Dana Minbaeva

Associate Professor in Strategic HRM

Center of Strategic Management and
Globalization
Copenhagen Business School
Denmark

What drives knowledge sharing
behavior of individuals?
My research
All papers are available upon the request
Knowledge characteristics



Knowledge transfer and HRM
Sender Receiver Knowledge
Organizational environment
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Barren organizational context
Minbaeva and
Michailova (2004) in
Employee Relations
Minbaeva et al (2003) in
JIBS
Minbaeva (2005) in
Personnel Review
Minbaeva (2008) in
Management
International Review
Governance of knowledge processes
Firm:
governance
mechanisms
Individual:
conditions of
individual actions
Individual:
individual knowledge
sharing behavior
Firm:
knowledge
processes outcomes
Gooderham, Minbaeva and Pedersen (2010), in Journal of Mgt Studies
Minbaeva and Pedersen (2010), in IJSCM
Michailova and Minbaeva (2011), forthcoming in International Business
Review
Foss, Minbaeva, Pedersen and Reinholt (2009) in Human Resource
Management
Minbaeva, Foss and Snell (2009), Special Issue of Human Resource
Management
Minbaeva (2008) in International Business Review
Minbaeva, Makela and Rabbiosi (2009), SMG Working Paper and under
review

(S)HRM in MNCs
Navrbjerg and Minbaeva (2009) in International
Journal of Human Resource Management
Minbaeva, Hutching and Thomson (2007) in
European Journal of International Management
Minbaeva and Muratbekova-Touron (2010) in
International Journal of Human Resource
Management


Employment Practices of Multinationals in Organizational
Context, international project, www.cbs.dk/mnc
Dana Minbaeva and Torben
Pedersen
Center of Strategic Management and
Globalization
Copenhagen Business School


What drives knowledge
sharing behavior of
individuals?
Rationale
Whether knowledge sharing takes place in an
organization depends to a great extent on
individual organizational members decision to
share or not the knowledge they possess.
in any model of knowledge sharing the
knowledge sharing behavior of individuals
has to be explained endogenously and on
individual level
there are not so many studies which managed
to do so empirically
Why not? (1)
The theories in which the discussion of intra-
organizational knowledge sharing is nested are
usually collective ones (Felin and Hesterly, 2007).
Knowledge-based scholars should carefully revisit
their underlying philosophical and theoretical
assumptions about the primacy given to collectives
and to consider potential individual-level explanations
as antecedents to new value creation (Felin and
Hesterly, 2007: 214).
Hence to push further the empirical research on
knowledge sharing, we need to integrate some
individual-level theories those considering
individuals and their actions as the basic units of
analysis (Elstner, 1989).
Motivation theory
Why not? (2)
To empirically study knowledge sharing at the
individual level, we need individual level data
collected at various locations, organizational
units, hierarchical levels, etc.
That is necessary since individuals are randomly
distributed within the organization.
Further, the data should be collected from various
social groups (gender, age, level of education)
since individuals are a priori heterogeneous.
Why not? (3)
Just understanding of the conditions of individual
action does not mean a lot for managers.
Hence, we need to consider managerial
interventions (governance mechanisms in Foss,
2007) which managers could employ to appeal to
the conditions of individual actions and thereby
facilitate individual knowledge sharing behavior.
In response
The theory of planned behavior (TPB)
The TPB is an extension of the Theory of Reasoned
Action (TRA) introduced by Fishbein and Ajzen
(1975)
Aim: to explain behavior of individuals
endogenously as determined by its predictors
(intentions, attitude, subjective norms and
perceived control)

The motivation sequence
The TPB in a nutshell
Source: http://www-unix.oit.umass.edu/~aizen/
Why the TPB?
The TPB was extensively used to study
human behavior and design appropriate
behavioral interventions to change behavior
by affecting one or more of its determinants
Knowledge governance mechanisms
KGA in Foss (2007): governance mechanisms are deployed
in the belief that influencing the conditions of individual
actions in a certain manner will lead employees to take those
decisions that when aggregated lead to favorable
organizational outcomes (knowledge acquisition and
utilization).
Represents a reaction to what it regards as the "methodological
collectivism" of explanations of knowledge processes currently
dominating the KBV research (Foss, 2007)
Understanding of relations between governance mechanisms
and knowledge processes implies theorizing individuals (Grant,
1996), individual heterogeneity (Felin and Hesterly, 2007), and
individual interaction (Felin and Foss, 2005).
Intra-organizational knowledge processes can be influenced and
directed through the deployment of governance mechanisms
(Foss, 2007)
Knowledge governance mechanisms conditions of
individual actions individual actions (when aggregated)
favorable organizational outcomes, such as knowledge
transfer.
E.g. theoretically: Foss and Michailova (2009) and empirically Gooderham, Minbaeva
and Pedersen(2010)
Knowledge governance mechanisms

We propose a number of knowledge
governance mechanisms that can be applied
to influence the previously identified
antecedents of behavioral intentions
(attitude, subjective norm and perceived
control) and thereby affect knowledge
sharing behavior of individuals.

Knowledge governance mechanisms
Ajzen (1991): it is at the level of beliefs that
we can learn about the unique factors that
induce one person to engage in the behavior
of interest (p. 206-207).

Knowledge governance mechanisms
three types of governance mechanisms
influencing behavioral, normative and control
beliefs and label them accordingly as
extrinsic rewards (behavioral beliefs)
reciprocal schemes ( normative beliefs) and
communication mechanisms (control beliefs).
Conceptual model
Rewards
Reciprocity
schemes
Communication
mechanisms
Attitude
Subjective
norm
Perceived
control
Intention to
share
Knowledge
sharing
behavior
H
1

H
2

H
3

H
4

H
7

H
6

H
5





Hypotheses
H1. Strong intention to engage in knowledge sharing behavior positively
influences the extent of knowledge sharing behavior.
H2. A positive attitude toward knowledge sharing positively influences the
individuals intention to share knowledge.
H3. Strong subjective norms about knowledge sharing positively influence
the individuals intention to share knowledge.
H4. Perceived behavioral control positively influences the individuals
intention to share knowledge
H5. The more individuals are externally rewarded for knowledge sharing, the
more positive their attitude toward knowledge sharing is.
H6. The more individuals are reciprocally rewarded for knowledge sharing,
the more positive their subjective norm regarding knowledge sharing is.
H7. The more individuals use communication mechanisms, the stronger their
perceived behavioral control is.

Data
Danisco and Chr. Hansen
MANDI Questionnaire on Knowledge Sharing
Response rate
Danisco: 77.94%; 219 respondents
Chr. Hansen: 72.75%; 251 respondents
Respondents
After consultation
with each
companys
representative, the
distribution of the
survey responses
was regarded as
representative.

Measures
We used
perceptual
measures for
operationalization
of all variables in
this study

Results

2
[127] = 311.5
GFI = 0.93
RMSEA= 0.05
Goodness-of-fit statistics for three
competing specification of the model
Results: antecedents
The decision not-to-share is individual, often
rational and well justified from the perspective of
the individual
The intention to share knowledge is formed as a
combination of the social influence (social norms),
an individuals confidence in her ability to perform
the knowledge sharing (perceived control), and
the individuals own attitude toward sharing of
knowledge (attitude).

Results: governance
mechanisms
A positive feedback on past instances of
knowledge sharing, being acknowledged of their
contribution to the work of others and/or
organizational development
Availability and use of required resources and
opportunities to carry out and successfully
complete that behavior

Results: BUT!
Contrary to commonly accepted practices
associated with knowledge management
initiatives, a felt need for extrinsic rewards
may very well hinder the development of
favorable attitudes toward knowledge sharing
Such a finding might simply be a reflection of
the specific extrinsic rewards applied in two
organizations
Insights from Motivational Theory on the link
between extrinsic motivation and performance
(e.g. Vroom)
Insights from Creativity Theory(e.g. Amabile)
Rewards and knowledge sharing (e.g. Bock et al,
2005; Minbaeva, Makela and Rabbiosi, 2010)
Performance
Rewards
Limitations
Our limitations
cross-sectional data

two MNCs from Denmark




using perceptual
instruments

Future studies
longitudinal research

a wider variety of firms
the impact of the external
environment (formal and
informal institutions)

more elaborate measures,
combining perceptual
ones with some objective
indicators
Implications
The use of external rewards seems surprisingly
enough to be counterproductive in creating a
positive attitude toward knowledge sharing.
The interactions of governance mechanisms -
complementarity effect (which could be
negative, neutral or positive)

To conclude
We need to push HRM scholars out of their
natural comfort zone (Becker and Huselid, 2006:
900)
which assumes the aggregation of individuals,
existence of an average individual and no
differences in individual perception of external
stimulus and reaction to that.