Knowledge sharing in the hospitality context: The roles of leader humility, job crafting, and promotion focus

Abstract

• The positive relationships between leader humility and knowledge collection and donation behaviors. • The three dimensions of job crafting function as mediators for such relationships. • Promotion focus moderates the relationships between leader humility and resource seeking as well as challenge seeking. Grounded in a view of self-transcendence, leader humility is expected to influence employees to acquire and share knowledge for self-development. This study investigates how and when leader humility activates hospitality employees’ knowledge collection and knowledge donation. The dataset was built from 674 employees and 87 direct managers working in the Vietnam-based hotel organizations. Analyzed through multilevel structural equation approach, the data provided support for the positive relationships between leader humility and knowledge collection and donation behaviors among hospitality employees. The three dimensions of job crafting functioned as mediators for these relationships. Employees’ promotion focus played a moderating role for the relationships between leader humility and seeking resources and challenges, but did not interact with leader humility to impact job demands. The discussion on the implications for hospitality scholars and practitioners from the research findings is presented.