Purpose: This study explored the influence of team member exchange on employees' knowledge hiding behaviors via job embeddedness and work alienation, with learning goal orientation acting as the boundary condition.
Method: ology: This study adopted a quantitative multi-study research methodology to validate the proposed hypotheses, combining a time-lagged field study with 459 in-service employees and a scenario-based experiment with 128 university students at a northern university in China.
Findings: In Study 1 (field study), team-member exchange was negatively associated with knowledge hiding, and job embeddedness and work alienation mediated this relationship. Perceptions of learning goal orientation can amplify the effect of team-member exchange on job embeddedness and work alienation, which in turn reduces knowledge hiding behaviors. A subsequent experiment (Study 2) almost replicated and supported these findings, but work alienation did not play a role as an intermediary in the relationship between team member exchange and knowledge hiding behavior.
Practical implications: Managers should stimulate social exchanges among team members to inhibit knowledge hiding behaviors and prioritize individuals exhibiting higher learning goal orientations when deciding whom to hire.
Originality: This research identifies and rationalizes how (underlying mechanisms) and when (contingencies) team-member exchange can make a difference in employees' knowledge hiding behaviors, expanding and advancing further research on the knowledge hiding phenomenon from a team perspective.
Keywords: Job embeddedness; Knowledge hiding; Learning goal orientation; Team-member exchange; Work alienation.
© 2024 The Authors.