Decreasing knowledge hiding through an understanding of its nuances

This article is part of a series on knowledge withholding, hiding, and hoarding.

Knowledge hiding¹ is an intentional attempt by an individual to withhold or conceal knowledge that has been requested by another person. It is different to knowledge hoarding, which represents the act of accumulating knowledge that may or may not be shared at a later date.

Articles in RealKM Magazine‘s knowledge withholding, hiding, and hoarding series have been exploring the emerging research knowledge base in regard to knowledge hiding. This has included the perspectives of social exchange theory (SET) and national culture², the theoretical landscape of knowledge hiding³, causes, impacts, and the ways forward⁴, the psychology behind knowledge hiding⁵, and workplace friendship and knowledge hiding⁶.

These articles provide understandings and advice to help managers decrease knowledge hiding in their organizations through approaches such as better “job design.” An area of human resources management (HRM), job design⁷ is concerned with⁸ the “content and organization of one’s work tasks, activities, relationships, and responsibilities.”

However, a recent paper⁹ published in The International Journal of Human Resource Management alerts that the literature finds that whereas some job design characteristics reduce knowledge hiding, others unexpectedly encourage it. Paper authors Muhammad Shujahat, Minhong Wang, Murad Ali, Qinghua Zhu, and Miha Škerlavaj examine how job demands and job resources as two distinct types of job design characteristics influence the expected costs and benefits of sharing solicited knowledge to affect knowledge hiding differently.

Shujahat and colleagues investigate the role of two job demands – job complexity and initiated interdependence – and three job resources – job autonomy, skill variety, and received interdependence. These job demands and job resources are defined as follows:

• Job complexity is the degree to which job tasks are complex.
• Initiated interdependence represents how work activities flow from one job to another.
• Job autonomy is the degree to which a job allows discretion in scheduling work activities, choosing work methods, and making decisions.
• Skill variety refers to the degree to which job performance requires various skills.
• Received interdependence represents how work activities flow from other jobs to a given job.

Results

Through their research, Shujahat and colleagues have found that:

• Job complexity and initiated interdependence as job demands encourage knowledge hiding by stimulating the expected direct and opportunity costs.
• Skill variety as a job resource lowers knowledge hiding by reducing the expected costs and financial benefits and increasing the expected non-financial benefits.
• Unexpectedly, job autonomy and received interdependence as job resources produce mixed effects on knowledge hiding. Whereas they may increase the expected non-financial benefits to mitigate knowledge hiding, they also increase the expected financial benefits and direct and opportunity costs to encourage it.

Shujahat and colleagues alert that:

• These results refute the HRM literature that applies motivational theories to propose, without distinguishing job demands from job resources and incorporating the expected cost mechanism, that the job design characteristics motivate employees to help manage employee behaviours, e.g. knowledge hiding.
• These results also do not support the theoretical literature which proposes that job complexity as a challenging job demand may not only boost the expected costs but also motivate employees to increase non-financial benefits and decrease the expected financial benefits.
• Demographics and organizational knowledge sharing climate do not provide plausible explanations for these contradictory results.
• The three measured forms of job autonomy – the discretion to schedule work, choose methods, and make decisions – do not vary to plausibly explain these contradictory results.

Recommendations for managers

From the results of their research, Shujahat and colleagues recommend that managers:

• Design and allow employees to craft low job demands and increased job resources to reduce knowledge hiding.
• (Re)analyze and intervene in job (re)design to lower demands and resources in different stages of the HRM process, e.g. while writing job descriptions for recruitment, hearing complaints about employee counterproductive behaviors, and workforce planning for an organizational change.
• Provide those job resources, e.g. skill variety, that mitigate knowledge hiding the most promisingly, with no mixed effect.
• Only provide double-edged job resources if conducive conditions are in place. Providing specific job resources, e.g. job autonomy, can produce mixed effects on knowledge hiding if certain conducive conditions, e.g. felt job responsibility, are absent.
• Facilitate employees’ attempts to craft jobs with optimal job demands and sufficient job resources to maintain health and motivate them to abstain from counterproductive outcomes, such as knowledge hiding.

Header image source: Created by Bruce Boyes with Microsoft Designer Image Creator.

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