Key determinants of knowledge sharing in an

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Key determinants of knowledge sharing in an electronics manufacturing firm in Malaysia Nurliza Mohammed Fathi, Uchenna Cyril Eze and Gerald Guan Gan Goh Knowledge Management Department, Faculty of Business & Law, Multimedia University, Melaka, Malaysia

Determinants of knowledge sharing 53 Received 1 April 2010 Reviewed 13 July 2010 Revised 11 August 2010 Accepted 24 August 2010

Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors that affect knowledge-sharing attitudes in Malaysia, with emphasis on a manufacturing firm and how this attitude influences their intention to share knowledge. Design/methodology/approach – This is a survey research conducted within a manufacturing firm. The questionnaire was developed by adapting items and concepts from prior works, and by developing a new variable, kiasuism. A census sampling method was used to select participants for this research. The data derive from a case analysis in a manufacturing company in Malaysia. The analysis was based on 141 valid responses. Findings – The findings indicate that collectivism, social network, social trust, shared goal, incentive systems, kiasuism and self-efficacy emerged significant except for individualism. A unique finding is that kiasuism emerged as proposed, which suggest that future works could focus more on this variable to highlight its impact in a firm’s ability to share knowledge. Overall, the data support our framework and indicate that knowledge sharing among employees in Malaysia’s private companies is gaining grounds. Research limitations/implications – The limitations of this research include the case study approach adopted, which does not allow the generalization of the results beyond that of the firm being studied. The implications emanating from this research is that the ability of a firm, especially electronic manufacturing firms, to harness internal resources and capabilities to enhance knowledge sharing among employees, would be critical for the firm to maintain a competitive position in the marketplace. Originality/value – This paper provides specific backgrounds of the key factors that could affect the effective implementation of knowledge-sharing initiatives in a firm, particularly those in the manufacturing sector. The findings suggest key implications for practice and research involved in knowledge-sharing activities in their firms and related initiatives. Keywords Knowledge sharing, Electronics industry, Malaysia Paper type Research paper

Introduction The manufacturing sector in Malaysia enjoyed 4.8 percent growth from January to September 2008 (MIDA, 2007). For the first nine months of 2008, the manufacturing sector accounted for 29.9 percent of Malaysia’s gross domestic product. The exports of manufactured goods accounted for 70 percent of the country’s total exports. Today, Malaysia is one of the world’s leading exporters of semiconductor devices, computer hard disks, audio and video products and room air-conditioners (MIDA, 2007). In today’s highly competitive business environments and the expanding global marketplaces, manufacturing companies are continuously searching for ways to maintain their

Library Review Vol. 60 No. 1, 2011 pp. 53-67 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0024-2535 DOI 10.1108/00242531111100577

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competitiveness (Zhang and Sharifi, 2000). Companies around the globe increasingly seek for means to maintain a competitive position in the marketplace (Choy et al., 2005). Sharing knowledge effectively in manufacturing firms may assist the firms in many ways. Knowledge sharing in firms could foster innovation by encouraging the free flow of ideas (Wasko and Faraj, 2000). It could also help in understanding the market demands and customers needs as well. In addition, knowledge sharing brings benefit to the manufacturing firms in terms of the development of products and services as well as the development of both vision and strategies (Sanchez and Palacios, 2007). Furthermore, knowledge sharing would contribute in building competencies, and in improving customer service by streamlining response times (Garcia-Murillo and Annabi, 2002). With the effective sharing of knowledge, manufacturing firms are able to get products and services to market faster, which has the capacity to boost their revenues (Davenport and Prusak, 2000). Additionally, knowledge sharing could enhance employee retention rates and minimise the negative effects of brain drain whenever employees leave the firm. This could be is by recognizing the value of employee’s knowledge and thus, rewarding them accordingly (Swart and Kinnie, 2003). Lastly, operations could be streamlined and costs reduced by eliminating redundant or unnecessary processes (Porter and Millar, 1985). There have been various studies on knowledge sharing ranging from those in organisations, teams and libraries. Parirokh et al. (2008) explained that the changes in the economy and knowledge work have resulted in dramatic changes to the nature of the work of library and information professionals, requiring them to enhance their knowledge-sharing capabilities to provide better services to library patrons. From a cultural viewpoint, Chow and Chan (2008) conducted a study on the social capital of organizational knowledge sharing by analyzing surveys of 190 managers from Hong Kong firms. Michailova and Hutchings (2006) studied the national cultural influences on knowledge sharing by comparing China and Russia. Shin et al. (2007) conducted a research on the socio-cultural factors of information sharing in China. Though, these researches discussed knowledge-sharing motivators and knowledge-sharing barriers, there are still limited researches in terms of knowledge sharing among employees in Malaysian context. The research by Suhaimee et al. (2006) provided findings on knowledge sharing, but the focus of the study was on the Malaysian public institutions of higher education. Only a few researches have been conducted in Malaysia focusing on knowledge sharing in the manufacturing industry despite the growing importance of knowledge and communication technologies across sectors in Malaysia and the influence of the nation’s vision 2020 for national development. Cheah et al. (2009) conducted a comparative study on knowledge sharing in manufacturing and services firms but the research does not address the knowledge-sharing contexts and intentions of the firms’ employees. These studies do not adequately focus on the employees’ behaviour towards knowledge sharing. This paper, therefore, is a response to the sparse record of research examining the factors that influence knowledge-sharing intentions among employees in Malaysia, with key focus on the manufacturing sector. The key objective of this paper, therefore, is to understand employees’ knowledge-sharing behaviours. The impact of the few variables identified from prior research including individualism, collectivism, social network, social trust, shared goal, incentive systems, kiasuism and self-efficacy on the employees’ attitude towards knowledge sharing in an electronic manufacturing firm will also be investigated.

The findings would provide some evidence on what could motivate employees to share knowledge and would contribute to a greater appreciation of knowledge sharing among employees. Conceptual development The aim of this paper is to appreciate knowledge-sharing culture among the participants and the impacts of their dispositions on knowledge sharing in an electronics-manufacturing firm in Malaysia. The knowledge exchanged among employees in organizations should help in the process of maximizing their ability to meet customer’s demands as well as their changing needs and thus gaining a higher profit margin (Cabrera and Cabrera, 2002). Expanding manufacturing organizations will eventually inject a positive effect on the economic growth of Malaysia (Reynolds, 2004). Renzl (2008) explained that knowledge sharing plays a key role in organisations that would allow them to gain sustained competitive advantage. This is possible due to the intangibility of knowledge that makes it difficult to imitate by other organisations. In addition, knowledge sharing would lead to the synergistic collaboration among employees, who would then be equipped with a wider scope of capabilities to produce innovate ideas, products, services and technologies (Renzl, 2008). Handzic (2003) and Parirokh et al. (2008) noted that effective knowledge sharing require adequate technological and cultural facilitators. In recent years, many articles have focused on the former, more often than not neglecting the importance of cultural factors in the knowledge-sharing activities in firms. With the challenges in today’s business environment, manufacturing firms would therefore share knowledge to be innovative and remain competitive survival and possibility of growth. Against this backdrop, knowledge-sharing activities and the knowledge management discipline in general would play a pivotal role in the years to come as firms fully utilize and exhaust all their tangible resources become less of a differentiating factor for competitive advantage. More specifically, knowledge-sharing research would move towards micro-level domain that would inform practitioners and researchers about the unique organizational characteristics that could affect the knowledge-sharing processes. Studies that are broad-based in nature would still remain relevant but micro-level studies of knowledge sharing that examines social and technical issues at the individual level would be critical to provide insights on the best practices that would facilitate knowledge sharing, intensifying such activities to the next level for sustainable competitive advantage. In order to achieve the objectives of this study, we asked the following research questions: RQ1. What are the impacts of individualism, collectivism, social network, social trust, shared goal, incentive systems, kiasuism and self-efficacy on the attitude towards knowledge sharing and subjective norm? RQ2. What is the impact of attitude towards knowledge sharing on the intention to share knowledge? Figure 1 shows the conceptual framework for this paper and illustrates the independent and the dependent variables including the outcome variable (intention to share knowledge). We developed the framework based on prior literature and theory in the subject area. From the framework, we developed nine hypotheses, which are discussed in the next section.

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Individualism (H1) Collectivism (H2) Social network (H3)

56

Social trust (H4) Shared goal (H5)

Attitude towards knowledge sharing

H9

Intention to share knowledge

Incentive systems (H6)

Figure 1. Conceptual framework for knowledge-sharing attitude and intention

Kiasuism (H7) Self-efficacy (H8)

Individualism Individualism describes the tendency of people to place personal goals ahead of the goals of a larger social group such as the organization (Ardichivili et al., 2006). Individuals in such cultures are encouraged to become independent from others, and to discover and express one’s unique attributes. Usually in large firms, there is a predisposition for individuals to use knowledge as their source of power for personal benefit rather than as an organizational resource. Most managers see critical knowledge as a source of power, as advantage, or as a guarantee of continued employment, and are reluctant to share it (Ardichivili et al., 2006). People do not share knowledge without a strong personal motivation, and they would certainly not give it away without concern for what they may gain or lose by doing so (Ardichivili et al., 2006). Hence, referring back to the literature, there are three components of individualism: independence, competitiveness and uniqueness, which may discourage knowledge sharing. This analysis leads to hypothesis 1: H1. High level of individualism among employees will have negative influence on the attitude towards knowledge sharing.

Collectivism People tend to favour harmony and relationship in a collectivistic society. As a consequence, collectivism has been seen as the subordination of personal goals to those of the group with significance on sharing and harmony (Shin et al., 2007). These groups would consist of family members, friends, or even work colleagues. According to the interdependence theory, the stronger the cultural context supporting friendship and polite behaviour, the more likely it is that members of the group to willingly share resources (Shin et al., 2007). This leads to hypothesis 2: H2. High level of collectivism among employees will have positive influence on the attitude towards knowledge sharing.

Social network A social network can be defined as a patterned organization of a collection of actors and their relationships (Jones et al., 1997). In the firm, it is common for people to establish their contacts and links with others. Networks of informal relationships have a critical influence on work and innovation. Through social networking, more chances are available for people to begin their interpersonal contact. Social network also encourages collaboration among co-workers and tends to create a suitable surrounding or atmosphere to share knowledge. Research has shown that appropriate connectivity in well-managed networks within firms can have substantial impact on performance, learning and innovation. By developing a close relationship or closer ties, people would be more comfortable and much more positive in sharing their thoughts and resources (Jones et al., 1997). This leads to hypothesis 3: H3. High level of social network among employees will have positive influence on the attitude towards knowledge sharing. Social trust One of the factors which could influence the success of knowledge sharing is the social trust or mutual trust among members or employees (Chow and Chan, 2008). The social trust in a firm is where the development of interaction between colleagues improves by sharing their knowledge. In the firm, environment for sharing knowledge and management should be honest, as competition among the employees would exist. These competitions of wanting to be the best employee, wanting promotion exist in all firms (Chow and Chan, 2008). This would of course cause knowledge hoarding, which could affect knowledge sharing adversely as knowledge is considered as a powerful resource that could create advantage. The fear of not performing well in a firm or the fear that other employees would perform better and be promoted or get a raise when knowledge is shared, would ultimately restrict sharing of knowledge. Although, when there is trust among the employees, whereby the increased performance of a colleague is not seen as a threat by another colleague, knowledge is much easier to be shared (Chow and Chan, 2008). Hence, the hypothesis 4: H4. High level of social trust among employees will have positive influence on the attitude towards knowledge sharing. Shared goals In a firm, the presence of the same shared-goals between employees promotes mutual understanding and exchange of ideas (Chow and Chan, 2008). This indeed could encourage knowledge sharing among employees. Through these shared goals, it could be considered as the strength to hold people together and to let them share what they know to achieve specific firm goals. For instance, a department in a company has the objective to reach a goal or to achieve the sales target (Chow and Chan, 2008). Apart from that, goals such as growing the firm and becoming a well-known firm may help the chances of promoting knowledge sharing among employees towards achieving these goals. In the effort to achieve the goals, holding discussion or brainstorming sessions could help in the exchange of ideas and thus cultivate a knowledge-sharing environment. Within a firm, shared goals can be achieved through cooperation and knowledge-sharing initiatives. Hence, the next hypothesis:


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H5. High level of the shared goals among employees will have positive influence on the attitude towards knowledge sharing. Incentive systems From a socio-economic perspective, it is assumed that an individual actor will choose the course of action, which maximizes the utilities in a given and stable set of preferences (Smelser and Swedberg, 1994). Siemens’ ShareNet, which offers incentives such as mobile phones; personal digital assistants or even travels to a knowledge management conferences in New York, as an example of a firm that uses incentives to encourage knowledge-sharing culture among employees. These monetary styles were effective in motivating employees to share their knowledge (Voelpel and Han, 2005). Apart from that, Samsung Life Insurance’s Knowledge Mileage Program, which keeps the sales manager equipped with the state of art learning content made knowledge sharing easier to embrace among users (Bock et al., 2005). Knowledge sharing is most likely to occur when employees perceive that incentives exceed costs (Bock et al., 2005). The idea of an incentive system is to align the individual benefits of certain behaviour with corporate goals (Muller et al., 2005). The presence of incentive systems promotes higher motivation level towards employees to share their knowledge. Incentive systems have to compensate for the possible benefit of hoarding knowledge. This analysis leads to hypothesis 6: H6. High level of incentive systems among employees will have positive influence on the attitude towards knowledge sharing. Kiasuism Kiasuism is a cultural trait that is claimed to be present among the individuals of Chinese-descent, particularly Singaporeans (Chaudhry, 2005, Hwang et al., 2002; Ho et al., 1998). Kiasuism which is in the Chinese Hokkien dialect is literally translated to “afraid to lose” and is believed to be a distinguishing characteristic of Singaporeans and the individuals of Chinese descent. The presence of kiasuism could initiate a competitive environment, which may lead to the obsessive concern to get the most ahead of others. Though it drives people to excel in a positive way (known as positive kiasuism), but it frequently drives individuals to become overly aggressive and could influence a person to become self-centred (Kirby and Ross, 2007), sometimes referred to as negative kiasuism. To be among the best and to be acknowledged within the firm would influence the attitude of the members of firm. Higher levels of negative kiasuism could affect knowledge sharing adversely. This leads to hypothesis 7: H7. High level of kiasuism among employees will have negative influence on the attitude towards knowledge sharing. Self-efficacy Perceived self-efficacy plays an important role in influencing individuals’ motivation and behaviour (Bandura, 1997). Self-efficacy entails self-evaluation that influences decisions on what behaviours to take. According to Baron and Kenny (1986), it is said that variables such as self-efficacy acts as an intermediary between two other variables such as training and job performance (Orpen, 1999). This positive link is said to be well established between self-efficacy and work-related behaviours (Sadri and Robertson, 2008). Based on this proof, it is important to consider how people can develop and

maintain perceptions of high self-efficacy. This indicates that people who have high self-efficacy will be more likely to perform related behaviour than those with low self-efficacy. Bock and Kim (2002) also proposed that self-efficacy could be treated as a major factor of self-motivational source for knowledge sharing. Their findings reveal that the individual’s judgment of his contribution to firm performance has positive influence on knowledge sharing. This analysis leads to hypothesis 8: H8. High level of self-efficacy among employees will have positive influence on the attitude towards knowledge sharing. Intention to share knowledge Chow and Chan (2008) had claimed that personal attitudes towards a behaviour are a significant predictor of intention to engage in that behaviour. It is also argued that the behavioural intention to share knowledge is determined by a person’s attitude towards knowledge sharing. By limiting the domain of the behavioural intention model to the rational actor, the intention to engage in a behaviour is actually determined by an individual’s attitude towards that behaviour (Ajzen and Fishbein, 1980). At this point, the attitude towards knowledge sharing is defined as the degree of one’s positive feelings about sharing one’s knowledge (Bock et al., 2005). Employees tend to believe that they could improve their relationship with co-workers by offering their knowledge and skills. They believe that by doing so, they would develop a more positive attitude towards knowledge sharing. This analysis leads to hypothesis 9: H9. Supportive attitude towards knowledge sharing will have positive influence on the intention to share knowledge. A summary of the variables used in this study is presented in Table I. Methodology We used a case study approach to examine knowledge-sharing behaviours and the attitude towards sharing knowledge in an electronics-manufacturing firm in Malaysia. We developed the survey questionnaire based on the prior research and the conceptual framework. The questionnaire provided information on the conceptual model and background of the individual participants from the firm. We used a seven-point Likert-type scale for the questionnaire responses, where “1” represents “strongly disagree” and “7” represents “strongly agree” (Connelly and Kelloway, 2003; Hwang et al., 2002). We then conducted a pilot survey with 20 individuals to examine the face validity of the questionnaire in order to ensure reliable results in the main survey. We then evaluated all the comments and suggestions, and incorporated them into survey questionnaire accordingly before generating the final version. Finally, we used the revised questionnaire for data collection. In sampling the participants for this research, we used census-sampling method to select 526 participants (individuals) ( Jacobs and Roodt, 2007) from the manufacturing firm located in Melaka, Malaysia. The unit of analysis was individual. Of the 526 questionnaires distributed, we received 143 completed questionnaires, two of which were invalid because there were many uncompleted sections of the questionnaire. For the analysis, therefore, we used the 141 valid responses. We then used the statistical software called Statistical Package for Social Sciences to analyse the data.


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No. Variable

Key references

1. Individualism

Ardichivili et al. (2006)

2.

Shin et al. (2007) and Hofstede (1980)

3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

8.

9.

Table I. Definition of variables

Definitions

Individualism describes the tendency of people to place personal goals ahead of the goals of a larger social group such as the organization Collectivism The degree to which people prefer to act as members of groups rather than as individuals Social network The degree of contact and accessibility of one with other people Social trust The degree of one’s willingness to be vulnerable to the actions of other people Shared goal The degree to which one has collective goals, missions and visions with other people Incentive systems The extent to align the individual benefits of certain behaviour with corporate goals Kiasuism A distinct character of Singapore culture which associates with “knowledge is power” and to be afraid of losing their “exclusiveness”. The obsessive concern with getting the most out of every transaction and a desire to get ahead of others that stems from greed and promotes envy and selfishness Self-efficacy To the degree of self-evaluation that influences decisions about what behaviours to undertake, the amount of effort and persistence to put forth when faced with obstacles, and finally, the mastery of the behaviour Attitude towards The degree of one’s favourable or knowledge sharing positive feeling about sharing one’s knowledge

10. Intention to share knowledge

The extent to which people are willing to share knowledge with others

Nahapiet and Ghoshal (1998) and Chow and Chan (2008) Nahapiet and Ghoshal (1998), Hsu et al. (2007) and Abrams et al. (2003) Wong et al. (2001) and Chow and Chan (2008) Andriessen (2002) Chaudhry (2005), Hwang et al. (2002) and Ho et al. (1998)

Hsu et al. (2007)

Michailova and Hutchings (2006), Ajzen and Fishbein (1980, 1975), Price and Mueller (1986) and Robinson and Shaver (1973) Andriessen (2002)

Pearson’s correlation analysis and linear regression were used to evaluate the hypotheses outlined earlier in this paper. Results Table II presents the demographic profile of the respondents, and indicates that most of the respondents came from two categories: the others and production department, with over 70 percent. Those in others category are mainly factory workers with managerial responsibility. Most of the participants have worked in the company for more

Items Department Finance Production Maintenance R&D Others Executive level Junior Senior Supervisor Manager Director CEO Others Years employed in this company 0-3 4-6 7-10 11-15 More than 15 years Education level High school (SPM) Diploma Bachelor degree Master degree Doctorate

Frequency

Percentage

1 46 13 12 69

0.7 32.7 9.2 8.5 48.9

26 53 19 35 4 0 4

18.4 37.6 13.5 24.8 2.9 0 2.8

29 21 25 12 54

20.6 14.9 17.7 8.5 38.3

3 28 94 15 1

2.1 19.9 66.7 10.6 0.7


Table II. Respondents’ demographic profile

than one year accounting for about 79 percent of the total responses, which indicates that the respondents are experienced about the firm and could respond to the questions adequately. Based on the respondents’ profile, most the participants (over 70 percent) in this research have bachelors and higher degrees, which indicate a high level of academic awareness and may suggest that they could appreciate the research subject. Table III indicates the means and Cronbach alphas of the variables. The variables have Cronbach alpha values exceeding 0.70, which suggest that the variables are reliable Variables Individualism Collectivism Social network Social trust Shared goal Incentive systems Kiasuism Self-efficacy Intention to share knowledge Attitude towards knowledge sharing

No. of items

Mean

Cronbach alpha

20 18 3 3 3 11 6 6 5 5

4.53 4.86 5.34 5.41 5.40 5.11 4.48 5.93 4.95 5.97

0.75 0.73 0.74 0.71 0.79 0.77 0.74 0.86 0.84 0.72

Table III. Variable means and reliability values

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and could be used for further analysis. The mean values of most of the variables emerged four points and above, which indicate that most of the respondents agreed or tended to agree with the statements on the variables. Table IV illustrates the correlation results for the independent variables against dependent variable, attitude towards knowledge sharing. As the table indicates, a one-tail Pearson correlation analysis reveals that all the variables except individualism were significant at 0.05 significance level. The results show that positive assessment of the independent variables correlates with a positive assessment of the dependent variable. Prior research indicates that individualism would have a negative correlation with attitude towards knowledge sharing, which means that an increase in individualism would lead to a decrease in attitude towards knowledge sharing. However, our finding is different from those of prior research and may be a result of differences in firm culture or individual disposition. Table V illustrates the regression analysis results. As in the correlation analysis, all the hypothesized relationships appeared significant except for HI. As we noted, earlier prior research shows that individualism has a negative impact on attitude towards knowledge sharing. Our result did not support that proposition, but instead the hypothesized relationship was insignificant. Another interesting finding, which has not been examined

Independent variables

Table IV. Correlation analysis results

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

Individualism Collectivism Social network Social trust Shared goal Incentive systems Kiasuism Self-efficacy

0.060 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000

0.132 0.324 * 0.406 * 0.356 * 0.374 * 0.535 * 2 0.561 * 0.656 *

Notes: *Correlation is significant at: 0.05 level (one-tailed); n ¼ 141

Hypotheses

Table V. Linear regression analysis results

Dependent variable: attitude towards knowledge sharing Sig. (one-tailed) Pearson correlation

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

Individualisma Collectivisma Social networka Social trusta Shared goala Incentive systemsa Kiasuism a Self-efficacya Attitude towards knowledge sharingb

Standardized coefficients SE b 0.093 0.099 0.071 0.069 0.064 0.066 0.032 0.053 0.622

0.132 0.324 0.406 0.356 0.374 0.535 20.561 0.656 0.087

t

Sig.

R2

1.56 4.03 5.23 4.49 4.75 7.45 27.99 10.24 0.519

0.199 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 7.154

0.017 0.105 0.165 0.127 0.140 0.286 0.315 0.430 0.269

Notes: aDependent variable: attitude towards knowledge sharing; bdependent variable: intention to share knowledge; n ¼ 141

in previous works, is the hypothesized relationship between kiasuism and attitude toward knowledge sharing (H7). Kiasuism is a disposition that tends to be individual-centric and would have a negative influence on the attitude towards knowledge sharing. A t-value of 27.99 with a p-value of 0.000 and R 2 of 0.315, indicate that H7 is significant. This finding, therefore, supports the hypothesis and confirms the pre-existing perception on the dimension. A t-value of 7.15, a p-value of 0.000 and R 2 of 0.269, indicate that H9 is significant. This finding, therefore, supports the hypothesis, which is consistent with views of practitioners in the industry. This finding indicates that attitude towards knowledge sharing would positively influence the intention to share knowledge among employees in a firm. Discussion Findings from this research provide some knowledge critical in understanding the factors that affect knowledge sharing, particularly, among employees in an electronics-manufacturing firm in Malaysia. Individualism was not a significant factor that would influence the attitude of knowledge sharing among the employees. In fact, prior research have established that individualism would have a negative impact on the attitude towards knowledge sharing, and evidence from practice tend to suggest prior research findings are valid. In this paper, however, we were unable to establish this fact. This could be due to the context we discussed this paper or because we used a case study approach. It would be interesting to know what results emerge from future related research. Another new and interesting finding is impact of kiasuism on attitude towards knowledge sharing. Kiasuism is a relatively new term applied sparsely in researches, but some researchers are now applying and developing this construct for future research applications. The term kiasuism originated from South East Asia (a very popular term in Singapore) and defines the tendency for someone to outshine the rest members of a community for his/her benefits (Chaudhry, 2005; Ho et al., 1998; Hwang et al., 2002). The findings on this factor support the view that employees who have this attribute would hamper any possibility to encourage knowledge sharing in any firm and would be a distraction to any efforts to foster the culture of knowledge sharing in the firm. In addition, this study has also indicated that while kiasuism may have been originally attributed to Singaporeans, Malaysian organisations with a relatively large composition of staff with Chinese-descent, as in this case study, would also exhibit this characteristic. Adequate measures would therefore need to be taken by the firm to ensure that the negative elements of kiasuism is reduced if not eliminated to promote more positive knowledge-sharing attitudes and intentions among its employees as proposed by Kirby and Ross (2007). This study also confirms the role of national cultural influences on knowledge-sharing attitudes and intentions, which is consistent with the earlier works by Michailova and Hutchings (2006) and Shin et al. (2007) who examined this factor in the Russian and Chinese settings. In view of this, researchers and managers would therefore need to be aware that their local and national culture may play a significant role in facilitating or inhibiting knowledge sharing. The other independent variables such as incentive systems, self-efficacy, social network, social trust, collectivism and social goals are all established attributes that would enhance the attitudes of employees to share knowledge. The findings


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on these factors are consistent with discussions in the preceding sections, which confirms the standing perception. The significance of these findings is that most of the prior findings were based on other industries and sectors than manufacturing and industrial engineering. This research is one of the few studies in Asia, and in Malaysia, in particular that uses data from the manufacturing sector. Findings from this paper could serve as a frame of reference for other manufacturing firms and researchers who may be interested in understanding factors that may influence their employees’ knowledge-sharing attitude, and investigate related subjects in the future. Apart from contributing to the literature of knowledge sharing in the electronics-manufacturing firm, identifying and understanding the factors, which could motivate and inhibit knowledge-sharing culture in a firm, would assist in developing an appropriate framework for the firm. Based on the findings, most of the variables have significant influence on the attitude towards sharing knowledge. This research, however, suffers from a few limitations. First, this is a case study and the potential to generalize the results in this paper would be limited to the specific firm or related firms. Case study provides a detail analysis of a specific problem relevant to an entity. Future research could apply this framework in a longitudinal setting to obtain results that would have wider implications. Second, the number of respondents was not large enough and this affected the types of statistical techniques application in this research. Future research should use larger valid responses to enable a wider application of statistical tools. Third, we did not test the conceptual model in this paper. We would suggest that future research in this subject area should apply structural equation modelling approach to test the model. Future research could use triangulation method to achieve a more balanced result both from quantitative and qualitative perspectives. Conclusion Based on the findings, we have been able to answer the research questions and address the objectives we outlined earlier in this paper. The data we obtained supported majority of the hypotheses and provided mostly consistent results compared to prior researches except for a few cases. Although, we used a case study approach, the findings in this paper would be valuable to electronics manufacturing and related firms. The contemporary business environment is increasingly becoming very volatile and unpredictable. The ability of firms, especially electronic manufacturing firms to harness internal resources and capabilities with respect to knowledge sharing among employees, would be critical for these firms to maintain a competitive position in the marketplace. Firms that are able to recognize the power of knowledge, and are able to develop a strong knowledge-sharing supportive culture, would be better prepared to develop unique strengths that would be crucial in this twenty-first century. Based on the foregoing, managers in electronics-manufacturing firms should realize that every aspect of the value chain in a firm would benefit from an effective knowledge-sharing structure. The results in this paper provide key evidence for firms to use in developing a knowledge-sharing capability that takes in account the key requirements for success: developing factors that encourage knowledge sharing and support attitude that could lead to intentions to share knowledge. When these ingredients are in place in a firm, those firms would be able to motivate employees to participate actively in knowledge-sharing initiatives in the firm.

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