The impact of paradoxical leadership on employee knowledge-sharing behavior: The role of trust in the leader and employee promotive voice behavior

Abstract

As the organizational environment becomes more volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous, and the economy becomes increasingly knowledge-based, organizational knowledge management is key for companies’ success. This is especially important as organizational ties are weaker and job-hopping becomes a more prevalent phenomenon. As human resource mobility increases, companies must ensure that knowledge remains within the company despite employee exit. In this context, the current study sought to understand how leaders’ actions can facilitate employee knowledge sharing, focusing on paradoxical leadership. Besides examining the impact of paradoxical leadership on employees’ propensity to adopt knowledge-sharing behaviors, this study also explored the effects of one potential intervening variable (i.e., promotive voice behavior) and one potential boundary condition (i.e., trust in the leader) on this relationship. A two-wave time-lagged correlational study was conducted with a sample of 154 workers from various sectors. The results of moderated mediation analysis suggest that paradoxical leaders indirectly promote greater knowledge-sharing among subordinates by fostering their promotive-voice behaviors, but only for those with high levels of trust in the leader. The implications of these findings for current organizational challenges regarding knowledge management are discussed.