How Leadership and Trust in Leaders Foster Employees' Behavior Toward Knowledge Sharing

Abstract

We explored the effect of transformational leadership and trust in leaders on knowledge collecting and knowledge donating, the 2 components of knowledge sharing, with data from 368 employees at 63 Chinese firms. The results showed that trust in leaders mediated the relationship between transformational leadership and knowledge sharing. In addition, transformational leadership had a greater effect than did trust in leaders on knowledge donating, and aspects of trust in leaders had a greater effect than did transformational leadership on knowledge collecting. The findings provide theoretical insights and practical initiatives for knowledge management.