Impact of Organizational Context Factors on Individuals' Self-Reported Knowledge Sharing Behaviors

The proliferation of teams and team-based activities emphasizes the need to understand knowledge sharing behaviors in order to facilitate team performance. Knowledge sharing in teams is valuable and indispensable for both academic and corporate organizations in order to meet and manage team effectiveness. Knowledge is driven by people who behave in different ways based on their environment and its accompanying factors. Considering what factors facilitate knowledge sharing behaviors in teams within an academic environment is an important benchmark for knowledge management researchers and instructional designers. Instructors and professors plan various thorough and organized collaborative opportunities for teams in their classrooms to encourage knowledge sharing. Similarly, understanding the specific factors of a collaborative context before setting team procedures better facilitates knowledge sharing behaviors. Therefore, the research problem addressed in this study was to predict what contextual factors promote perceptions toward knowledge sharing behaviors in students enrolled in graduate courses from a business school, as measure by a self-reported questionnaire. Prior studies on student teams state that team climate and leadership contributes to student knowledge sharing behavioral patterns. These studies emphasize the importance of recognizing specific factors that function with climate and leadership to contribute towards knowledge sharing behaviors and attitudes toward knowledge sharing; this would allow instructional designers to more fully understand the process. Furthermore, other studies related to team knowledge sharing behaviors reported certain specific factors, like organizational context, interpersonal and team characteristics, and cultural characteristics as crucial in influencing knowledge sharing behaviors. Specifically, in regard to team context, existing studies mentioned five factors - climate, leadership, rewards and incentives, structure, and support - that encourage knowledge sharing behaviors and attitude towards knowledge sharing in teams. Thus, in this study, the researcher investigated team climate, leadership, rewards and incentives, task structure, and task support to determine in what manner these factors influence student knowledge sharing behaviors as well as attitudes toward knowledge sharing in graduate business courses. This study used the quantitative methodologies. Multiple regression and correlation analysis were used to measure students' self-reported perceptions of what contextual factors impacted their knowledge sharing behaviors and attitudes toward knowledge sharing during team project work. The findings of this study show that in the studied context, students reported that task structure affected their knowledge sharing behaviors more than the rest of the identified factors. Correspondingly, rewards and incentives impacted their attitudes toward knowledge sharing behaviors. The findings also indicate negative correlations of team climate and leadership with attitudes toward knowledge sharing. Correspondingly, this study delineates certain implications for instructional designers for assisting knowledge sharing behaviors in teams. The study results contribute to the body of literature that suggest the importance of motivating and supporting detailed task structure and procedures for promoting knowledge sharing behaviors in student teams.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph. D.

Level thesis:degree_level

doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Curriculum and Instruction

Department dc:contributor.department

Teaching and Learning

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Tech

Year dc:date.issued

2015

Author dc:creator

• Nandy, Vaishali

Chairs dc:contributor.committeechair

• Cennamo, Katherine S.
• Scales, Glenda R.

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Lockee, Barbara B.
• Burton, John K.

• Learning Sciences

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Dc Identifier Other

vt_gsexam:4610

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/51997