Personality traits predicting knowledge hiding behaviour: Empirical evidence from academic institutions of Pakistan

Abstract

Knowledge is considered as a source of competitive advantage for the organizations. Organizations put lots of efforts to increase the extent of knowledge sharing among the employees to boost up innovation and creativity. Despite all these measures people still hide their knowledge from others in the workplace. So, this study aims to investigate the individual differences which may cause knowledge hiding and the impact of knowledge hiding on the hurt relationship and future withholding of knowledge. The data was collected from 245 full-time teachers of public and private sector universities of Southern Punjab, Pakistan. PLS-SEM was used for data analysis. The results of the study showed that the people who score high for extroversion and openness to experience don’t hide knowledge as compared to people who have a high score on agreeableness, consciousness, and neuroticism. Implications, Limitations and future research directions are also discussed.