Master Human Resource Management Faculty of Economics and Business University of Groningen

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HET NOORDERPOORT

Organizational Learning in Educational

Institutions: the Influence of Knowledge

Sharing and Trust

Master Human Resource Management

Faculty of Economics and Business University of Groningen

March 16th, 2014

“A lack of trust makes employees untrustworthy which does not bode well for the future of virtuality in organizations. If we are to enjoy the efficiencies and other benefits of the virtual organization, we will have

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1 ABSTRACT

The purpose of this research is to examine the influence of knowledge sharing and trust on organizational learning in educational institutions. Previous research on the relationship between organizational learning and trust has indicated that specification of the type of trust influencing organizational learning is needed. This research will focus on the influence of the self-efficacy of employees, lateral and vertical trust. Moreover, the relationship between knowledge sharing and organizational learning will be further investigated. The research was conducted at the Noorderpoort, a regional educational institute with 35 locations in the province Groningen, the Netherlands. All 97 participants are members of the Noorderpoort community. The research consisted of two parts: quantitative, correlational research and qualitative research. The latter was mainly used to get a better understanding of processes influencing the relationships. In this research a moderate, positive correlation was found between lateral trust and knowledge sharing, lateral trust and team learning, and self-efficacy and individual learning. Furthermore, a strong, positive correlation between vertical trust and organizational learning was found. Lastly, the relationship between knowledge sharing and organizational learning was a weak, positive correlation, which almost proved significant (p=.07). This implicates that organizations that emphasize organizational learning should consider to firstly develop high levels of self-efficacy, lateral and vertical trust to enhance knowledge sharing and thus organizational learning.

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INTRODUCTION

Although schools are educational organizations and play an important role in each person’s development, an educational institution itself is rarely regarded as a subject for development or innovation. Instead schools are often considered as being resistant to change, where experts on different subjects work individually and where cooperation among this group barely exists. The assumption is that educational organizations tend to be autonomous and individually-oriented. Employees in schools are quite often hesitant or unwilling to share and exchange their materials with one another (Seonghee & Boryung, 2008).

Todays’ society requires people to have the ability to continuously develop new skills and implement these for the improvement of processes. (Kessels, 2006; Kessels & Verloop, 2006). Employees are involved in a process of life-long learning, a process which is

especially apparent in education. In the Netherlands measures are being taken to ensure that the country becomes and remains a high-quality knowledge economy. The Ministry of Education, Culture and Science has paid much attention to the professionalization of schools and teachers (Ministry of Education, 2007). The teacher is seen as an important link with regard to the transfer of knowledge. Professional teachers are expected to display a learning-oriented attitude, which means that teachers actively acquire and process new information (Bergen & van Veen, 2004). Thus, this process of professionalization asks teachers to exhibit learning oriented behaviours during their entire career.

However, Den Besten and Dresen (2010) state that it seems more often a dream than reality to transform organizations into learning organizations. According to them this is due to the fact that changing a culture is more difficult that changing a structure. Implementing a new structure can also be hindered by the old culture. Moreover, Garvin (1993) states that educational organizations do not automatically become learning organizations just because their primary product is all about learning and knowledge. A learning organization possesses the skills and capabilities to create, achieve and transfer knowledge. More importantly, this learning orientation helps teachers to exhibit new knowledge and skills.

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human resource developers typically promote continuous learning opportunities for individuals. Continuous learning at the individual level is necessary but not sufficient to influence perceived changes in knowledge and performance. It is argued that learning must be captured and embedded in on-going systems, practices, and structures so that it can be shared and regularly used to intentionally improve changes in knowledge performance (2003, p. 133). The DLOQ developed by Marsick and Watkins and adapted by Yang et al. (2004) for research purposes, measures the different levels of learning. These levels of learning combined can measure the overall level of organizational learning.

Thus, cooperation and information sharing among individuals to achieve

organizational goals is the core ingredient to organizational learning. According to Wilson (2011) although employees are likely to agree that this process of information sharing is beneficial for the firm, their involvement is this process in limited. This can be explained by their concern that such information sharing could lead to changes in power structures, which can be risky to some individuals or groups (Jayasingam et al., 2010; Liao et al., 2008; Anderson & Leandri, 2006). Therefore, information sharing is only likely to happen when there is an atmosphere of trust and people are genuinely interested in helping one another (Senge, 1997).

The influence of trust on organizational learning is often identified (Davenport & Prusak 1998; Dymock 2003). McElroy (2002) suggested that trust is one of the key factors that add value in an organization or between organizations. Trust helps to speed up the transfer of information and the development of new knowledge. Thus, it can be concluded that trust is important to knowledge sharing (Herschel et al., 2001; Renzl, 2008). However, the nature of trust is complex and less easy to understand because trust is believed to have different facets (Chowdhury, 2005), which implies different impacts on knowledge sharing. While there has been much work done to study trust in stimulating organizational learning, there is a lack of consensus on the specific type of trust. Furthermore, according to Baker and Sinkula (1999) few scholars have attempted to conduct empirical research that would more systematically identify those factors supporting effective organizational learning. Therefore, specification of types of trust influencing organizational learning is necessary.

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efficacy, lateral and vertical trust. Self-efficacy is defined as the level of faith people have in themselves in regard to their daily work performance. McCauley and Kuhnert (1992)

distinguished lateral and vertical trust relationships in the workplace. Lateral trust is defined as the level of trust between employees and their peers and vertical trust refers to employee trust of the immediate supervisor, subordinates and senior management.

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THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

Organizational learning

In today’s changing environment the need for flexible, adaptive and productive organizations is increasing. Only organizations possessing these qualities will excel. Becoming a learning organization provides a promising mechanism of adapting to required changes, remaining competitive and fostering continuous improvement (Senge, 1990). A learning organization is ‘an organization skilled at creating, acquiring and transferring knowledge, and at modifying its behavior to reflect new knowledge and insights’ (Garvin, 1993, p.80). Moilanen (1999) defines a learning organization as a consciously managed organization with “learning” as a vital component in its values, visions and goals, as well as in its everyday operations and their assessment. The aim of a learning organization is to facilitate structures for learning, eliminate obstacles of learning and to receive feedback and benefits from learning outcomes. According to Watkins and Marsick (1993, p. 8), the concept of the learning organization could be explained as “one that learns continuously and transforms itself. . . Learning is a continuous, strategically used process—integrated with and running parallel to work . . . Learning also enhanced organizational capacity for innovation and growth. The learning organization has embedded systems to capture and share learning”.

Organizational learning fosters the desire for companies to enable learning at the individual, team, and organizational level (eg. Senge, 1990; Dixon, 1994). Senge (1990) argues that organizations need to ‘discover how to tap people’s commitment and capacity to learn at all levels’. Individual learning is part of this learning process. The dictionary

definition of learning is the acquisition of knowledge and skills. Thus, learning is about acquiring new knowledge and skills. At the individual level, this is about developing new ideas and insights based on personal experience. However, individual learning does not guarantee organizational learning, but without it organizational learning does not occur at all (Senge, 1990).

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Individual

Learning

Team

Learning

Organizational

Learning

learning (Slavin, 1996; Michaelsen & Sweet, 2007), team effectiveness (Crossan, Lane, White, & Djurfeldt, 1995; Van den Bossche, Gijselaers, Segers, & Kirschner, 2006) and organizational learning and innovation (Crossan, Lane & White, 1999). Therefore, the key driver of organizational learning depends on its employees’ continuous learning within teams. This indicates interaction among employees and enhances team learning. Knowledge and information is shared and shared understanding between individual and group guarantees coherent, collective action within the organization. Moreover, management can enhance the possibilities by creating good learning conditions and facilitating and coaching these learning processes.

The final aspect is organizational learning, which mainly consists of the

institutionalization of learning. Shared understanding is implemented in systems, structures, procedures, rules and strategies, which will be used to guide the policies of the organization. Everyone in the organization is part of developing the shared understanding, the origin is unimportant. Crossan et al. (1999) argue that organizational learning is a multilevel process that begins with individual learning, that leads to group learning, and that then leads to organizational learning. These levels, they argue, are connected by bidirectional processes that involve both the creation and application of knowledge. The 4I model was developed by Crossan et al. (1999) and describes four processes that connect individual learning to

organizational learning, namely intuiting, interpreting, integrating, and institutionalizing.

1. Intuiting: This process of developing new insights and ideas based on personal experience is located within the individual.

2. Interpreting: In this step, the individual explains his/her insights through words and/or actions to him-/herself and – more importantly – to others. 3. Integrating: This step takes place at the group level where a shared understanding among individuals and groups is achieved which allows for coherent, collective action within the organization.

4. Institutionalizing: Finally, shared understanding is implemented in systems, structures, procedures, rules and strategies, thereby becoming independent of its individual or group origins, and guides organizational action.

This model indicates that learning occurs in multiple stages within the organization.

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Knowledge Sharing

Jashapara and Prasarnphanich (2004) describe knowledge sharing as a set of behaviors that involves the exchange of information or provision of assistance to others. Knowledge sharing improves organizational ability and enlarges organizational knowledge (Gold, Malhotra & Segars, 2001), realizes the learning process of individuals and organizations (Andrews & Delahaye, 2000), and is a critical factor of organizational learning and performance (Bartol & Srivastava, 2002).

As Jashapara and Prasarnphanich (2004, p.12) state effective learning processes are associated with exploration, exploitation and sharing of human knowledge (tacit and explicit) and the usage of appropriate technology and cultural environments to enhance the

organization’s intellectual capital and performance. Thus, knowledge sharing can enhance organizational learning in two ways. In the first place, learning technologies can be used to connect new skills and abilities. Secondly, the transformation of individual learning into organizational learning. Knowledge management practices provide a systematic and structured approach to encourage knowledge generation, share best practices, and store and deliver knowledge necessary to provide quality education. Thus, individual and group knowledge must be embedded into organizations and made available across the organization for future use. The emphasis of this study is on the perception of the necessity and importance of sharing teaching and research materials among employees.

Using knowledge management techniques and technologies in higher education is as vital as it is in other sectors. Effective use of these technologies can lead to better decision making capabilities, reduced “product” development cycle time (for example, curriculum development and research), improved academic and administrative services, and reduced costs (Kidwell, Vander Linde &Johnson 2000, p.31).

Hypothesis 1: knowledge sharing among employees, teams and organizations enhances organizational learning.

Self-efficacy

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involves making mistakes and learning from those mistakes. Self-efficacy is an important variable in the process of uncertainty and the process of making mistakes.

Bandura (1986) defines self-efficacy as individuals’ beliefs in their capability to accomplish a specific task. This general concept is also translated by for specific situations, such as occupational self-efficacy in the workplace. Occupational self-efficacy is the level of faith people have in themselves in regard to the performance of a specific task or displaying a certain behavior, which may be a prerequisite for innovative behavior. Stajkovic and Luthans (1998) add to this that this concerns an individuals’ abilities to mobilize the motivation, cognitive resources, and courses of action needed to execute this task. Individuals select their choices and initiate their effort, employees tend to weigh, evaluate, and integrate information about their perceived capabilities (Stajkovic & Luthans, 1998). Thus, employees need to believe that they can gather the necessary motivational, cognitive and behavioral resources to fulfill their task. This believe in their capabilities will affect their persistence en effort, as employees have the tendency to focus solely on activities at which they are self-confident and believe that they are competent. Employees who perceive themselves as highly efficacious will initiate the necessary effort which, if well executed will produce successful outcomes. On the other hand, employees who perceive low self-efficacy are likely to cease their efforts prematurely and fail at the task (Stajkovic & Luthans, 1998). In this research self-efficacy is defined as the level of faith people have in themselves in regard to their daily work

performance.

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ways of doing things and liberate the entity aspirations (Pedler, Burgoyne & Boydell, 1991; Senge, 1990). Thus, high levels of self-efficacy are vital for individual learning.

Hypothesis 2: Self-efficacy enhances individual learning.

Trust

Research has indicated trust as an essential element in the development learning environments (Hoy, Hoffman, Sabo, & Bliss, 1996; Hoy & Tschannen-Moran, 2003; Tschannen-Moran, 2009). Moreover, trust is a key element in building and maintaining positive interpersonal relationships, communication, and organizational effectiveness (Lewicki & Bunker, 1996; Mayer, Davis, & Schoorman, 1995; Rogers & Riddle, 2003).

Trust and its influence can be seen at various levels within the organization, namely, at the individual, the group and the organizational level. Trust starts developing at the first interaction among employees. This initial trust is then further developed over time when the interaction continues. Flores and Solomon (1998) proposed that trust is a dynamic aspect of human relationships and requires interaction over time to be developed.

McCauley and Kuhnert (1992) mentioned that trust in the work place consists of two trust relationships, namely lateral and vertical dimensions. First, lateral trust refers to trust relationships between the employees and their peers. Thus, trusting relationships between individuals and their teams. According to Levin and Cross (2004), trust is a key factor in information transfer facilitation which promotes learning in an organization. The conﬁdence that an individual has in others regarding their consideration of the individual’s needs could inﬂuence the individual’s preference to interact with others and share knowledge with them (Swift & Hwang, 2006). Thus, trust affects the level of willingness of knowledge sharing and the involvement and cooperation in the knowledge transfer process. The findings of Levin and Cross (2004) do not involve lateral or vertical trust, but do demonstrate the influence of trust on knowledge sharing.

Hypothesis 3: Lateral trust enhances knowledge sharing

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accomplishments and prepare for future actions. Trust encourages teams to reflect on potential or actual performance problems by creating a safe atmosphere in which team members feel comfortable talking about their own or others’ performance problems (Elfring & de Jong, 2010). Furthermore, it enhances team members’ willingness to show initiative and propose actions that are aimed at performing more effectively (Elfring et. al, 2010). Thus, without trust and the sharing of knowledge, there will be no organizational learning since such learning is based upon cooperation among employees and achieving organizational goals. When lateral trust between employees exists they will engage in productive interactions and they will be willing to engage in team learning.

Hypothesis 4: Lateral trust enhances team learning

The second type is vertical trust, which refers to employee trust of the immediate supervisor, subordinates and senior management. Within a firm different subcultures of trust can exist, which implicates that an employee’s degree of trust may vary between the

supervisors, co-workers, subordinates and the organization as a whole. Thus an employee might perceive high levels of trust in his subordinates, while perceiving low levels of trust in the organization as a whole.

At the organization level, trust influences coordination and control, and helps to overcome individual and organizational inadequacies (Albrecht &Travaglione 2003; Argyris 1991). As mentioned before trust usually develops by continuous interaction. However, trust of the CEO and top management is usually based less on direct observation but more on decision outcomes made by top managers (Costigan et al, 1998). This type of trust involves efficiency and fairness of decisions of top management. Thus, vertical trust contains trust in the organizational culture and trust in the ability of supervisors and managers to make fair and effective decisions. Employees will perceive these decisions as fair and effective, when they believe they are in the best interest of the organization and themselves. However, employees tend to become defensive of their actions when trust in the organizational culture is missing, because they have to justify and back up every action. This will in turn inhibit organizational learning (Costigan, Ilter & Berman 1998).

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11 Conceptual model

The following figure illustrates the conceptual model of this research. The research question based on the model states: what is the influence of knowledge sharing and trust on organizational learning in educational institutions.

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12 METHOD

Participants

The research was conducted at the Noorderpoort, a regional educational institute with 35 locations in the province Groningen, the Netherlands. The participants are members of the Noorderpoort community, which are employees who have stated to be willing to participate in research in their organization. The Noorderpoort community has 167 employees, which includes 83 teachers and 84 employees of the supporting staff and management. A total of 97 responses were obtained, a total response rate of 58,1%. The respondents consisted for 49,5% of teaching staff, 37,1% of supporting staff and 13,4% of management. 29,9% of the

respondents were male and 70,1% female. The age range from 23 to 65, M= 47.93, SD= 9.92. The educational level of the participants ranged from high school up to university level (4,1%, 16,5%, 55,7%, 23,7%). The modal educational level was college.

Procedure

All employees of the Noorderpoort community received an email with the invitation to fill out the questionnaire. This group received a reminder for the questionnaire twice, which was send one and two weeks after the initial invitation. Moreover, the questionnaire was spread via the intranet. A newsfeed was created on the intranet to remind employees of the questionnaire and to provide them with the link. This newsfeed was updated twice, to remind the employees of the questionnaire.

The dimensions of learning organization questionnaire (DLOQ) were used to measure to which extent the Noorderpoort already possesses an organizational learning culture

(Watkins & Marsick, 1993; Watkins et al., 1997; Yang et al., 2004). Marsick and Watkins (1999) distinguish three levels of learning for the development of a learning organization; these are individual learning, team learning and organizational learning. Moreover, levels of trust and self-efficacy and perceptions on knowledge sharing were measured for all

respondents. The questionnaire consisted of 44 items on organizational learning, self-efficacy, trust and knowledge sharing.

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The group consisted of four employees, two teachers, an employee from the

supporting staff, whom is also teaching, and a former higher management member. Two of the employees were female and two were male. All employees have been employed by organization for more than 5 years.

The first step of the qualitative process was to transcribe the group-interview. The program ‘Kwalitan’ was used to identify significant fragments within the text and label these fragments with different concepts. Analysis of the initial concepts created different sub-groups of concepts. Finally, these sub-sub-groups were further developed into the final concepts. Measures

Self-efficacy. Ten items developed by Teeuw, Schwarzer and Jerusalem (1994) were

used to measure the levels of self-efficacy of employees. The scores are measured on a five point scale beginning at 1 (strongly disagree) and ending at 5 (strongly agree). A sample item is: “It is easy for me to stick to my aims and accomplish my goals”. All items are listed in appendix A. In this current study, the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was .83.

Lateral Trust. The five-item scale developed by De Jong and Elfring (2010) will be

used to measure the levels of interpersonal trust. This scale also includes a “direct measure” of trust to ensure that trust rather than trustworthiness is being measured. The scores are measured on a five point scale beginning at 1 (strongly disagree) and ending at 5 (strongly agree). A sample item is: “I trust my team members”. In this current study, the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was .88.

Vertical Trust. Organization Trust Instrument (OTI) could be utilized as part of the

survey in order to test for vertical trust. This original instrument has 12 constructs, however I will use only 4 items developed by Nyhan and Marlowe (1997) which emphasize vertical trust. These scores are measured on a 7 point scale ranging from 1 (nearly zero) to 7 (near 100%). A sample item is “My level of confidence that this organization will treat me fairly is…..” In this current study, the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was .83.

Knowledge sharing. In order to measure knowledge sharing a combination of 3 items

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how, information and knowledge with other employees”. A sample item of Seonghee and Boryung (2008) is “I am willing to accept and use course materials from my colleagues”. In this current study, the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was increased from .58 to .61 after deleting the item “I can freely access document, information and knowledge held by other divisions within the organization.

Learning organization: The dimensions of learning organization questionnaires

(DLOQ) were used to measure the level of supportive learning culture (Watkins & Marsick, 1993; Watkins et al., 1997; Yang et al., 2004). The validity and reliability of the DLOQ has been confirmed by many empirical studies (Ellinger, Ellinger, Yang & Howton, 2002; Marsick & Watkins, 2003; Watkins & Marsick, 2003; Yang, 2003; Yang, Watkins, &

Marsick, 2004). This instrument includes three levels of analysis namely, individual learning, team learning and organizational learning. The original DLOQ consisted of 43 items, but in this research the abbreviated 21-item version was used. This version has been validated as more effective for research purposes (Yang et al., 2004). The scores are measured on a five point scale beginning at 1 (strongly disagree) and ending at 5 (strongly agree). A sample item is: “My organization makes its lessons learned available to all employees”. In this current study, the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient for the DLOQ was .76. The Cronbach’s alpha for the three levels were .76 for individual learning, .60 for team learning and .81 for organizational learning.

Control variables: This research includes four types of control variables, namely

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15 RESULTS

Results of the survey

The relationship between knowledge sharing and organizational learning was

investigated. There was a weak, positive correlation between the two variables, r=.18, n=97, however this was not significant with p=.07. The relationship between self-efficacy and individual learning was investigated using Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient. There was a moderate, positive correlation between the two variables, r=.34, n=97, p<.01, with high levels of self-efficacy associated with high levels of individual learning. This is in accordance with hypothesis 2. The relationship between lateral trust and knowledge sharing was investigated using Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient. There was a

moderate, positive correlation between the two variables, r=.32, n=97, p<.01, with high levels of lateral trust associated with high levels of knowledge sharing. This shows support for hypothesis 3. The relationship between lateral trust and team learning was investigated using Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient. There was a moderate, positive correlation between the two variables, r=.47, n=97, p<.01, with high levels of lateral trust associated with high levels of team learning. This is in accordance with hypothesis 4. The relationship

between vertical trust and organizational learning was investigated using Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient. There was a strong, positive correlation between the two variables, r=.54, n=97, p<.01, with high levels of vertical trust associated with high levels of organizational learning. This is in accordance with hypothesis 5.

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Results from the group interview

Hypothesis 1: the relationship between knowledge sharing and organizational learning. The qualitative data indicate that employees at the organization emphasize

knowledge sharing as a critical factor for learning, which supports hypothesis 1. Employees identify the importance of knowledge sharing for all levels of organizational learning. At the individual level employees can benefit from knowledge sharing as this prevents employees from working on the same problems or developing the same curriculum. Even more importantly, employees can benefit from the materials already available within the organization. Employees identify knowledge sharing as a very practical way of learning, especially when it involves discussing subject-related knowledge with peers. As stated by an employee “I think this is way more beneficial than schooling. When I follow a training course, I usually receive a lot of information during the day but quite often I cannot

implement or use this in a practical manner. Often this information does not return to me in daily situations, which causes me to forget about it.” This is contradicting to knowledge sharing, which is perceived as practical and directly applicable.

At the team level, knowledge sharing offers workers the opportunity to discuss subject-related knowledge with their peers. This type of knowledge is generally perceived as very practical, as teachers can use and implement this directly in their daily work situations. Sharing this knowledge provides the opportunity for peers to learn from one another or help each other out in difficult situations.The employees believe that knowledge sharing enhances clarity and agreements within the group, but also within the organisation. A teacher stated “within our department we meet up regularly to discuss what should be done in the upcoming period. One person prepares the subject thoroughly and the others just read about it and are prepared to ask questions. As a result, we discuss the subject within our team, set our goals straight and everyone knows what should be done. This provides the opportunity to learn from each other, which at the same time lowers the workload as everyone benefits from it.”

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practices and if necessary also the huge pitfalls that occur during a process. Share those things, because they will help the organization grow.”

Thus, employees believe that knowledge sharing can be very important for

organizational learning as this provides the opportunity to discuss subject-related knowledge with peers and helps to reduce the “product” development cycle time and share best practices. This shows support for hypothesis 1, that knowledge sharing among employees, teams and the organizations enhances organizational learning.

Hypothesis 2 states that self-efficacy enhances individual learning. In general the employees of Noorderpoort state that most employees are eager to learn and are willing to develop themselves. This tendency is most apparent by new employees or teachers, however it does not stay for long as workload and continuous changes put pressure on employees. As stated by a teacher “I think most teachers are motivated to learn. Yet, often you see that new teachers start with a lot of enthusiasm, which usually decreases within a short period of time. You notice that their enthusiasm is soon reduced, because of the workload they are facing.” This indicates that mobilization of motivation to learn of employees is affected by their workload. This also indicates that it becomes more difficult to mobilize the cognitive

resources and courses of action needed to engage in individual learning. Thus, employees are willing to learn, but they have to belief this is possible within their abilities. “Everyone wants to learn, wants to develop. But at some point it should be possible within your own abilities and also within your contract.” This implicates that self-efficacy is positively related to individual learning.

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and share their knowledge, but in order for this to be successful a trusting relationship between co-workers need to be build.

Thus, employees clearly see the benefits from knowledge sharing, especially in the process of subject-related knowledge. A teacher stated “You have to look at similar courses and programs, they should be connected horizontally. This brings along the advantage of a decreasing workload, as everyone will be less busy working on this. If not, everyone will continue working on the preparation for their own lessons.” A colleague added to this

“Exactly, when you start a discussion on subject-related knowledge with your colleagues you will be able to help each other and learn from one another.” Thus, knowledge sharing among employees will benefit from a trusting climate within a team. In this climate workers

experience the benefits of cooperation and grant each other access to their materials.

Furthermore, knowledge sharing might decrease the workload for employees and this might enhance employee morale and their willingness to learn.

Hypothesis 4 states that lateral trust enhances organizational learning, Employees of the Noorderpoort appoint lateral trust as a key concept for team learning, which is in

accordance with hypothesis 4. Employees express in a strong sense that they have to trust their colleagues to be able to learn from them. According to a teacher “You have to build a trusting relationship with your colleagues. In this situation it can be helpful if both parties are interested in learning from each other.” As lateral trust inﬂuences the willingness of

employees to exchange information or to engage in social interactions. An important aspect in team learning is the ability to be critical at your own and your peers’ performance. In order to benefit from team learning colleagues need to be able to be critical among one another. As long as a trusting relationship appears between colleagues they can be critical at each other’s performance, while obtaining positive outcomes. As expressed by a teacher “It does not mean that when you visit your peers’ classes, you cannot be critical at his performance. I think this is actually the crucial part of the learning process. I believe that when you trust one another you can and should be critical.”

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between employees and thus the process of team learning. Thus, in order to create a learning climate within a team you need lateral trust between employees and their peers.

Hypothesis 5 expresses that vertical trust enhances organizational learning. Vertical trust can be developed when the organization creates a learning climate that facilitates learning. As stated by an employee “Thus, central to the learning organization is the

acquisition of knowledge for professionals, the employees teaching the courses. But there also exists a hierarchical situation, someone who controls the organization, someone that needs to create a situation in which the acquisition of knowledge is possible.“ This learning climate makes workers aware of the necessity of learning, and shows the direction the company is heading. Important in fostering a learning climate is the development of a trusting

relationship.

During the interview a teacher stated “I do not think you can build trust when

someone, who has to assess you, does not have the knowledge about your job or if they do not have a clue of what is happening on the work floor.“ Thus, possessing knowledge is an

underlying concept in the process of vertical trust. Especially members in higher levels of the organization need to have the knowledge about what is needed on the work floor, but more importantly knowledge about what is actually happing. A teacher stated “we have a team manager, whom is also teaching, and therefore experiences what people on the work floor experience. That creates trust. “This creates trust as workers believe that management has the appropriate knowledge to make decisions and is acting in the best interest of the workers. Furthermore, working closely together creates opportunities to get to know one another and to experience situations together. As stated by a teacher “that experiencing things together that will at a certain point enhance trust again.” Accordingly, vertical trust will enhance

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20 DISCUSSION

This study provides a strong foundation for further empirical research on ways to promote knowledge sharing and the development of organization learning through the

enhancement of self-efficacy, horizontal and vertical trust. The first hypothesized relationship between knowledge sharing and organizational learning did not prove to be significant, this is puzzling. Even though employees stated to see knowledge sharing as a very practical way of learning, especially when it involves discussing subject-related knowledge with peers, there was an insignificant weak, positive correlation between knowledge sharing and organizational learning. This is inconsistent with Huber (1991), who found a positive relationship, which showed that knowledge transfer places an important role in organizational learning processes. Bartol and Srivastava (2002) even express knowledge sharing to be a critical factor of

organizational learning and performance. The inconsistent findings of this research might be caused by the conceptual distance of this hypothesis. Furthermore, these findings might also indicate that factors, like vertical trust, might moderate this relationship. Further research should look into these factors.

The second relationship between self-efficacy and individual learning shows a positive relationship. This implicates that high levels of self-efficacy can enhance individual learning. This indicates that high efficacious employees are more likely to engage in learning

processes. As individuals have to believe they have the necessary capacities to enter the learning process and to generate positive outcomes in this process. This is in alignment with Zimmerman (2000) who states that self-efﬁcacious individuals work harder, persist longer, and undertake more challenging tasks than low efficacious individuals.

In order to be willing to share information and ideas you need a trusting relationship with your colleagues. Lateral trust plays a critical role in the process of knowledge sharing. A moderate, positive correlation between lateral trust and knowledge sharing supports

hypothesis 3. Team members have to trust one another to be willing to share their

information. They have to believe that the information will not be misused and that they can benefit from the cooperation themselves as well. Trust in their colleagues is crucial in this process. This is also shown by Swift and Hwang (2006). They state that the conﬁdence an individual has in others regarding their consideration of the individual’s needs could inﬂuence the individual’s preference to interact with others and share knowledge with them.

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about one another’s performance which will provide opportunities to help each other and to learn from one another. If colleagues do not trust each other, they might perceive critical statements or questions from co-workers as judgmental and they will not learn from this. Furthermore, they will perceive the help from others as meddlesome and annoying. This is in accordance with work from Elfring and de Jong (2010), which states that trust encourages teams to reflect on potential or actual performance problems by creating a safe atmosphere in which team members feel comfortable talking about their own or others’ performance

problems. Elfring and de Jong (2010) also state that trust enhances team members’ willingness to show initiative and propose actions to enhance performance. Thus, trust

influences a persons’ willingness to exchange information and to engage in social interactions. Behavioural psychologists and organizational researchers have shown that positive emotional behaviours will help to develop trust, cooperation and information (Stouten & De Cremer, 2010). These findings add to the literature on the important influence of trust in influencing knowledge sharing and organizational learning (Brashear et al., 2003; Levin & Cross, 2004).

Support for hypothesis 5 was also found in this study. A strong, positive correlation was discovered between vertical trust and organizational learning with high levels of vertical trust associated with high levels of organizational learning. Employees have to trust their management and believe that they will act in the best interest of the workers, in order to enhance organizational learning. Management should facilitate a learning climate and

stimulate learning by including this topic in their strategic action plan. This creates credibility as employees are informed about the strategic direction in which the company is heading. Research by Costigan et al. (1998) describes what might happen if vertical trust is not

guaranteed. They state that employees tend to become defensive of their actions when trust in the organizational culture is missing, as they have to justify and back up every action. This will inhibit organizational learning. Vertical trust is thus crucial for organizational learning.

Limitations

The limitations of this research are that the data of this research might be biased because the measures were self-reported, cross-sectional and mono-method. Besides, the results are limited by the sample. The group personally addressed by this research was the Noorderpoort community, which consists of employees who have shown an interest in

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intranet, which also might attract more interested and proactive employees. Ideally, the number of participants would have been more evenly distributed across the different divisions of the organization. Furthermore, including more interviews across different groups of the organization would have diversified the represented sample.

Future Research

Further empirical research on the importance of self-efficacy, horizontal trust and vertical trust for knowledge sharing and organizational learning is needed. This should emphasise the constructs underlying self-efficacy, lateral trust and vertical trust. This should give further insights in how organizations can enhance those different levels of trust.

Furthermore, a greater depth of information may have been obtained by focusing on different groups within the organization, for example teaching staff, supporting staff and management. Different focus groups of each division of the organization might provide further insights in differences within the organization.

Implications

Organizations in today’s highly competitive world understand the need for better knowledge sharing within their organizations. Knowledge sharing is much needed for educational institutions as they are working towards professionalization of schools and teachers. Professional teachers are expected to display a learning-oriented attitude, which requires them to actively acquire and process new information (Bergen & van Veen, 2004). Professionalization of schools and teachers is emphasised as one of the core policies of The Ministry of Education, Culture and Science since 2007. Organizational learning can help educational institutions to comply with this policy.

The results of this study reveal that organizations need to develop structures and processes that could build the self-efficacy of workers and build horizontal and vertical trust within the organization. In order to implement organizational learning, the organization should focus on the self-efficacy of workers, lateral trust and vertical trust as these are necessary conditions for establishing individual learning, team learning and thus

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In order to develop vertical trust members in higher levels of the organization need to have insights in what is needed on the work floor and what is happing. They need to be aware of key issues, but also show an interest in their workers. Trust will be developed when

managers are more visible on the work floor. In educational institutions this can be

implemented by observing classes taught by employees, in which the emphasis is on shared experiences and getting insights in processes on the work floor instead of judging employees. Moreover, (team) managers can also start teaching to get a better feeling and understanding of the job. This will decrease the hierarchical gap between the work floor and management, which will eventually lead to higher levels of trust.

Moreover, external interventions can enhance the organizational learning environment. Organizations should create a learning climate in which they could offer meetings or training seminars to enhance learning. The development of both lateral and vertical trust will affect knowledge sharing and consequently learning in the organization. In conclusion,

organizations that emphasize organizational learning should consider to firstly develop high levels of self-efficacy, lateral and vertical trust to enhance knowledge sharing and thus organizational learning. This process of knowledge sharing can benefit from work related social networks as a foundation for organizational learning to take place.

Especially in the field of education they can benefit from knowledge sharing as this enhances the horizontal connections between different schools within an organization. Employees can share subject-related knowledge, which enhances the quality of the

educational programs. Moreover, the individual workload might be reduced by cooperation and knowledge sharing, which provides teachers opportunities to work on individual or team learning goals. This will further enhance the process of organizational learning. As

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Het Noorderpoort geeft aan “Wat het Noorderpoort voor de studenten is, is het ook voor de medewerkers: Een Lerende Organisatie”. Wat is uw mening hierover? Help mij met mijn afstudeeronderzoek door deze vragenlijst in te vullen. De vragenlijst is geheel anoniem en duurt ongeveer 10 minuten.

Ik wil benadrukken dat alle gegevens volstrekt vertrouwelijk verwerkt worden. Er zullen geen gegevens op individueel niveau worden verstrekt aan het Noorderpoort. Daarnaast zullen de resultaten enkel algemeen en anoniem gerapporteerd worden.

Lees de vragen rustig door en geef vervolgens meteen het antwoord dat het meest

overeenkomt met uw persoonlijke opvatting. Neem bij het beantwoorden van de vragen uw werk in het algemeen als maatstaf en richt u bij voorkeur niet op een recent of specifiek voorval. Geef het antwoord dat het eerste in u opkomt. Mocht u in aanmerking willen komen voor het winnen van een cadeaubon, vul dan ook uw emailadres in.

In mijn organisatie helpen mensen elkaar om te leren

Helemaal oneens Oneens Neutraal Eens Helemaal eens

In mijn organisatie worden mensen beloond voor leren.

In mijn organisatie krijgen mensen de tijd en de ruimte om te leren.

In mijn organisatie besteden mensen tijd aan het opbouwen van vertrouwen.

In mijn organisatie geven mensen open en eerlijk feedback aan elkaar.

In mijn organisatie, wanneer mensen hun mening geven vragen ze ook naar de mening van anderen.

In mijn organisatie hebben teams/groepen de ruimte om hun doelen zo nodig aan te passen

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In mijn organisatie herzien teams/groepen hun denken als gevolg van groepsdiscussies of verzamelde informatie.

In mijn organisatie hebben teams/groepen het vertrouwen dat de organisatie zal handelen op hun aanbevelingen.

Mijn organisatie maakt het geleerde beschikbaar voor alle medewerkers.

Mijn organisatie creëert systemen om het verschil tussen de huidige en verwachte prestaties te meten.

Mijn organisatie meet de resultaten van tijd en middelen besteed aan training.

Mijn organisatie werkt samen met de regio om in gezamenlijke behoeften te voorzien.

Mijn organisatie stimuleert mensen om antwoorden te zoeken/gebruiken vanuit de hele organisatie bij het oplossen van problemen.

Mijn organisatie stimuleert mensen om vanuit een globaal perspectief te denken.

Mijn organisatie erkent/beloont mensen voor het nemen van initiatief.

Mijn organisatie geeft mensen controle over de middelen die nodig zijn om hun werk te doen.

Mijn organisatie ondersteunt medewerkers die berekende risico’s nemen.

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In mijn organisatie coacht en begeleidt mijn leidinggevende iedereen die hij of zij leidt.

In mijn organisatie zoekt mijn leidinggevende voortdurend naar mogelijkheden om te leren.

In mijn organisatie zorgt de leidinggevende ervoor dat de acties overeenstemming zijn met de waarden van de organisatie.

Het lukt me altijd moeilijke problemen op te lossen, als ik er genoeg moeite voor doe.

Als iemand mij tegenwerkt, vind ik toch manieren om te krijgen wat ik wil.

Het is voor mij makkelijk om vast te houden aan mijn plannen en mijn doel te bereiken.

Ik vertrouw erop dat ik onverwachte gebeurtenissen doeltreffend aanpak.

Dankzij mijn vindingrijkheid weet ik hoe ik in onvoorziene situaties moet handelen.

Ik kan de meeste problemen oplossen als ik er de nodige moeite voor doe.

Ik blijf kalm als ik voor moeilijkheden kom te staan omdat ik vertrouw op mijn vermogen om problemen op te lossen.

Als ik geconfronteerd word met een probleem, heb ik meestal meerdere oplossingen.

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Als ik in een benarde situatie zit, weet ik meestal wat ik moet doen.

Wat er ook gebeurt, ik kom er wel uit.

Ik kan rekenen op de hulp van teamleden als ik moeite heb met mijn werk.

Ik kan er op vertrouwen dat teamleden mijn belangen meenemen bij het maken van werk-gerelateerde beslissingen.

Ik kan er op vertrouwen dat mijn teamleden mij op de hoogte houden over zaken die mijn werk beïnvloeden.

Ik kan er op vertrouwen dat mijn teamleden hun afspraken nakomen.

Ik vertrouw mijn teamleden.

Ik deel vrijwillig mijn kennis, informatie en know-how met andere medewerkers.

Ik communiceer of werk samen met andere medewerkers (in teams of groepen) om informatie en kennis te delen

Ik heb vrije toegang tot documenten, informatie en kennis van andere onderdelen binnen de organisatie.

Ik ben bereid om gebruik te maken van materialen van mijn collega’s.

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Mijn niveau van vertrouwen dat deze organisatie mij eerlijk zal behandelen is..

0% 20% 40% 50% 60% 80% 100%

De mate van vertrouwen tussen leidinggevenden en werknemers in deze organisatie is..

0% 20% 40% 50% 60% 80% 100%

De mate van vertrouwen tussen de mensen waar ik regelmatig mee werk is..

0% 20% 40% 50% 60% 80% 100%

De mate waarin we van elkaar op aan kunnen in deze organisatie is…

0% 20% 40% 50% 60% 80% 100% Geslacht  Man  Vrouw Functie  Onderwijzend personeel  Ondersteunend personeel  Management Leeftijd

Hoogst genoten opleiding

 Middelbaar onderwijs

 MBO

 HBO