The Empirical Study Of Staff Knowledge Sharing Motivation In Enterprise

21 century is the era of knowledge-based economy. The knowledge has replaced the traditional factors of production status and become an important resource to create competitive advantage as enterprises. With the development of knowledge-based economy triggered a wave of knowledge management. Knowledge management has become the common focus of attention for theorists and practitioners. In knowledge management, the most important thing is how to motivate the employees so that they will voluntarily share their own knowledge with other colleagues, in order to achieve the purpose of knowledge sharing. Boisot and Griffiths(1999) has pointed out that how to motivate employees to share their knowledge is more important than knowledge acquisition, storage and transmission. However, in many cases, the employees are often refused to share knowledge with others in the organization. The employees don't willing to share knowledge, which can be due to lack of time, inappropriate organizational structure, organizational culture and other adverse causes. But the most important reason is whether the employees have enough motives to drive to share the knowledge with others.For this issue, the foreign scholars had carried out the corresponding theoretical and empirical research, and made a number of research results. But so far Chinese scholars for employees motivation of knowledge sharing within the organization is still at the initial stage, and research have mostly focused on the theory study less empirical research.Based on the study of Chinese cultural background, on the basis of reviewing the current research, three stages of research work are conducted following the core concept of knowledge sharing motivation.First, based on the literature review and expert interview, the study used semi-structure questionnaire to survey the knowledge sharing motivation of employee. Through the data coding and content analysis, the interal knowledge sharing motivation conclude 6 dimensions: relationship, altruistic, emotion, prestige, benefit and inerest. Baed on the sample data, the study explored a questionnaire including the 6 dimension of employee knowledge sharing motivation, the results showed that the measure scale has good reliability and validity. At same time, this study compared these dimension with foreign mature classification and found the dimensions also can be divided into extrinsic motivation and intrinsic motivation. And there is similarity and differences between the dimensions.Second, this study explores the antecedent variables of employee knowledge sharing motivation. This paper explores the affect for staff knowledge sharing motivation from organization contextual factor of organization reward, leadership support and job characteristics. The results showed that the organization reward has significantly positive correlation with extrinsic motivation of employee knowledge sharing, leadership support and job characteristics have significantly positive correlation with extrinsic and intrinsic motivation of employee knowledge sharing.Finally, this study explores the effects of knowledge sharing motivation on the knowledge sharing behavior. At the same time, this study constructed a comprehensive model from the organizational and individual level to explore the influence between the organization contextual factor, knowledge sharing motivation and knowledge sharing behavior. The results showed the extrinsic and intrinsic motivation both have positive correlation with knowledge sharing behavior. The results also found the employee knowledge sharing motivation is the mediator between organization contextual factor and knowledge sharing behavior. The extrinsic motivation and intrinsic motivation play semi-mediator between job characteristics and knowledge sharing behavior. Extrinsic motivation and intrinsic motivation play full-mediator between leadership support and knowledge sharing behavior.The main contributeion of this study is as follows:(1)This study is a basic research on employee knowledge sharing motivation in Chinese context. This study brings out 6 dimensions of knowledge sharing motivation and develops a reliable and valid scale using the sample data. (2) This study has carried out beneficial research on antecedent of knowledge sharing motivation from the organization contextual factor of organization reward, leadership support and job characteristics. This study expanded the antecedent research of knowledge sharing motivation and provided broader perspective for other researchers to find the influence factor of knowledge sharing motivation, this study also provided effective guidance for manager to design the incentives for employee knowledge sharing. (3) This study constructed a model from organization and individual level to explore the relationship between the organization contextual factor, employee knowledge sharing motivation and knowledge sharing behavior. The results verified the employee knowledge sharing motivation was the mediator between organization contextual factor and knowledge sharing behavior.