To share or not to share? Explaining bidirectional knowledge transfer between younger and older employees from a social comparison perspective

• Applicants: Professorin Dr. Ulrike Fasbender; Professorin Fabiola Gerpott, Ph.D.
• Subject Area: Social Psychology, Industrial and Organisational Psychology ; Accounting and Finance
• Term: since 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 438083224

Knowledge is an important asset for organizations and its effective transfer between younger and older employees is a challenge. Whereas an increasingly age diverse workforce can be beneficial when employees of different ages learn from each other through bidirectional knowledge transfer, these processes do not occur automatically. That is, employees often experience a motivational dilemma about whether to engage in knowledge transfer as a consequence of social comparisons with each other. This motivational dilemma is particularly pertinent between younger and older employees due to existing and expected future status differences. Older employees often have a longer work history (both within and outside the organization) and possess a higher current status than their younger counterparts, but younger employees may have more “potential” to climb the career ladder and gain status in the future. Thus, although older employees may be naturally motivated to pass knowledge to the next generation, they may also fear to lose status by sharing their knowledge with younger colleagues. In contrast, younger employees may be naturally motivated to develop and learn through knowledge transfer and at the same time may experience fear of losing “face” when sharing knowledge with their older colleagues. To untangle this motivational dilemma, this project seeks to advance our understanding of knowledge transfer in organizations from a social comparison perspective between younger and older employees. Specifically, we aim to explain how knowledge sharing enhancing and inhibiting processes play together to determine older and younger employees’ decision to share or not to share their knowledge with their younger or older colleagues. Furthermore, we seek to investigate organizational boundary conditions (i.e., age-inclusive Human Resource Management-practices and intergenerational competitiveness climate) that strengthen or attenuate these relationships.Our work program includes three studies that combine different research methodologies to achieve both internal and external validity. In Study 1, we will conduct an experimental lab study to establish the central assumption that social comparison processes are related to knowledge sharing through knowledge sharing enhancing and inhibiting processes. In Study 2, we will use an experimental vignette design to test whether organizational context factors can change the relationship between social comparison and the knowledge sharing enhancing and inhibiting processes of older and younger employees. In Study 3, we integrate all our arguments to test the complete chain of effects in a field setting with different organizations.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: Netherlands
• Cooperation Partners: Professorin Dr. Anne Burmeister; Professor Dr. Steffen R. Giessner