thesis_Daniela Noethen_print final - Jacobs University

Preventing Knowledge Loss When Employees Expect to Leave
between their attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors. This discomfort constitutes a motivational drive
to reduce the inconsistencies that cause it. Chen and colleagues (1998) and Chen (2005)
assume that cognitions about leaving the organization (turnover intention) and OCB
(behaviors that express a positive attitude toward the organization) are inconsistent, and that
the employee will seek to reduce this inconsistency. Building on the same theoretical basis,
we suggest that turnover intention, as a negative attitude toward the organization, and
knowledge sharing, as a behavior expressing a positive attitude toward the organization, are
inconsistent, and that in order to reduce this inconsistency, employees with turnover intention
will share knowledge less frequently.
The suggested negative relationship between OCB and turnover intention has been
supported in several empirical studies (Chen, 2005; Chen et al., 1998; Coyne & Ong, 2007;
Podsakoff, Blume, Whiting, & Posdakoff, 2009). Considering the similarities between OCB
and knowledge sharing, Gagné (2009) proposed that they should be influenced by similar
motivational factors. Thus, assuming that turnover intention motivates certain behaviors (and
demotivates others), it can be assumed that if turnover intention empirically shows to be
negatively related to OCB, this should also be the case for knowledge sharing. Based on the
presented arguments, we thus propose:
HYPOTHESIS 1: Turnover intention is negatively related to knowledge sharing.
Turnover intention and expected involuntary turnover share certain similarities, but they
also differ in certain aspects. Expected involuntary turnover is similar to turnover intention in
that both constructs imply that employees do not expect to work for the organization in the
future, are possibly looking for other jobs, and are disengaging from the organization. Thus,
the theoretical arguments that have been presented above for the relationship between
turnover intention and knowledge sharing should equally apply for the relationship between
expected involuntary turnover and knowledge sharing. Employees who expect involuntary
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