Measuring Individual and Organizational Knowledge Activities in Academic Libraries with Multilevel Analysis

Abstract

Knowledge management is vital in many work environments; however, it is difficult to measure the outcome of knowledge management and to distinguish the typology of knowledge activities. This study proposes a knowledge activity scale for assessing individual tacit knowledge and organizational knowledge. This study not only explores knowledge activities of knowledge workers from both individual and organizational dimensions but also investigates the empirical data from academic librarians with exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses of both individual and organizational levels. More than 550 sample data were collected and analyzed in several stages. To conduct a multilevel analysis, the final sample consisted of 286 persons from 40 universities and colleges, and the organizational sizes ranged from 3 to 22 persons. The results show 6 constructs for individual dimensions (knowledge acquisition, knowledge absorption, knowledge sharing, knowledge obstacles, knowledge transfers, and knowledge diffusion) and 3 constructs for organizational dimensions (knowledge growth, knowledge integration, and knowledge breadth). The scale from both individual and organizational dimensions shows robust psychometric properties with acceptable levels of reliability and validity. The proposed scale can reveal the value of librarians' intangible work and also indicate the level of creative organizational climate within academic libraries.