Knowledge sharing in multicultural organizations: evidence from Pakistan

Abstract

Purpose

Taking higher educational institutes (HEIs) operating in Islamabad metropolitan, and Pakistan as research context, the purpose of this paper is to identify the antecedents of knowledge sharing behavior (KSB) and to check their causal effect in perspective of culturally diverse academic staff. In addition, the authors suggest certain policies for HEIs that can raise knowledge sharing practices in multicultural environment.

Design/methodology/approach

It is a cross-sectional study, quantitative in nature, and has used a self-administered questionnaire for data collection. With proportionate stratified random sampling technique, 278 academic employees working in three faculties from six public sector universities operating in Islamabad metropolitan have recorded their responses. This research also applied confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling to examine the proposed hypothesis of this inquiry.

Findings

The empirical results indicate significant and positive effect of cultural diversity management, interpersonal trust, and leader-empowering behavior on KSB, whereas knowledge technology has insignificant effect on KSB of culturally diverse academic staff. Moreover, proposed model has explained 54 percent variation in endogenous construct.

Practical implications

The present research aids academic leadership in designing policies and strategies to enhance knowledge sharing among faculty members and to create a supportive knowledge sharing culture.

Originality/value

This study fills the empirical gap that exists in literature by exploring the antecedents and their effect on KSB of multicultural academic staff associated in public sector HEIs in Islamabad metropolitan, Pakistan.

Citation

Raza, I. and Awang, Z. (2020), "Knowledge sharing in multicultural organizations: evidence from Pakistan", Higher Education, Skills and Work-Based Learning, Vol. 10 No. 3, pp. 497-517. https://doi.org/10.1108/HESWBL-09-2019-0114