indicated a desirable fit for the estimated model. Obtained results revealed t-values of greater than 1.96 for all subsidiary hypotheses and supported their significance. Additionally, conducting the bootstrapping method supported the main hypothesis representing the significant mediation of employee’s self-efficacy in the relationship between knowledge sharing and organizational development.
5-  DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION
In this research, the relationships between knowledge sharing, employees’ self-efficacy, and organizational development were explained theoretically and then examined. In fact, the main purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect of knowledge sharing on organizational development by mediation of employees’ self-efficacy. Research results indicated that knowledge sharing directly affects organizational development and indirectly through employees’ self-efficacy. It should be noted that the indirect effect of knowledge sharing was greater than its direct effect.

Keywords

• Knowledge
• Knowledge sharing
• Self-efficacy
• Organizational development

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