The effect of team atmosphere and leadership empowerment on knowledge sharing behavior among employees of education groups in Rasht district

Academic Thesis for Master's Degree: Public Administration, Human Resources Orientation

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to investigate the effect of team atmosphere and leadership empowerment on knowledge sharing behavior among employees of education groups in Rasht district. Therefore, it is practical in terms of purpose, and in terms of the method of data collection, it is descriptive of the correlation type. The statistical population in this research is the employees of the educational groups of the 2nd District Education Department of Rasht, which according to the received statistics, there are 87 people. In this research, the standard questionnaire of Liang and Xiu, Bradley (2010) was used. Descriptive statistics methods including (frequency, percentage and graph) and inferential statistics methods including correlation, analysis of variance were used for data analysis. Regression was used to examine the research hypotheses, and the results showed that the proposed model is significant and the research hypotheses based on the effect of the leadership empowerment variable on knowledge sharing behavior, the impact of the leadership empowerment variable on the knowledge sharing attitude, the impact of the team atmosphere variable on the knowledge sharing behavior, the impact of the team atmosphere variable on the knowledge sharing attitude are significant. Also, the results indicate that there is a significant difference between the gender and the knowledge sharing behavior of the employees, according to the average, women have more knowledge sharing behavior, but no significant difference was observed between the age group and the knowledge sharing behavior of the employees.

Key words:

team atmosphere, leadership empowerment, knowledge sharing behavior, attitude.

Introduction

The current era is the era of rapid change and evolution of knowledge. The volume of knowledge doubles every five and a half years, while its average lifespan is less than four years. In such a situation, knowledge is presented as a valuable strategic asset and resource that requires management. According to the above conditions, if we also add the intense competition in the world markets, the importance of the organization's knowledge as a competitive advantage in the current knowledge-based economy doubles. As the volume and complexity of organizational operations become wider, the importance of knowledge becomes more important and the need to be managed on a wider level. Today, organizations are trying hard to be recognized as the pioneers of knowledge management skills and in this way get the reward for their efforts. This is possible through the application of knowledge for innovation purposes. Today, in leading organizations, knowledge is recognized as an enabling element that can transform the organization in such a way that it is able to provide great capabilities from the point of view of productivity and efficiency. Knowledge sharing is the key element of efficient and effective knowledge management programs (Ridge[1], 2005).

Targeted knowledge sharing in organizations leads to faster individual and organizational learning, develops creativity and ultimately improves individual and organizational performance. It is on this basis that organizations strengthen knowledge sharing and encourage their employees to do so. Because people usually do what they tend to do, it is expected that people will be interested in sharing knowledge when they find a positive attitude towards it (King [2], 2001). Knowledge sharing requires cooperation, long-term commitment, creativity and a team atmosphere.

Therefore, experts consider the lack of teamwork culture in affairs as one of the factors of Iran's underdevelopment (Azeimi, 2015) and mention this issue as one of the main weaknesses in organizations. They advance this issue as far as a comparative discussion with some countries, including Japan. One of the most important factors in Japan's development was the acceptance of groups and teamwork. In the life of a Japanese, the team has a deep effect and he attaches special importance to being a member of it. In Japanese society, the individual does not have much meaning. When they wanted to revise their laws after years of voluntary isolation in 1868, they did not know what to write for the rights of the individual, and in order to respect the rights and rights of individuals (the originality of the individual) in the constitution, they had to seek help from Western lawyers and intellectuals. Therefore, it can be seen that in the culture of that society, the individual is not very important, but it is the group that is important, and it is the power and trust of the group that has made Japan unique. Japanese people are fond of living together and consider group efforts to be more important than individual efforts. A number of experts call Japanese people "organizational people".A number of experts call Japanese people "organizational people" who consider group (team) models superior to individual models for a part of their lives. The Japanese feel the satisfaction of the work when you have an eye on their team to finish the job. Therefore, creating work teams and belonging to them is one of the management foundations of Japanese culture. On the other hand, nowadays many companies in America and Europe have turned to the foundation and institutionalization of team culture according to Japan's experience. According to the results of a research work in 1987, about 28% of the largest companies did their work based on teams. While in 1996, this figure has increased to 78%. One of the professors at the University of California believes in this field, "I see a new generation of experienced employees and team skills who will go to high positions in the organization and when they reach the top officials of companies, they will follow teamwork with passion and interest" (Dave [3], 2000). Let's base our expectations on the behavior of team members, and the work and personal characteristics of each team member are the basis of team work. Based on this, we can help our team members and be more effective members regardless of their talent level (Jafarzadeh Kermani, 2013). Therefore, the purpose of this research is to investigate the effect of team atmosphere and leadership empowerment on knowledge sharing behavior among education and training workers in Do Rasht district. As a social behavior, an individual is inevitably exposed to the increase of other people's social influences. Knowledge sharing as an organizational process plays a key role in creating new ideas. All the benefits of effective shared knowledge, from the employees involved through their performance and this improvement of the financial, marketing and other outputs of the organization will effectively communicate.

Also quoted by Liang (2010), the social environment is an important source of information that people use for the actual structure and formulated ideas, attitudes and behavior. While social networks can influence individual behavior. Previous research in social psychology has shown that strong social influences occur in work teams because people like to feel closely identified with their work teams, so they tend to conform to the norms of their team. He found that team atmosphere affects individual perceptions, normative beliefs, use of technology and knowledge sharing behavior among employees. Therefore, in this research, the researcher intends to investigate the effect of team atmosphere and leadership empowerment on the behavior of knowledge sharing among the employees of educational groups in Rasht district. Nowadays, many studies of management science researchers have been directed towards work teams in order to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of activities. Forming efficient work teams and defining different projects for teams, according to their ability and expertise, is an unavoidable principle in managing and controlling work processes and activities. In general, a deep general understanding of knowledge sharing within teams is desirable; Because team design has been widely adopted by organizations. Work activities and coalition job designs require a work group, so understanding how team-related factors affect individual knowledge sharing behaviors is fundamental. The literature shows that team atmosphere is a composite structure of three dimensions of solidarity, trust, and innovation (Book [6], 2005). Solidarity and unity refers to perceptions of a sense of being together among members and is defined as the attraction of members to the team. It can be considered as a physical force that keeps people together. Feelings of solidarity and unity tend to promote team members' willingness to care or help each other. They are more willing to share knowledge with each other.

Trust in a team environment is defined as the willingness of individuals to accept vulnerability based on the expectation of self-confidence, teammate competence, honesty, and benevolence. Effective communication occurs in an environment where trust and commitment are common (Paulo[7], 2007). Team members with stronger trust are more willing to work together continuously and harmoniously.