HOW CAN “GOOD SOLDIERS” ENHANCE

ORGANIZATIOANL PERFORMANCE:
KNOWLEDGE SHARING AS A MEDIATOR

Chi-Wei Liu 1, Shih-Chieh Fang 2 and Pei-Wen Huang3

1
Lecturer, Management School, HungKuang TechnologyUniversity, Taichung,
Taiwan
Doctoral student, Graduate School of Management, I-Shou University, Kaohsiung,
Taiwan
2
Professor, Department of Marketing and Distribution Management,
National Kaohsiung First University of Science and Technology, Kaohsiung, Taiwan

3
Lecturer, Department of International Trade, Cheng-Shiu University, Kaohsiung,
Taiwan
Doctoral student, Graduate School of Management, I-Shou University,
Kaohsiung, Taiwan

Correspondence:
Lecturer, Management School, HungKuang TechnologyUniversity, Taichung,
Taiwan
Doctoral student, Graduate School of Management, I-Shou University, Kaohsiung,
Taiwan
Tel: 886 7 4 2623 3427
E-mail: wliu01@ms15.hinet.net
 HOW CAN “GOOD SOLDIERS” ENHANCE
ORGANIZATIOANL PERFORMANCE:
KNOWLEDGE SHARING AS A MEDIATOR

ABSTRACT

Though organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) has been regarded as an

important concept in that it is thought to be able to enhance organizational
performance by promoting the effective functioning of the organization, this
conceptual plausibility has received little empirical attention. Thus, this paper aims to
broaden our knowledge on the effect of OCB on organizational performance by
proposing knowledge sharing as a mediator of the relationship between OCB and new
product development (NPD). Based on the assumption that an organization functions
as a social community, by synthesizing and examining the relevant theories, we
generate that social exchange theory and psychological contract serve as the
theoretical underpinnings the relationship of OCB and NPD posits. The moderating
effect of trust on the relationship of OCB and knowledge sharing is proposed to be
examined in this study.

Keywords: organizational citizenship behavior, organization performance, knowledge

sharing, social exchange theory, psychological contract, new product development
 INTRODUCTION

Organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) has been the focus of considerable

attention since Organ (1988) proposed that organizational citizenship behavior is
related to individual and organization performance (Podsakoff, Mackenzie, Paine &
Bachrach, 2000; Organ, 1997; Podsakoff, Ahearne & MacKenzie, 1997; Krilowicz &
Lowery, 1996; Organ & Ryan, 1995; Podsakoff & MacKenzie, 1994; George &
Battenhausen, 1990). Organ (1988) described OCB as good solider syndrome, such
discretionary behavior is usually not directly or explicitly recognized by the formal
reward system but in the aggregate promotes the effective functioning of an
organization. However, to our knowledge, it is surprising that this conceptual
plausibility, compared with the interest in identifying the antecedents of OCBs, has
received little empirical attention (Podsakoff et al., 2000). Thus, to broaden our
knowledge about the effect of OCB on organizational performance, more focus needs
to be put. Especially when an era dominated by knowledge economy, nowadays to
examine whether OCB can enhance knowledge management performance in an
organization may be in need of more attention.
From knowledge management perspective, organizational members are the primary
learning entity in organizations (Dodgson, 1999). These important knowledge carriers
proceed with knowledge activities such as knowledge sharing, transfer, integration,
absorption and application within the organization. Accordingly, in promoting
organizational performance on knowledge management activities, organization
members play vital roles. On the other hand, empirical findings of earlier OCB
research also showed that OCB has a positive impact on enhancing organizational
performance (Podsakoff & MacKenzie, 1994; Podsakoff, Ahearne & MacKenzie
1997). In line with this, we argue that if an organization with more employees
proceeding with OCBs, it will have a positive impact on organizational knowledge
performance. And our argument is supported by some research (cf., Davenport &
Prusak, 1998; Bouty, 2000; Osterloh & Frey, 2000). In analyzing the antecedents of
knowledge sharing in an organization, these research conceptually proposed that OCB
was one of the antecedents of knowledge sharing. Their argument added a distinctive
but reasonable perspective to the existing empirical findings on the antecedents of
knowledge sharing and the impact of OCB. It implies that members showing more
organizational citizenship behavior are more willing to share knowledge with their
co-workers. Nevertheless, this contention went largely unnoticed but provided another
direction to investigate the impact of OCB on knowledge activities. We argue that if
OCB does serve as the antecedent of knowledge sharing, and then how does the
relationship transform into one of the organization performance?
In a knowledge economy era, in order to make fast responses to the intense
competition and satisfy customers’ rapid and changeable demands, a firm’s capability
of designing and developing new products will determine the survival and growth of
the firm (Zander & Kogut, 1995). Thus, what are the decisive factors determining the
success of a NPD needs investigating. Will OCB influence the performance of NPD in
an organization? If our assumption is supported, how do these citizenship behaviors
enhance the performance of NPD? New product development is regarded, to great
extent, as an embodiment of knowledge creation. During the process of knowledge
creation, knowledge sharing serves as the core foundation (Nonaka, 1994). Without
effective functioning of knowledge sharing, the knowledge embedded and dispersed
in individuals in the organization will be less likely transferred in an organization.
Accordingly, while examining the relationship between OCB and NPD, we can not
neglect the role of knowledge sharing in this relationship. In line with this, in this
study, we argue that the impact of OCB on NPD performance should be mediated by
the effect of knowledge sharing. With these wonderings to be clarified, this study
serves to be at the inception of discovering the theoretical underpinnings behind the
interesting phenomenon by investigating the underlying rationale of this conceptual
plausibility.
Among the literature review regarding factors affecting knowledge sharing,
theorists have analyzed this issue from different aspects (Davenport & Prusak, 1998;
Dyer & Nobeoka, 2000; Gupta & Govindarajan, 2000; Hansen, 1999; Hendriks, 1999;
Senge, 1998; Tsai, 2001; Zander & Kogut, 1995). Some scholars considered the
structural dimension of organizations has direct impact on knowledge sharing
activities, evidenced by some related literature (Davenport & Prusak, 1998; Hendriks,
1999; Osterloh & Frey, 2000; Tsai, 2002). Others explored the influence of relational
dimension on knowledge sharing (Gupta & Govindarajan, 2000; Kale, Singh, &
Perlmutter, 2000; Madhavan & Griver, 1998; Nonaka, Toyama, & Konno, 2000; Tsai
& Ghoshal, 1998). Still some researchers investigated how organizational culture
affected knowledge sharing (Hanley,1999). Szulanski (1996) searched for the
procedures of knowledge sharing while Hendricks (1999) explored from the
organization’s institutional dimension. To synthesize the past researches, only few of
them explored knowledge sharing from the viewpoint of individual interaction within
an organization and this perspective needs more effort to focus (Bounty, 2000). This
study responds to this call to provide a more comprehensive understanding about
intra-organizational knowledge sharing from an interaction perspective and makes
itself valuable by examining the impact of OCB on organizational performance.

Organization: another form of “social community”

The premise of examining knowledge sharing among organization members from

an interaction perspective lies in the assumption that an organization functions as a
social community. Kogut & Zander (1996:503) asserted that a firm is a social
community which specializes in effective and speedy knowledge sharing and
knowledge creation. Being a member of the social community, an organization
member shares similar identity with others (Kogut & Zander, 1996; Brown & Duquid,
2001). It is this identity that makes firms more capable of sharing and creating
knowledge than other governance form of knowledge (e.g. market).
A social community is a context woven from shared identity, common norms,
general belief, collective vision or joint experiences (Kogut & Zander, 1996; Nahapiet
and Ghoshal 1998; Lesser 2000; Brown & Duquid, 2001; Adler and Kwon 2002).
Members in the social community interact with each other on the basis of reciprocity,
or community identity (Gulati 1995; Dyer and Singh 1998). Such identity enhances
the cohesion and norms of organization members and exemplifies on the interaction
based on common language (Nonaka & Takeuchin, 1995; Grant, 1996b). Thus, under
such cooperative ambience based on reciprocity and community identity, members in
the organization would be more likely to reduce barriers of communication and
opportunistic behaviors in the light of common norms and shared context (Conner and
Prahalad 1996; Dyer and Singh 1998) and accordingly be more willing to show the
spirit of altruism, the core concept of OCB. And their altruistic behavior (or OCB)
will make knowledge exchange and knowledge sharing in an intra-organization much
more smoothly. Simply put, under such a context with shared identity, members in the
organization would have more motivation and opportunities to share knowledge or
resources with each other (Dyer and Nobeoka 2000; Adler and Kwon 2002),
especially when the context is full of the spirit of altruism. Subsequently, such
ambience raises the level of quality and quantity of the knowledge exchanged (Koka
and Prescott 2002) and therefore promotes the performance of knowledge activities in
the organization. This perspective regarding an organization as a social community
provides support for our examining the relationship between OCB and knowledge
sharing.
Related to the above contention, a social community can be characterized by the
concept of “reciprocity” and “identity” (Gulati 1995; Kogut & Zander,1996; Dyer and
Singh 1998; Brown & Duquid,2001; Nahapiet and Ghoshal 1998; Lesser 2000; Adler
and Kwon 2002). The former could be regarded as the main concept of social
exchange theory while the latter is the key concept of psychological contract. In line
with this, to examine the relationship of OCB and knowledge sharing among
organizational members from these two theoretical perspectives gains justification.
We echo the contention that OCB is one of the antecedents of knowledge sharing (cf.,
Davenport & Prusak, 1998; Bouty, 2000; Osterloh & Frey, 2000) and further propose
that the impact of the relationship on organization performance could be embodied in
new product development (NPD). Thus, based on the nature of this study, this
research aims to examine the effect of OCBs on NPD in an organization with
knowledge sharing as a mediator.
This paper is organized as follows. In the next section, the literature on knowledge
sharing, especially the antecedents of this behavior, is briefly reviewed. Next, we
move our focus on the literature of organizational citizenship behavior and generate
the content of OCB in this study. In the section that follows, supposed that an
organization functions as a social community, we investigate the underlying
theoretical underpinnings of the relationship between OCB and knowledge sharing
posits and further examine the moderating effect of trust on this relationship. Next, we
propose that the embodiment of the knowledge sharing will be transformed into
NPD. Based on the rationale, a conceptual model of the effect of OCB on NPD, an
organizational knowledge creation advantage, is presented. Finally, this paper ends up
with some discussion for the future research.

LITERATURE REVIEWS AND PROPOSITION DEVELOPMENT

Knowledge Sharing
 From knowledge-based view, a firm is regarded as a knowledge base (Kogut &
Zander, 1992, 1996; Grant, 1996b). Since knowledge is dispersed and embedded in
individuals, equipment or routines, it would be difficult to govern knowledge related
activities if knowledge can not be thoroughly shared within the organization.
Therefore, the antecedent role of knowledge sharing in the process of knowledge
creation has always been a critical issue in knowledge management (Nonaka, 1994;
Nonaka, Toyama & Konno, 2000).
Yet, the definition of knowledge sharing has not yet reached consensus. Scholars
interpret the concept of knowledge sharing from different perspectives: knowledge
interaction perspective (Nonaka and Takeuchi, 1995), learning perspective
(Senge,1998), knowledge market perspective (Davenport and Prusak,1998),
communication perspective(Hendriks, 1999), political power perspective (Frehcn and
Raven, 1959; Emerson, 1962). No matter what perspective lens has been taken to
explore the nature of knowledge sharing, a basic concept to be clarified is that
knowledge sharing and information sharing tell different stories. Generally speaking,
information is often open and accessible, while knowledge sharing mostly depends on
the agreement of the other party (Senge, 1998) That is, in addition to the fact that the
knowledge provider is willing to disseminate his knowledge, he is also ready to help
the receiver understand and learn the content of this knowledge. The advanced level
of knowledge sharing would be the knowledge receiver transformed the received
knowledge into his own with distinctive characteristics. In the light of this viewpoint,
knowledge sharing includes two aspects: willingness and ability of knowledge sharing
(Hansen, 1999). Kostova (1999) discussed the process of knowledge transformation
from psychological and cognitive aspects, proposing that successful knowledge
transfer is absolutely dependent on both parties’ ability as well as their willingness.
Dixon (2000) and Senge (1998) argued that the interaction of knowledge sharing is to
achieve others’ “knowledge knowing”. Thus, without the relevant ability for
executing knowledge sharing, such as communication, information delivering and
interpretation, the effect of knowledge sharing would be discounted even organization
members are willing to share their knowledge. To be specific, the dedicated
willingness and ability to share are two key components for knowledge sharing. But
in terms of the nature of our research question and the perspective we took to examine
the impact of OCB on knowledge sharing, we would focus on the dimension of the
willingness of knowledge sharing. Thus, the focus of the willingness of knowledge
sharing in this study is that whether the knowledge provider is willing to assist others
in learning and share his personal knowledge. As for other issues such as knowledge
characteristics, content and the knowledge receiver’s absorptive ability are beyond the
scope of our research. Based on Nonaka and Takevchis’s (1995) contention that the
willingness of knowledge sharing as the individual member actively involve in
sharing knowledge, this paper interprets knowledge sharing as “organization members
spontaneously share their knowledge and are indifferent to external motivation
with-out the organization.”
Davenport and Prusak (1998) compared “knowledge sharing” to a process of
members’ searching and exchanging knowledge in an internal organizational
knowledge market. Using the concept of “exchange” to examine the willingness of
knowledge sharing helps recognize two parties involving in knowledge sharing: a
“knowledge holder” and a “knowledge receiver” as a seller and a buyer respectively
in the knowledge market while “knowledge” is the target of exchange. As such,
whether individual members in the organization are willing to transact or exchange
their knowledge resources depends on mutual benefit, reciprocity, reputation and
altruism (Davenport & Prusak, 1998; Bouty, 2000). In this study, we focus on
regarding the context of an organization as a social community rather than an
internal-market described by Davenport & Prusak (1998 ). We suppose that under the
identity-shared or common-value context, through formal and informal
communication channels, organization members will exchange resource or help with
each other spontaneously. Related research proposes that the richness of personal
interaction, especially informal communication channels have higher impact on
knowledge sharing than formal communication channels (Davenport & Prusak, 1998;
Tsai & Ghoshal, 1998). The interaction channels enable organization members to
shape the shared identity and through the mechanism of “common language” (Grant,
1996) to promote the quantity and quality of knowledge sharing (Davenport &

Prusak，1998; Madhavan & Griver,1998; Hansen ,1999; Tsai & Ghoshal, 1998). And,

here these spontaneous organizational citizenship behaviors function in an

organization to great extent as an informal interaction channel. Thus, we propose that
with the core concept of altruism, OCB serves as an informal interaction channel to
facilitate knowledge sharing in an organization.
Organizational Citizenship Behavior

The theory of organizational citizenship behavior originally came from scholars

who are looking for what kind of condition an effective organization should have. In
terms of human resources management, it is about what kind of performance
individuals should possess to help achieve the effectiveness of organizational
performance. Organ (1988) pointed that there is no such perfect organization that
organizational objectives could be accomplished by organization members’ in-role
behavior. Therefore, an extra-role behavior is motivated to help fill up the deficiency
of formal organization systems as well as the realization of role objectives. Such
spontaneous extra-role behavior is termed as organizational citizenship behavior by
Smith, Organ & Near (1983).
Most of the induction of the antecedents of OCB is based on social exchange theory

and positive affective (Konovsky & Pugh, 1994；Moorman, 1991；Organ, 1990).。

Positive affective approach is to examine OCB from a perspective of social

psychology. They believed that when people are in a state of positive emotion, such as
joy and happiness, they are more likely to proceed with altruistic behavior. Some
empirical studies expanded individual altruistic behavior as OCB and found support
for the above reasoning (Smith, Organ, & Near, 1983). With the increase in theoretical
and empirical researches, different concepts for analyzing have been brought forward
by some scholars, such as the psychological contract perspective (Robinson &
Morrison, 1995) and covenantal relationship perspective (Van Dyne, Graham &
Dienesch, 1994).
Although the variant perspectives to examine OCB research undoubtedly have
broadened our knowledge on OCB, the literature has focused less on carefully
defining the nature of citizenship behavior itself (Podsakoff, et al., 2000). Podsakoff
et al. (2000:515) proposed “… the proliferation of research on OCBs and other forms
of extra-role behavior has resulted in a lack of recognition of some of the similarities
and differences in some of these constructs”. The contextual dimensions of OCB have
to do with social culture and economic institutional framework (Farh, Zhong & Organ,
2004). Without taking the factor of culture into consideration while they investigated
the socially-based citizenship behavior, the same construct may have different, even
conflicting conceptual interpretation for people in different cultures (Podsakoff et al.,
2000). By examining the prevailing research on OCB, Liu, Chen & Lin (2004) found
that “altruism” is an etic dimension of OCB across cultures. Based on earlier work’s
contention that OCB as an antecedent of knowledge sharing, the researchers claimed
that here they meant OCB as a helpful behavior, the core value of “altruism”. Thus, in
order to make the empirical study appropriately applied in diverse cultures and to
examine the impact of the core concept of OCB, in this study, we only examine the
altruism dimension of OCB and define altruism as being active and pleased to provide
knowledge to others in need of.
With the assertion that an organization functions as a social community, in which
organizational members interact with each other on the base of reciprocity and shared
identity, we will examine the relationship between OCB and knowledge sharing in an
intra-organization context from social exchange theory (with reciprocity as the core
concept) and psychological contract (with identity as the fundamental concept) in the
following section.

Relationship Between OCB and Knowledge Sharing:

Social Exchange Theory Approach and Psychological Contract Approach

Social Exchange Theory Approach. Many scholars (Organ, 1988；Bateman &

Organ, 1983；Moorman,1991；Konovsy & Pugh, 1994) tried to reason organizational
citizenship behavior from social exchange theory. Organ (1988) adopting the notion
of Blau’s (1964) argued that there are two dominant models of interpersonal
interaction, namely social and economic exchange. Social exchange is distinguished
from economic exchange in that the foundation of the former is “trust” (Blau, 1964)
while the basis for the latter is “transaction”. Blau believed that in the process of
social exchange, the resulting reciprocity brings about gratitude, responsibility and
trust. From the perspective of social exchange theory, members would change their
perception and attitude as a result of social interaction. When members perceive
organizational justice and the autonomy and interdependence of their job, members
would reinforce their confidence and responsibility to the organization and further
habitually present organizational citizenship behavior (Organ, 1988). According to
Bolino (1999), organization members exhibiting citizenship behavior are trying to
remunerate the organization. Therefore, an organizational citizenship behavior is a
rewarding behavior out of organization members’ free will based on social exchange
perspective (Organ, 1988, 1990). In a nutshell, the relationship between the cognition
and attitude of organization members and organizational citizenship behavior is based
on the social exchange theory.
Traditionally, OCB is regarded as an extra-role behavior which organization
members have their right to do or not. Providing that employees consider the
relationship between them and organization is a kind of social exchange, they would
conduct advantageous behavior to organization based on the concept of reciprocity
(Organ, 1988, 1990). When the above contention is applied to the issues of knowledge
sharing within organizations, knowledge sharing is the embodiment of reciprocity.
From a reciprocal viewpoint, the knowledge provider would be more ready to spend
time and effort for knowledge sharing if he expects the knowledge requirer would
gives him a hand whenever necessary. On the contrary, an altruistic perspective would
suggest that the knowledge provider shares his knowledge from his free will is just
because of OCB being an altruistic behavior (Bouty, 2000). Hendriks (1999)
concluded that all in all knowledge sharing gives the knowledge requirer an
opportunity to reward the provider based on reciprocity consideration and may be
likely to share his rebuilt or innovative information or knowledge with the provider in
the future. Furthermore, the willingness of knowledge sharing might also be
influenced by “empathy” mentality (Hoffman, 1975). “Empathy”, a psychological
state of shared feeling, is a response that shares other person’s feelings. Hoffman
(1975) supposed that through experiencing the other’s emotion, the stronger the
knowledge provider can feel the empathy; the more explicitly the spirit of altruism
will reveal. Accordingly, with the strong altruistic orientation, the knowledge provider
will have high willingness to share knowledge. Accordingly, through the process of
social exchange, organization members spontaneously behave organizational
citizenship behaviors as the consequence of their job satisfaction, trust towards the
superiors, or organization commitment. In a similar vein, when the occurrence of
empathy incrementally increases, organization members will incline to behave with
altruism and consequently, their willingness of knowledge sharing will also be
enhanced.

Psychological Contract Approach. Psychological contract first is used to describe the

subjective perception of the relationship between employers and the employees.
Schein (1980) regards psychological contract as an unwritten expectation existing
between all the employees and managers. Based on reciprocity, Rousseau (1989)
defines psychological contract as the belief holding by individuals that there exists
reciprocal responsibility between individuals and the organization. Specifically,
psychological contract is the mutual expectation between individual employee and his
or her organization (Brooks, 1999). Robinson & Morrison (1995) postulated that the
virtues of citizenship behavior would decrease once the employees perceive the
violation of the psychological contract. From organizational justice perspective,
employers’ breaching of psychological contract makes employees feel depressed and
betrayed because the procedural justice has been impaired. Consequently, this
perceived experience fails to motivate employees’ organizational citizenship behavior.
Turnley & Feldman (2000) further provided evidence that the violation of
psychological contract would result in employees’ changing their jobs, overlooking
their task duties or even diminishing their OCBs.
Rousseau and Parks (1993) pointed that the essence of social exchange is trust,
fidelity and commitment. Among which, trust is the key factor of sustaining exchange
relationship. “Trust”, a concept of “shared value”, could be used to distinguish the
difference between psychological contract and traditional exchange relationship
(Graham, 1991). This kind of shared value will promote an intimate relationship
among employees and also facilitate positive emotions between employees and their
organizational identification. Thus, if members could understand the value of the
organizational culture, they will behave more beneficial behavior towards the
organization. Under the context of common values and shared meanings among
organization members, it is favorable for them to achieve common recognition (Grant,
1996a) of the assigned task. Hence, under the context of organizational identification,
the ambience would induce more motivations for organization members to share
knowledge and, as a result, promote knowledge flows and exchange within
organizations (Kogut & Zander, 1996; Brown & Duguid, 2001).
Osterloh & Frey (2000) explored the relationship between psychological contract
and knowledge sharing and claimed that an organizational structure and an incentive
system have an effect on knowledge sharing within organizations. Specifically, both
intrinsic and extrinsic motivations influence the effect of internal knowledge sharing
and transfer. Intrinsic motivation, from a view point of psychological contract,
suggests non-financial reward, such as public praise for outstanding behavior, peer
affirmation and job promotion. In this view, satisfaction in psychological contract
would induce more knowledge sharing behavior.
 To synthesize the above argument, the relationship between OCB and knowledge
sharing anchors in the employee’s cognition of organizational justice, the interaction
between leaders and followers, organizational support and organizational
identification. Based on the cognition in terms of different facets, organization
members gradually build trust towards the organization. Moreover, it is the trust and
without violation in psychological contract that encourage employees to perform
citizenship behaviors and further promote their willingness of knowledge sharing.
In a nutshell, a shared context of social community helps organization members
conduct OCB either beneficial to individual members or the organization as well as
promotes the willingness of knowledge provider to share the embedded knowledge
(Nahapiet & Ghoshal, 1998; Lesser, 2000); in due course, knowledge creation
activities could be expected. Therefore, either a social exchange theory or
psychological contract perspective supports that, on condition that organization
members conduct more altruistic behavior, their willingness of knowledge sharing is
accordingly amplified. Hence, we content that either with the motivation of
reciprocity or with a high identity towards the organization, being in a social
community, organization members will behave more organizational citizenship
behaviors, and accordingly promote their willingness of knowledge sharing. Hence,
we propose that:

Proposition 1: When organization members conduct more citizenship

behavior, they are more willing to share knowledge
within the organization.

An intra-organization functions to great extent as a closed-network, in which the

embeddedness of close social ties would stimulate strong trust among members.
Under shared norms and the common belief, organization members trust that
individual members would obey organization regulations and assume responsibility
for an individual behavior to maintain organizational reputation and credibility. Since
the quality of relationship between members is composed of trust, commitment and
reciprocity, this close relationship between members helps eliminate inter-personal
barrier (Nonaka et al., 2000), disarm mutual defensive mentality, increase the
willingness of sharing risks resulting from knowledge exchange (Gulati, 1998; Dyer
& Singh, 1998), and encourage devotion to knowledge exchange activities (Nahapiet
& Ghoshal, 1998). Tsai and Ghoshal (1998) also contended that when both parties
trust each other, they will be more prepared to share their resources with no fear of
being taken advantages. A trust-based relationship not only diminishes the possibility
of opportunism but also promotes knowledge sharing between organization members
(Kale, Singh & Perlmutter, 2000). To sum up, a trust-based mechanism would
improve individual members’ mutual reciprocity and interdependence. Accordingly,
we propose that trust has a moderating effect on the relationship of OCB and
knowledge sharing to great extent and we’ll discuss it in the next section.

The Role of “Trust” in the Relationship of OCB And Knowledge Sharing

Trust stands for a multi-dimensional concept. The meaning of trust includes: (a) a
status of cognition, not easy for objective evaluation; (b) a belief of expectation, the
trusters do not expect disadvantageous action from the trustees; (c) a behavior of
mutual interaction (d) a behavior of trust is advantageous to inter-personal or
inter-divisional positive interaction (Dodgson, 1993; Davenport, Davis & Grimes,
1999).
Nonaka et al. (2000) pointed that the premise of members’ sharing tacit knowledge
is that there should be intensive love, caring, trust and commitment between members.
Under this ambience, organization members would be induced to share their tacit
knowledge. Therefore, trust is a key factor to provoke knowledge sharing. Blau (1964)
suggested that a trust-based behavior resulting from reciprocal consideration in the
long run rather than concern of short-term interest. Consequently, individual members
would share their knowledge because of mutual trust in the hope of future
remuneration. Jones & George (1998) indicated that once non-conditional trust occurs
among people, they will share their knowledge and information of their own accord.
Thus, trust has a predicting effect on the knowledge sharing behavior. A study of
collaborative R&D project teams (Davenport et al., 1999) found that mutual trust
among team members is essential for promoting the performance of R&D cooperation.
Whereas the trust between the two knowledge sharers not only means the trust on the
knowledge demander’s behavior, the component of the trust also includes the trust on
the exchanged target.
In terms of the nature of our research question, trust is the centrality of knowledge
exchange and sharing. Davenport & Prusak (1998) postulated that trust is not only the
necessary condition for knowledge exchange, it could be also the outcome of
knowledge exchange and sharing. If the organizational members could interact and
build up trust, the two parties of knowledge exchange would be able to recognize both
quality and quantity of the target knowledge and be able to identify if the exchange is
satisfactory or not. We think that this will encourage knowledge flow within
organizations. Therefore, we argue that mutual trust among organization members
could facilitate the knowledge flow thoroughly and transparently within the
organization (Nahapiet & Ghoshal, 1998; Davenport, et al., 1999). In a nutshell, trust
among organization members help eliminate the barrier for knowledge sharing,
improve the quality and quantity of knowledge exchange and further strengthen
organizational knowledge creation.
Based on the above contention, we suppose that if there is high degree of trust
between organization members, they are more willing to exchange information and
ideas. In the long run, the effect of knowledge sharing would be promoted.
Accordingly,

Proposition 2: The trust among organizational members moderates the

effect of OCB on knowledge sharing.

Knowledge Sharing and New Product Development

Holthouse (1998) proposed that “knowledge” functions as a concept of “flow”.

During the interaction between a knowledge–provider and a knowledge-receiver,
knowledge will have the interacting synergy through the process of knowledge
sharing. Knowledge sharing means creating the quantity of knowledge flow in the
inter-organization. When the more powerful knowledge flow becomes, the more
effectively and efficiently knowledge will be transformed and created. Consequently,
organizational competitive competence and core capability will be as the consequence
of the knowledge flow (Osterlon & Frey, 2000). In terms of our research question, the
embodiment of the organization core competitive advantage will present in the
performance of the new product development (NPD).
Products are the embodiments of knowledge and the most valuable knowledge
usually is embedded in the group members of NPD. From knowledge-based
perspective, new product development could be regarded as a process of integrating,
or recombining knowledge localizing in the internal organization and the external and
then embody the integrated and recombined knowledge into products (Madhavan &
Grover, 1998). Hence, in terms of knowledge sharing in an internal organization, the
key to the successful knowledge sharing lies in how to make the tacit knowledge
embedded and dispersed in individuals or departments flow and be shared in the
organization, how to transform the knowledge into organizational knowledge and then
how to apply the organizational knowledge into innovative activities. Thus, for a NPD
team, the first step to be involved in knowledge activities is to thoroughly share the
embedded knowledge within the group and then carry on value creation activities with
new product. When NPD team members with high degree of willingness to share their
knowledge, it means that the knowledge-provider would like to share his new
knowledge about the technology and market and at the same time the
knowledge-receiver is also willing to learn the shared knowledge. Therefore,
knowledge sharing has its positive impact on the accomplishment of new product
development project under time pressure. Tsai (2001) also agreed that knowledge
transfer is an opportunity for organization members to learn and cooperate with each
other. Knowledge transfer could stimulate new knowledge creation and enhance
organization’s innovation capability by virtue of internal knowledge exchange and
flow to share the product-related knowledge with the individuals in need.
Most of the past research emphasized the importance of knowledge sharing to
organizational new product development. Nonaka et al.(2000) proposed that when the
more successful knowledge sharing in an intra-organization proceeds, the more new
knowledge will be generated by members, and consequently, this will shorten
members’ time for information-searching (Hansen, 1999). Dixon (2000) suggested
that higher degree of knowledge sharing within organizations would enable the
application of past experience of NPD on new project, which may reduce the time for
try and error. Susman, Gray, Perry & Blair (2003) argued that knowledge sharing
among NPD team members would promote organizations’ innovation capability and
market efficacy and so on. As for the research of Hoopes & Postrel (1999), they
observed that without the existence of shared knowledge, a negative effect on the
performance of new product development would occur.
For the nature of our research, organization members would form as a social
community with shared context by means of socialization. Therefore, on the basis of a
shared context of cognition, organization members embrace common value, norms
and identity (Nahapiet & Ghoshal, 1998; Lesser, 2000). Under such context,
self-disciplined and self-enforcing forces (Adler & Kwon, 2002) would be shaped to
encourage the interaction of knowledge sharing as knowledge-shared routines (Gulati,
1995; Yli-Renko et al., 2002) as well as compose a psychological contract in terms of
knowledge sharing (Osterloh & Frey, 2000), which in turn will motivate members to
involve in knowledge exchange activities with enthusiasm. On the other hand, since
the members in NPD team share the cognitive context, cost of conflict and
coordination could be reduced during the process of knowledge exchange and
communication (Dyer & Singh, 1998; Dyer & Nobeka, 2000). Hence, we posit that
new product development plays a mediating role in the process of knowledge
conversion. Through this process of knowledge conversion, the tacit knowledge,
which is difficult to observe and transfer, gradually embodies on the conceptualization
of new product. Therefore, knowledge sharing plays a decisive factor of determining
the success of a new product development. Accordingly, our study asserts that through
socialization, a shared context will be shaped among the organization members.

Proposition 3: When the organization members are more willing to share their
knowledge, the more efficient the new product development will be.

DISCUSSION

Research on the topic of organizational citizenship behavior has addressed many

interesting findings. As the forementioned discussion, conceptually, there are several
reasons why citizenship behaviors could enhance organizational competitiveness
(Organ, 1988, 1990; Karambayya, 1990; Podsakoff & MacKenzie, 1994, 1997;
Podsakoff et al., 1997). For example, as Podsakoff & MacKenzie (1997) summarized
OCBs may contribute to organizational performance by enhancing productivity,
utilizing resources more productively, helping to coordinate activities, enabling the
organization’s adaptation to changeable environment or strengthening the
organization’s ability by attracting best employees. But it is surprising that the
assumption that OCB will influence organization effectiveness is only examined by
few studies. And generally speaking, the empirical research supports Organ’s
assertion that the “good soldier” syndrome is related to organization performance (cf.
Karambayya, 1990; Podsakoff & MacKenzie, 1994; MacKenzie, Podsakoff &
Ahearne, 1996; Walz & Niehoff, 1996; Podsakoff et al., 1997). However, the findings
are inconsistent. Helping behavior was found to enhance performance in some
research (MacKenzie, et al.,1996; Walz & Niehoff, 1996; Podsakoff et al., 1997) but
also appeared to have a negative impact on performance (Podsakoff & MacKenzie,
1994). With the inconsistence, our study tries to investigate the reason why the
findings are not consistent.
Based on the assertion that an organization functions as a social community, in
which organization members interact with each other under a context with shared
identity, we argue that as an informal channel, OCB will rich the interaction of
knowledge sharing among members and then enhance the performance of NPD in an
organization. This study investigates the underlying theoretical perspectives of the
conceptual plausibility that OCB is positively related to organization performance. By
synthesizing the relevant theories, we generate social exchange theory and
psychology contract as the theoretical underpinnings the relationship between
organizational citizenship behavior and new product design deposits. Specifically, we
argue that the inconsistent findings on the relationship between OCB and
organizational performance might be due to the role of a mediating mechanism in the
relationship. In this study, we assert that only through the meditating effect of
knowledge sharing will the embodiment of OCB influence the performance of NPD.
This insight makes us critically re-think about the existence of mediating mechanisms
in the relationship between OCB and organization performance. Is it with high
possibility that the impact of OCB on organization performance only exists at the
presence of some mediating effect? Or is it the different mediating mechanism that
result in different consequences? Our wondering corresponds to what Podsakoff &
MacKenzie, (1997) claimed. In their study, they proposed that in terms of the effect of
OCB on organizational success, citizenship behaviors have been hypothesized to
influence organizational success through a wide variety of different mechanisms. In a
nutshell, the assertion of this study not only corresponds to Podsakoff & MacKenzie’s
(1997) assumption, but provides an empirical direction to examine the mechanism of
knowledge sharing in the relationship between organizational citizenship behavior
and new product development.
In closing, the contribution of this research is four-fold: (a) it conceptually supports
that organizational citizenship behavior will have a positive effect on the performance
of NPD by investigating the underlying rationale that an organization functions as a
social community. (b) it provides a more comprehensive theoretical underpinnings the
impact of OCB on NPD posits. (c) it argues that OCB will influence NPD
performance with the existence of the mediator of knowledge sharing. (d) it broadens
our knowledge about the relationship between OCB and organization performance by
re-emphasizing the role of mediating mechanism in the relationship.

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