Knowledge management process, knowledge based innovation: Does academic researcher's productivity mediate during the pandemic of covid-19?

Fazal Ur Rehman,Ali Zeb,Muhammad Mujtaba Asad,Muhammad Saeed Shahbaz,Hishamuddin Ismail,Basheer M Al Ghazali,Rogis Baker

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0261573

Abstract

Drucker's knowledge-worker productivity theory and knowledge-based view of the firm theory are widely employed in many disciplines but there is little application of these theories in knowledge-based innovation among academic researchers. Therefore, this study intends to evaluate the effects of the knowledge management process on knowledge-based innovation alongside with mediating role of Malaysian academic researchers' productivity during the Pandemic of COVID-19. Using a random sampling technique, data was collected from 382 academic researchers. Questionnaires were self-administered and data was analyzed via Smart PLS-SEM. Knowledge management process and knowledge workers' productivity have a positive and significant relationship with the knowledge-based innovation among academic researchers during the Pandemic of COVID-19. In addition, knowledge workers' productivity mediates the relationship between the knowledge management process (knowledge creation, knowledge acquisition, knowledge sharing, and knowledge utilization) and knowledge-based innovation during the Pandemic of COVID-19. Results have also directed knowledge sharing as the key factor in knowledge-based innovation and a stimulating task for management discipline around the world during the Pandemic of COVID-19. This study provides interesting insights on Malaysian academic researchers' productivity by evaluating the effects of knowledge creation, acquisition, sharing, and application on the knowledge-based innovation among academic researchers during the Pandemic of COVID-19. These useful insights would enable policymakers to develop more influential educational strategies. By assimilating the literature of defined variables, the main contribution of this study is the evaluation of knowledge creation, acquisition, sharing, and utilization into knowledge-based innovation alongside the mediating role of knowledge workers productivity in the higher education sector of Malaysia during the Pandemic of COVID-19.

Highlights

The far-reaching innovation has changed the process and capacity of production in many fields of endeavor around the globe
The results have provided a bigger picture for a better understanding that the knowledge management process and knowledge workers’ productivity are the crucial factors in knowledge-based innovation among researchers during the Pandemic of COVID-19
This study aims to evaluate the effects of the knowledge management process on knowledgebased innovation along with mediating role of academic researchers’ productivity during the Pandemic of COVID-19 at Malaysia

Summary

Introduction

The far-reaching innovation has changed the process and capacity of production in many fields of endeavor around the globe. Management practitioners and strategists widely focusing on the need to increase the productivity of academic researchers They emphasized evaluating the impacts of the knowledge management process on individuals with concerns about the soft and hard aspects of tasks as recommended in the literature [9]. In such circumstances, evaluating the effects of the knowledge management process on the knowledge-workers productivity among academic researchers (individual workers) could be a novel contribution in the Malaysian academic environment [3,4,5,6, 10], which could attract literature attention towards this part of the world during the Pandemic of COVID-19. The problems in this context are presented in the following passages

Objectives

Methods

Results

Conclusion