Indirect effect of knowledge hiding in the relationship between abusive supervision and employee creativity

Muhammad Awais^*, Amna Manzoor and Sajid Imran
^*Correspondence: Muhammad Awais, MS Scholar/ University of Lahore, Pakistan, Tel: +92 03327506435, Email:

Keywords

Abusive Supervision • Knowledge Hiding and Employee Creativity

Introduction

Research suggests that supervisors exhibit aggressive behavior toward their subordinates with disconcerting frequency [1,2]. In the last two decades, scholars have predominantly considered abusive supervision as an intensive form of such undesirable leadership, denoting subordinates' perceptions of their supervisors' sustained nonphysical hostility [2,3]. Abusive supervision defined as “subordinates’ perceptions of the extent to which supervisors engage in the sustained display of hostile verbal and nonverbal behaviors, excluding physical contact” [2]. A substantial body of literature has illustrated the negative consequences associated with abusive supervision [1,4].

Employee creativity has been treated as essential for organization’s survival and competition [5]. Shalley and Oldham coined the term refers to the generation of novel and useful ideas regarding products, practices, services or procedures in workplace Employee creativity is viewed as an indispensable part of innovation, which includes not only the new idea generation, but also the implementation of these new ideas [5]. Creativity is important in and of it and can be conceptualized as a necessary precondition for innovation [6]. The majority of scholars who have explored the antecedents of employee creativity have found that the leader’s positive behavior is a vital precursor of employee creativity. Recently, research has focused on Knowledge hiding is the intentional attempt to conceal or withhold knowledge requested by others [7]. It provides an interesting contingency to employee innovation because it is not simply the opposite of knowledge sharing; it implies an intent to withhold knowledge that someone else has requested. Such behavior may represent a threat to beneficial outcomes [7].

During the last fifteen years there has emerged in sociology and social psychology a distinct approach called social exchange theory. Four figures were largely responsible: George Homans. John Thibaut. Harold Kelley, and Peter Blau. Homans in "Social behavior as exchange" made a conscious effort to identify and advance this point of view. In 1961.he amplified his argument in Social Behavior: Its Elementary Forms, which has now been revised. Also in the late 1950s Thibaut & Kelley were constructing their compact conceptual scheme in The Social Psychology of Groups. While different in important ways, their work converged with Homans's, strengthening the general exchange approach. When Blau's Exchange and Power appeared, the exchange approach was assured a future in the field. Blau states that all behaviors are a series of exchanges. It explains how a relationship develops with others through these exchanges and the individual engaged in social behavior expect contributions from the other party as well in social exchange Emerson. The contribution of this study is that it chronicles abusive supervision specifically help managers in the form that how abusive supervision effect the behavior of their employees and how they hide (Figure 1).

Abusive Supervision and Employee Creativity

Leaders have traditionally been conceptualized as an important contextual factor that cultivates or stifles employee creativity. Although extant literature has not examined the effect of abusive supervision on creativity, a limited but growing body of abusive supervision research has demonstrated that exposure to abusive supervision results in subordinates’ unwillingness to “go the extra mile” to perform behaviors that benefit their organizations which may involve advancing creative ideas and solutions that improve organizational effectiveness. Drawing on prior creativity research, we argue that team leader abusive supervision may undermine team member creativity because it reduces team member intrinsic motivation, which refers to the degree to which an individual undertakes an activity for the sake of his/her enjoyment of an interest in the activity itself, rather than as a result of external pressures and rewards [8]. Earlier researches have concluded that supportive relationships between leaders and subordinates enhance subordinate creativity [9]. But abusive supervision can create feelings of being humiliated among the subordinates and this lessens the creativity. Consequently, abused employees are less likely to actively accept challenges and put forward brilliant ideas or solutions. Even sometimes, victims of abusive supervision have strong intentions to quit their job [10]. We argue that abusive supervision may also dampen employees’ intrinsic motivation and hence their creativity. When team members encounter abuse by leaders, in the form of public criticism, derogating comments, loud and angry tantrums, rudeness, inconsiderate actions, and coercion, they are apt to feel belittled, humiliated, and undermined as to their reputation in the workplace. When Blau's Exchange and Power appeared, the exchange approach was assured a future in the field. Blau states that all behaviors are a series of exchanges. It explains how a relationship develops with others through these exchanges and the individual engaged in social behavior expect contributions from the other party as well in social exchange Emerson. Abusive supervision also leads subordinates to doubt whether organizations respect their contributions and whether their jobs are meaningful to their own and organizations’ development [11]. We propose: H1. Abusive supervisions have negative impact on employee creativity.

Abusive Supervision and Knowledge Hiding

Connelly et al. [7] concluded that those engaged in knowledge hiding may in some situational circumstances characterize themselves as having positive intentions. For example, they may justify their actions as an attempt to avoid hurting other people’s feelings. Despite this, knowledge hiding exerts a negative influence on organizational performance and team effectiveness by damaging the organization cooperation, creativity development, and organizational policy implementation. As observed by Connelly et al. [7] the negative impact of knowledge hiding on organizations has been established. Abusive supervision refers to subordinates’ perceptions that their supervisor directs repeated acts of hostility toward them [2]. Hiding as an increasingly hot topic among practitioners and scholars [7,12]. Knowledge hiding refers to “an intentional attempt by an individual to with hold or conceal knowledge that has been requested by another person”. Behaviors commonly associated with self-regulation include resisting temptations and the suppression of certain thoughts and behaviors [13-15]. Abusive supervision is defined as “subordinates' perceptions of the extent to which supervisors engage in the sustained display of hostile verbal and nonverbal behaviors, excluding physical contact” [2]. Abusive supervision created the knowledge hiding because employee dislike supervisor this kind of supervision. Social exchange theory proposes reciprocal social exchange which nurtures trust and develops social bonds and the lack of this trust develops suspicion in employees as they will think of every possibility before doing anything. Supervisors' abusive behaviors, such as yelling and shouting, intimidating employees through threats of job loss, and making aggressive eye contact, could cause abused subordinates to perceive a loss of control. Therefore, we predict the following:

H2. Abusive supervision has positive impact on knowledge hiding.

Knowledge Hiding and Employee Creativity

Although it should be understood and examined as a complex and ambiguous concept, creativity deals with idea generation or exploration as interpreted within a particular social context [5]. The generation of creative ideas is often the result of grouping novel combinations of the varied perspectives and approaches to which people are exposed via social interactions. Consequently, creativity is very much dependent on information and knowledge sharing and thus may be crucially influenced by knowledge hiding. A social exchange relationship between coworkers facilitates knowledge sharing and, in turn, enhances creative performance because mere exposure to diverse alternatives can trigger the use of wider mental processes and generate more divergent solutions. In addition, such a relationship increases the ability to generate, validate, and determine the appropriateness of potential solutions between trusting group members. A reduction in knowledge sharing will lessen people’s ability to generate creative ideas and to critically evaluate their value to the group and/or organization. Creativity requires information about a problem and a certain degree of prior knowledge regarding the task at hand. Thus, knowledge hiding may prevent employees from collecting the existing concepts they require to create new concepts. Blau notes that social exchange generates “emergent properties in interpersonal relations” that arise out of the interdependence between participants that are subsequent to the exchange. So, while the behavior of participants in exchange “may be reinforced by the rewards it brings,” nevertheless “the psychological process of reinforcement does not suffice to explain the relation that develops.”

Individuals with few psychological resources may adopt a denial coping strategy to preserve their limited resources, despite this strategy’s appearing inefficient or irrational. Nevertheless, like Connelly who allude to the importance of social relations for work in predicting knowledge hiding, we explore this construct and its outcome in the form of dyadic creativity. We propose:

H3. Knowledge hiding has negative impact on employee creativity.

Mediating role of Knowledge Hiding

In the previous section we described the relationship between abusive supervision and its outcome i.e. employee creativity [11]. The relationship between dark side of supervision and knowledge hiding and the relationship between knowledge hiding and its outcome i.e. employee creativity.

Although extant literature has examined the effect of abusive supervision on creativity, a limited but growing body of abusive supervision research has demonstrated that exposure to abusive supervision results in subordinates’ unwillingness to “go the extra mile” to perform behaviors that benefit their organizations, which may involve advancing creative ideas and solutions that improve organizational effectiveness.

H4. Knowledge hiding mediates the relationship between abusive supervision employee creativity.

Methodology

Research design gives the overview of overall plan of pursuing research. The study is based on perceptions of employees therefore Survey method has been used to get responses proposed model in this study is med model. Through personal and professional contacts, we gained access to and collected data from various organizations operating in the service sector in Sargodha, Pakistan. Respondents were assured the confidentiality of results and were free to decline to participate at any stage. Among the 320 surveys distributed, 222 were returned complete (with 69% response rate).

Our unit of analysis is employee of Sargodha service sector. This study based on the cross sectional. The demographic results revealed that the majority of respondents (47.4 %) were male and (52.7%) were female respondents. About 22.1 % respondents had 20-25 age and 23.9% had 26-30 age and 28.4% had 31-45 age and 25.7 had 46-60 age. About36.5 % respondents had bachelor and 33.3% had master and 30.2% had Ph.D. About 43.7 % respondents had less than 1 year to 1 year and 49.5% had 2 year to 5 year experience and 5.4% had 5 year to 8 year experience and 1.4% had 9 year to more than 10 year experience.

Measurement Tools

Present study measures were anchored on a 5-point rating scale of 1 = Strongly Disagree to 5 =Strongly Agree. Abusive supervision measured by fifteen item scales developed by Tepper [2] with the reliability of 0.80. The sample questions are “Ridicules me and Tells me my thoughts or feelings are stupid”. To measure knowledge hiding between employees and their coworkers the twelve items scale from Connelly was adopted. Sample items included: “I agreed to help him/her but instead gave him/her information different from what s/he wanted”, “I said that I did not know even though I did". The measurement of employee creativity was adopted from Tierney with seven items. Sample items were “This employee demonstrated originality in his/her work.” and “This employee took risks in terms of producing new ideas in doing job.” Cronbach's alpha on this scale was 0.88.

Control variable

Before running the analysis, we conducted one way Analysis of variance (ANOVA) to identify controls for our study. We found significant differences in our study's dependent variables because of Educational and working experience so that’s why we take them as control variables with dependent variables

Data Analysis

Correlation and Reliability Analysis

Table 1 shows the results of Means, Standard Deviations, Inter-correlations and Cronbach alpha reliabilities of the present study's variables.

Table 1 shows the Mean, Standard Deviation, Correlation and Cronbach alpha values of the Variables used in this study i.e. Gender, Age, Education and Experience as Demographic Variables with Abusive Supervision, Knowledge Hiding, Employee Creativity. The No of Respondent in this study was 222. The Mean of all the variables used in this study was between 1.52 and 3.39. The Standard Deviation of all the variables was between the 0.50 and 1.09.

Table 1 also shows the Cronbach Alpha values of the Variables included in this study. The Cronbach alpha value of Abusive Supervision is (0.90), the value of Knowledge Hiding is (0.85), the value of Employee Creativity is (0.86). According to Nunnally if, the value of reliability is above 0.70, it is said that the questionnaire is reliable to collect the data. Hence, the variables used in this study have above 0.70 Cronbach alpha. We could say that the questionnaire used in this study are reliable.

n= 222; Control Variables are Education and Working Experience; where AS= Abusive Supervision, KH=Knowledge Hiding, CR= Employee Creativity. Alpha reliabilities are given in parenthesis.*p<.05, **p<.01.

Bivariate correlation analysis was used in order to check the relationship between the variables. In the Table 2 results revealed that the Abusive Supervision is positively significant with knowledge hiding at (.58 **), but negatively with Employee Creativity at (-63.**). Knowledge Hiding negatively correlated with Employee Creativity at (-.56**).

n= 222; Control Variables are Education and Working Experience; where AS= Abusive Supervision, KH=Knowledge Hiding, CR= Employee Creativity. Alpha reliabilities are given in parenthesis.*p<.05, **p<.01.

Regression Analysis

For the identification of impact of abusive supervision on outcome (employee creativity), impact of abusive supervision on knowledge hiding and impact of knowledge hiding on outcome (employee creativity). We employed Preacher and Hayes (2004) process technique to test mediation.

Hypothesis 1 stated that Abusive Supervision have positive impact on employee creativity. The result shows that Abusive Supervision positively effect on employee creativity (p= .000 less than .05, β = .52) with the value of R² 0.41. So our hypothesis 1 was supported.

Hypothesis 2 stated that Abusive Supervision have positive impact on knowledge hiding. The result shows that Abusive Supervision positively effect on knowledge hiding (p= .000 less than .05, β = .59) with the value of R2 0.46. So our hypothesis 2 was supported.

Hypothesis 3 stated that knowledge hiding have positive impact on employee creativity. The result shows that knowledge hiding positively effect on employee creativity (p= .000 less than .05, β = .22) with the value of R2 .41. So our hypothesis 3 was supported.

The authors deploy bootstrapping technique for robust test. For mediation analysis, we plotted the significant interactions. Table demonstrates the results for mediation hypothesis H4. Abusive Supervision was found to have a positive and indirect effect on Employee Creativity through Knowledge Hiding (β=0.56, t= 2.73, p< .001). The formal two tailed significance test assuming a normal distribution showed that the indirect effect was significant and positive (Sobel effect= .04, z = 3.42, p<.001). Bootstrap results confirmed the Sobel Test, with a bootstrapped 95% CI around the indirect effect not containing zero (.001, .36). Thus, Hypothesis H4 was accepted.

Discussion

The primary objective of this study is to find the impact of abusive supervision on employee creativity and mediate knowledge hiding is the lens of COR theory in the service sector of Sargodha, Pakistan. In this research we hypothesized that abusive supervision has negative and direct impact on employee creativity. Our result also authenticates this negative and direct relationship between abusive supervision and employee creativity. Previously research also suggests the same relationship between abusive supervision and employee creativity [11,16]. Our hypothesis H2 express that abusive supervision has positive and direct impact on knowledge hiding. Our result also authenticates this negative and direct relationship between abusive supervision and knowledge hiding. Previously research also suggests the same relationship between abusive supervision and knowledge hiding. Our hypothesis H3 express that knowledge hiding has negative and direct impact on employee creativity. Our result also authenticates this negative and direct relationship between knowledge hiding and employee creativity. Previously research also suggests the same relationship between knowledge hiding and employee creativity. Our hypothesis H4 Knowledge hiding mediates the relationship between abusive supervision employee creativity. Abusive supervision direct impact on employee creativity so in case of supervisor are rude or abuse so employee move to knowledge hide. Knowledge hiding refers to “an intentional attempt by an individual to withhold or conceal knowledge that has been requested by another person.

Theoretical implications

Our findings contribute to the leadership, creativity, and attribution literatures in four primary ways. First, this research enhances understanding of the role of negative aspects of leadership in the development of employee creativity. Past research concerning the link between leadership and creativity has exclusively concentrated on identifying positive leader behaviors that may facilitate subordinate creativity; identified behaviors include transformational leadership and a supportive supervisory style. Consequently, the influence on creativity of negative leader behaviors such as abusive supervision, which has been found to occur frequently in organizational contexts, has generally been left unexplored. Practitioners are also striving to develop and establish knowledge sharing climate at workplace. They also seek to remove negative practices like abusive supervision which not only effect individual employees but the organization as whole. Knowledge hiding practices are also effecting the efficient functioning of organizations. Beyond of the implication the present study will help the practitioners to promote a safe and knowledge sharing climate which will not only help employees to gain and share new knowledge but will also promote organizational efficiency.

Managerial implications

Based on our series of studies, we are able to make several recommendations for manager and research. Of course, in the same way that knowledge sharing is not always a positive and beneficial behavior it is equally important to emphasize that knowledge hiding is not necessarily a ‘‘bad’’ or deviant behavior. This study will be helpful to managers in managing abusive supervision by employee knowledge hide at work, and also increase and promote the knowledge sharing climate in organizations. This study will also be helpful in decreasing the organizational misbehavior which is done intentionally at workplace and will help increase a trusted environment by minimizing knowledge hide in the work place.

Limitations and Future Research Direction

Limitations of Research

Our research has limitations that highlight opportunities for future research. First, although our research shows that prevention-focused individuals increased their knowledge hide in response to peer abusive supervision, it is unclear whether they may sustain their knowledge hiding level over time.

Second, limitation of this study is cross sectional study. Third, limitation of this study is lack of resources. Fourth, limitation of this study is convenient sampling technique and data coller from service sector.

Future Research Directions

In this study is to find the impact of abusive supervision on employee creativity and mediate knowledge hiding is the lens of Social exchange theory. Therefore, future research should use longitudinal studies to examine the long-term creative effects of abusive supervision. Future studies can examine the empirical evidence of these explanatory mechanisms and their differential mediating role in the abusive supervisor and employee creativity link. Future researchers can also use the different moderator and examine role of abusive supervisor and knowledge hiding link. In future, researcher also generalizes result of this study on other cultures and countries, cities or industries.

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