Abstract
Knowledge hiding—an intentional attempt to withhold or conceal knowledge from others—has been reported by recent studies to be a negative phenomenon in the workplace. Considering the importance of knowledge for organizational performance, this study intends to advance understanding by investigating the mediating role of knowledge hiding on the relationship between perceived organizational support and affective commitment as predictors and organizational citizenship behaviors and turnover intentions as outcomes. Using a cross-sectional design, the study was conducted in emergency ambulance healthcare settings on 305 medical or paramedical professionals. As indicated by structural equation modeling results, perceived organizational support and affective commitment positively predicted organizational citizenship behaviors but negatively predicted turnover intentions. Also, knowledge hiding was negatively associated with perceived organizational support, affective commitment, and organizational citizenship behaviors and positively with turnover intentions. Moreover, knowledge hiding mediated the relationship between perceived organizational support and affective commitment as predictors and organizational citizenship behaviors, respectively turnover intentions, as dependent variables.
Highlights
Knowledge hiding has gained increasing attention in recent years in the field of organizational behavior, especially concerning its potential influence on organizational performance [1,2,3,4,5,6,7]
Gender, and professional level have been shown in other studies to influence turnover intentions or organizational citizenship behaviors
Knowledge hiding positively correlated with turnover intentions (r = 0.36, p < 0.0001) whereas affective commitment negatively correlates with knowledge hiding (r = −0.13, p < 0.05)
Summary
Knowledge hiding has gained increasing attention in recent years in the field of organizational behavior, especially concerning its potential influence on organizational performance [1,2,3,4,5,6,7]. Knowledge hiding, and knowledge manipulation are the main streams of literature developed to explain individuals’ tactical choices involving knowledge [2,8]. The focus in the knowledge management literature is typically on knowledge sharing and less on the other processes involving knowledge (e.g., knowledge hiding). Knowledge hiding represents a new topic in knowledge management research, which has not been thoroughly researched. We largely accept that knowledge hiding is not beneficial for the organizations at all levels, including individual and team levels, but we need to deepen the understanding of specific consequences within organizations [16]
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