Knowledge-Sharing Behavior for the Growth and Development of Library and Information Science Professionals: A Developing Country Perspective

Introduction

Throughout the past decade, knowledge management (KM) has turn out to be an important apprehension. It has widely recognized as a critical organizational resource irrespective of economic sector or type of organization. KM has been the primary focus of attention from organizations, which perceive it as strategic means for innovation and the maintenance of competitive advantage (Chua, 2009). The multidisciplinary nature of knowledge management has resulted input from people in different fields including economists, human resource professionals, IT professionals and library and information professionals (Sarrafzadeh, Martin, and Hazeri, 2006). A number of organizations have adapted and applied formal knowledge management over the past decade as practitioners and academics have identified effective knowledge management as a crucial factor for success in higher education (Aulawi et al., 2009; Kim and Ju, 2008). With the overall knowledge management domain, a critical area that needs more attention is knowledge sharing. Organizations are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of knowledge sharing to survive and remain competitive (Yusof et al., 2012). Effective knowledge management strategies must emphasize the role of knowledge sharing to achieve maximum results for academic institutions. Knowledge sharing is considered as the most important process in knowledge management and it seems necessary for academic institutions to do more research on it. As library and information science professionals play an important role in higher education (doing research, publishing, providing consultation and conducting other professional activities) identifying factors influencing their knowledge sharing behavior was considered in this study. In this paper the knowledge sharing factors that are focused on include attitude, intention and intrinsic motivation. Also, the role of types of institution, length of time of professionals’ working experience, and level of education are further analyzed.