Multilevel Knowledge and Team Performance

Journal of Organizational Behavior J. Organiz. Behav.
31, 10031031 (2010) Published online 21 September 2009 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/job.660
Multilevel knowledge and team performance

TERRI L. GRIFFITH1* AND JOHN E. SAWYER2
1 2
Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University, California, U.S.A. Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics, University of Delaware, Delaware, U.S.A.
Summary
We examined team performance as it was affected by organizationally supported face-to-face and technology-mediated knowledge practices. Guided by an information processing perspective, we demonstrate from a eld study of over 250 teams within a global Fortune 100 technology company that team member participation in face-to-face and technologymediated knowledge practices (e.g., community of practice (CoP) meeting attendance and use of CoP-related technologies, respectively), and team knowledge sharing practices are positively related to individual team member knowledge. We predicted that absorptive capacity would moderate tacit knowledge relationships with team performance, and that transactive memory would moderate explicit knowledge relationships with team performance. We found that the patterns of relationships differed depending on the measure of team performance. The predictions held for absorptive capacity by tacit knowledge on manager-assessed performance, and for transactive memory by explicit knowledge on customer satisfaction. Additionally, there was a signicant direct effect, with no moderation, of tacit knowledge on customer satisfaction. We highlight multilevel modeling for team research and argue for joint consideration of organizational and technology practices. Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Introduction
The American Society for Training and Development estimates from their annual benchmarking survey that U.S. organizations are spending $134.39 billion annually on workplace learning and performance (ASTD, 2008). However, it is difcult to verify the return on investment of knowledge sharing practices or tools (Cohen, 2006). Organizations are complex, and a critical open question is how knowledge practices work in concert, and across levels of analysis, to support performance. These issues are emphasized in times of cost cutting when rms try to reduce costs by looking to technologyenabled learning tools, instead of face-to-face workshops that require travel (Sokol, 2009). We are aware of no eld-based empirical studies that address the role of face-to-face and technology-mediated knowledge development practices for team performance in concertyet we know of no organization that uses these practices in isolation.
* Correspondence to: Terri L. Grifth, Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University, Lucas Hall, 500 El Camino Real, Santa Clara, CA 95053, U.S.A. E-mail: tgrifth@scu.edu
Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Received 27 May 2008 Revised 11 July 2009 Accepted 21 July 2009
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T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER
We address this question beginning with organizationally supported face-to-face and technologymediated knowledge practices for individuals, and then consider how the knowledge acquired by these individuals translates into team performance. Our approach builds from an information processing model of teams (e.g., Hinsz, Tindale, & Vollrath, 1997). We start by describing organizational support for individual knowledge acquisition, then explicitly link this individual knowledge to the knowledge processing at the team-level, and then tie team knowledge to team performance. There is a long history of information processing in organizations. Information processing is foundational for the acquisition and use of knowledge for both individuals and teams. Jay Galbraiths foundational organizational design work (Galbraith, 1974) highlighted information processing as a key metric of organizational design. Nadler and Tushman (1997) continued this work, emphasizing that organizational systems must be considered contemporaneously, rather than piecemeal, to fully understand and optimize their impact. They noted that organization effectiveness is greatest when the information-processing capacities of the structure t the information-processing requirements of the work (p. 68). We see our current research as providing an examination of modern organizational knowledge practices, using historically sound foundations, while taking advantage of modern conceptualizations in information processing (e.g., transactive memory and absorptive capacity, described below) and advances in multilevel modeling. We provide a unique perspective both on knowledge practices in organizations and on the capabilities we have for teasing apart the underlying dynamics.
Foundations
In the sections that follow, we will provide detailed theoretical background on the particular constructs of our model. However, rst we present a high level perspective as a basic introduction. Our theoretical boundaries are that of team knowledge and team performance. We are interested in the relationships between organizational support for knowledge, team support for knowledge, team knowledge processing, and team performance. In an information processing model, team performance is based on individual knowledge, and how that knowledge is incorporated by the team (Hinsz et al., 1997). Knowledge development begins with individual knowledge development behaviors even in team-focused organizations, (e.g., Brown & Duguid, 2001). We posit that both face-to-face and technology-mediated practices, provided by the organization in the case of this study, can support the efcacy of individual knowledge development and that the knowledge development is moderated by team-level knowledge sharing practices. The resulting base of individual team member knowledge provides the knowledge available to the team (e.g., the raw tacit and explicit knowledge that will or will not be used, Grifth, Sawyer, & Neale, 2003). Relationships between this available knowledge and team performance are moderated by the teams process knowledge (e.g., Kozlowski & Ilgen, 2006) in the form of absorptive capacity (the ability to utilize new knowledge as a function of prior knowledge, e.g., Cohen & Levinthal, 1990; Szulanski, 1996) and transactive memory (knowing who knows what, knowing how to coordinate given this knowledge, e.g., Moreland, Argote, & Krishnan, 1998). We provide Figure 1 as an overview moving from individual knowledge antecedents, through the aggregation of team member knowledge to the team-level, and nally to team performance. Two levels are presented in the gure. Below the line are individual-level effects and outcomes. Above the line are team-level effects and outcomes. Note that we describe both top-down (team-level effects on individual-level constructs) and bottom-up (individual-level effects on team-level constructs) relationships.
Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. J. Organiz. Behav. 31, 10031031 (2010) DOI: 10.1002/job
MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE
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Figure 1. Conceptual model of individual-level knowledge, team-level effects, and performancea
In the sections below we rene and test this model within a Fortune 100 technology company. We provide theoretical and managerial value in linking concepts across levels of analysis and in assessing these effects for indicators of team performance.
A Multilevel, Multimodal Perspective on Knowledge

Prior research has considered the importance and characteristics of multilevel modeling for understanding knowledge processes, including training (Chen, Thomas, & Wallace, 2005; Kozlowski, Brown, Weissbein, Cannon-Bowers, & Salas, 2000), expertise recognition and utilization (Bunderson, 2003), member expertise and helping (Van der Vegt, Bunderson, & Oosterhof, 2006), and technology outcomes (Lapointe & Rivard, 2005). However, those studies used a narrower lens than we do here, in that each focused on either organizational practices or technology. We assess both modes of learning via organizational practices and technology tool use, and cross both team and individual levels to investigate knowledge development at the individual level, as well as resultant team performance. We propose that knowledge outcomes must be understood to be multilevel and derived from both individual and team-level processes, and must consider the impact of both technology tools and organizational practices. An important characteristic of organizational knowledge is that it can be learned and transferred through both face-to-face and technology-mediated practices, i.e., support can be multimodal. This premise is motivated by DeSanctis and Pooles observation that socio-technical outcomes are based on the social interaction derived from the combination of four sources of structure: Technology (features and spirit), task (task knowledge or rules), organizational environment (social knowledge or rules of action), and the groups internal system (e.g., styles of interacting)(1994: 129, 132, 144). The social
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and technical focus also speaks to calls from the past couple of decades to explicitly and simultaneously consider information technology and organizational features (Orlikowski, 2000; Zuboff, 1988); the claim being that to consider either one independently will paint an incomplete picture of modern organizational realities (Zammuto, Grifth, Majchrzak, Dougherty, & Faraj, 2007). Much of the research on support for knowledge development emphasizes that explicit and tacit knowledge are differentially affected by modes of support. Explicit and tacit knowledge are acknowledged to span a continuum from codied to uncodied knowledge (Leonard & Sensiper, 1998). Spender (1996) claried that some tacit knowledge cannot be articulated, while the articulation of other tacit knowledge has either not occurred or has been forgotten. The more tacit the knowledge is, the more knowledge transfer requires interpersonal interaction (e.g., Davenport & Prusak, 1998; Edmondson, Winslow, Bohmer, & Pisano, 2003; Sole & Edmondson, 2002; Szulanski, 1996). Thus, we expect differential benets for face-to-face versus technology-mediated support. Additionally, we expect differential relationships between the explicit and tacit knowledge available to the team and how that knowledge is processed within the team.
Individual tacit knowledge

Individual tacit knowledge is that aspect of knowledge sometimes referred to as know-how, as opposed to know-what (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995). Tacit knowledge is frequently learned by experience, and because much of it cannot be made explicit (Polanyi, 1966), it is not amenable to formal training. Tacit knowledge can, however, be acquired through socialization and internalization (sharing experiences and learning by doing, respectively, Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995; Swap, Leonard, Shields, & Abrams, 2001). Participation in face-to-face knowledge support practices can provide engaging opportunities for both socialization and internalization. Practices that provide opportunities for sense making (such as facilitation, deep discussion, and frequent interaction, DeSanctis, Fayard, Roach, & Jiang, 2003) provide greater opportunities for tacit knowledge development. While non-face-to-face knowledge support practices can also support tacit knowledge development (e.g., DeSanctis et al., 2003), face-toface practices provide a more direct and natural route. The face-to-face setting allows participants the chance to choose communication modes that are more amenable to tacit knowledge transfer, such as demonstration and discussion. Technologically-mediated settings, on the other hand, can result in choices to use more direct forms of communication that are more amenable to explicit knowledge transfer (Tidwell & Walther, 2002), such as documents, instructor-led formal training, and the like. Summarizing the above discussion of individual tacit knowledge: Hypothesis 1: Participation in face-to-face knowledge support practices is positively related to individual tacit knowledge. In team settings, the outcomes of individual behaviors are also subject to moderating and direct inuence of team-level effects (Kozlowski et al., 2000). The practices established to encourage and incent knowledge sharing within the work team provides an additional window into how knowledge support practices culminate in individual tacit (and explicit) knowledge. Team-level knowledge sharing practices are related to psychological safety and its ability to support learning behaviors in teams (Edmondson, 1999, 2002), and thus the socialization and opportunities for internalization necessary for tacit knowledge development. Quigley, Tesluk, Locke, and Bartol (2007) found that knowledge sharing was higher in teams with high incentives and norms to share, and that sharing was positively related to performance. We expect that individual tacit knowledge will develop differently among the members of different work teams based on the teams knowledge sharing practices.
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Team knowledge sharing practices will support the development of tacit knowledge by encouraging knowledge transfer of all types. Team knowledge sharing practices work against knowledge being withheld due to fear of ridicule, or motivations to hoard knowledge. While there are many factors in teams that affect individual learning, the individual information processing theory suggests that formal goals, metrics, and incentives in the team affect information processing objectives (e.g., Hinsz et al., 1997). In teams that implement sharing practices, individuals are expected to bring back what they have learned from participating in face-to-face training and learning activities, and to share that learning with their team members. From an information processing perspective (Hinsz et al., 1997) these team knowledge sharing practices enhance processing objectives, which are known to affect attention, and thus inuence the processing (encoding, storage and retrieval) of knowledge. When employees are expected to offer knowledge into discussions and to go looking for needed knowledge with the expectation that it will be provided and shared openly among the team, they attend to the knowledge opportunity, such as face-to-face meetings, in a deeper way, thus enhancing encoding and retention. Knowledge sharing practices support opportunities to further develop ones own knowledge through the renement necessary for sharing with others (e.g., Bargh & Schul, 1980), and establish a context for greater availability of knowledge from teammates. We expect both direct and moderating effects: Hypothesis 2: Team-level knowledge sharing practices are positively related to individual tacit knowledge. Hypothesis 3: Team-level knowledge sharing practices positively moderate the relationship between participation in face-to-face knowledge support practices and individual tacit knowledge such that sharing practices strengthen the relationship between participation in face-to-face practices and tacit knowledge.
Individual explicit knowledge

Explicit knowledge acquisition can be supported by both face-to-face practices and technologymediated tools. Codied, explicit knowledge (i.e., informationthe critical input to an information processing model) can be transmitted, for example, via face-to-face training, informal meetings, email, and/or custom designed technology management systems, although varying features and quality of these practices and tools can affect this process (DeSanctis et al., 2003). Participation in face-to-face knowledge support practices provides individuals with opportunities to enact knowledge dynamics related to explicit knowledge: Interact with the explicit knowledge of others, transition their own tacit knowledge to explicit knowledge in efforts to communicate with others (Bargh & Schul, 1980), or develop new explicit knowledge through combination of their knowledge with that of others (e.g., emergent knowledge, Argote, 1999). Hypothesis 4: Participation in face-to-face knowledge support practices is positively related to individual explicit knowledge. Technology-mediated tools are growing in organizational use with repositories of best practices, presentations, and other explicit work products providing key content in knowledge management databases (e.g., Alavi & Leidner, 2001). Technology-mediated tools can provide value for individuallevel explicit knowledge acquisition (McCall, Arnold, & Sutton, 2008) and thus input into the information processing model. As noted above, due to the need for socialization and direct interaction to transfer tacit knowledge, we do not expect that technology-mediated knowledge tools would directly affect tacit knowledge. However, tools such as repositories combined with powerful search engines
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give us access to vast pools of explicit knowledge that might have been cumbersome to nd, if not impossible to access without technology-mediated knowledge support. Hypothesis 5: Use of technology-mediated knowledge support tools is positively related to individual explicit knowledge. Knowledge sharing practices are expected to have a similar effect on explicit knowledge as described above for tacit knowledge. Individuals in teams with support for knowledge sharing will have greater access to explicit knowledge via face-to-face or technology-mediated practices; the practices will be more productive as members are less likely to have knowledge withheld due to fear of ridicule, or motivations to hoard knowledge (DeSanctis et al., 2003; Edmondson, 2002; Quigley et al., 2007). Team knowledge sharing practices will directly support explicit knowledge acquisition, as well as through individuals enhancing their own knowledge in preparation for sharing with others (e.g., Bargh & Schul, 1980), thus focusing and facilitating the processing objectives known to enhance encoding, storage, and retrieval (Hinsz et al., 1997). By logical extension from information processing theory, when processing objectives are enhanced with goals and expectations for sharing knowledge, attendance at face-to-face meetings, and use of technology tools should have enhanced effects on learning. Hypothesis 6: Team-level knowledge sharing practices are positively related to individual explicit knowledge. Hypothesis 7: Team-level knowledge sharing practices positively moderate the relationship between participation in face-to-face knowledge support practices and individual explicit knowledge such that sharing practices strengthen the relationship between participation in face-to-face practices and explicit knowledge. Hypothesis 8: Team-level knowledge sharing practices positively moderate the relationship between use of technology-mediated knowledge support practices and individual explicit knowledge such that sharing practices strengthen the relationship between use of technology-mediated practices and explicit knowledge.
From individual knowledge to team performance

The transition from individual knowledge to team knowledge is one of emergence. Kozlowski, Brown, Weissbein, Cannon-Bowers, and Salas (2000) discuss this issue of vertical transfer of individual training outcomes to higher level organizational outcomes. They note that it is important to explicitly consider whether the emergence of knowledge from the individual to the team setting is one of composition or compilation. In composition, individual and group performance are isomorphic, with possible emphasis on dispersion. In compilation, team performance involves complex interactions among individuals and integration of their unique skills. We see this description as an interesting extension of Steiners (1972) work on group performance, where group performance is either the result of the additive combination of individual members work, reective of the highest individual performance (disjunctive), or constrained to the lowest individual performance (conjunctive). As Steiner points out, additive tasks can be effective or ineffective. In purely additive tasks the team combines inputs equally and they are summed. In discretionary tasks members are free to combine efforts in processes that produce weighted or unweighted averages of their inputs. The inputs for the team are that knowledge, both tacit and explicit, that is held or accessible by the team members. Thus, as a baseline, the average of team member knowledge represents the existing available knowledge of the team.
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Team available knowledge is knowledge that is held among the members of the team about what and how to do the task. This acknowledges that individuals within teams serve as knowledge repositories (Argote, 1999). Available knowledge is not knowledge jointly held by the team such as shared mental models, shared cognition, and shared understanding (Cooke, Kiekel, Salas, & Stout, 2003; Cooke, Salas, Cannon-Bowers, & Stout, 2000), but rather task knowledge available to the team from the individuals. Some elements may be common or shared (i.e., knowledge that more than one member holds in common) and some may be uniquely held (i.e., knowledge that only a single individual holds) (Stasser, Vaughan, & Stewart, 2000). Our modeling of team available tacit and explicit knowledge as the average individual-level knowledge held within the team depicts a sampling of the teams available knowledge, the mean being the best expectation we have about team knowledge in the absence of theory regarding other congurations (see Klein & Kozlowski, 2000, regarding the mapping of theory to congurational expectations). This averaging reects a team compensatory model in which some members high level of knowledge can compensate for other members lesser knowledge to affect team performance depending on the discretionary tasks of the team. The focus of our model is on team available knowledge and how that knowledge is transformed into team performance through the discretionary tasks of members. Teams combine their available knowledge on the basis of process knowledge (modeled here as absorptive capacity and transactive memory) to produce more or less effective team outcomes. Absorptive capacity and transactive memory moderate the transformation of available knowledge into team performance. We focus on these particular constructs as they have their foundations in information processing (Absorptive Capacity: Cohen & Levinthal, 1990) (Transactive Memory: Ellis, 2006; Lindsay & Norman, 1977; Wegner, 1986), strong consistent results related to team performance (Lewis, 2004; Moreland & Argote, 2003; Zhang, Hempel, Han, & Tjosvold, 2007), and given our focus on the integration of individual knowledge for team performance. Individuals and teams must notice information, then encode (transform the information into a representation), store, and retrieve that information (Hinsz et al., 1997). At the team-level, absorptive capacity relates to how information is noticed (the attention portion of the information processing model) and integrated (encoded) into the groups knowledge, whereas transactive memory is more focused on storage and retrieval (Ellis, 2006). These are the key memory processing components in information processing. Without such information processing, available knowledge cannot result in performance (Grifth et al., 2003). There are, however, additional complexities to note: Both absorptive capacity and transactive memory themselves must be developed in teamsand so must themselves be created through noticing, encoding, storage, and retrieval (e.g., Oshri, van Fenema, & Kotlarsky, 2008). Additionally, some research has transactive memory as a mediator in the team characteristics to team performance relationship (Zhang et al., 2007). We hasten to note that in those studies transactive memory is serving as a proxy for the knowledge itself. We acknowledge these issues to highlight that our focus is on how absorptive capacity and transactive memory serve as moderators in the relationships between available knowledge and team performance. Individual tacit knowledge and team absorptive capacity Tacit knowledge can be independently assessed and has been shown to relate to individual (Wagner & Sternberg, 1986) and team performance (Berman, Down, & Hill, 2002; Edmondson et al., 2003; Ryan & OConnor, 2009). Polanyi (1966) highlights the positive relationship between tacit knowledge and performance, arguing that tacit knowledge is required for the use of explicit knowledge. At the individual level of analysis, tacit knowledge has been found to directly inuence performance in a number of areas including academia (Insch, McIntyre, & Dawley, 2008), business school students (Hedlund, Forsythe, Horvath, Williams, Snook, & Sternberg, 2006), and the military (Hedlund,
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Forsythe, Horvath, Williams, Snook, & Sternberg, 2003), and has been found to predict performance beyond that of intelligence tests or other tests of job knowledge (Sternberg, Wagner, Williams, & Horvath, 1995). Positive effects of tacit knowledge on team performance has been supported by research in teams where members have learned by doing. These teams perform at higher levels than teams with members who have less experience (Reagans, Argote, & Brooks, 2005). We hold that this is the result of these teams having access to more overall tacit knowledge through their individual members. Devadas and Argote (1995) found that teams that learned by doing had their performance reduced when members turned over. In their research there was loss of both tacit and explicit knowledge, as well as reorganization costs. We argue that, in a general sense, it is more detrimental to lose tacit knowledge, as it has not been stored in other memory repositories such as manuals or electronic documentation stores. In summary, Hypothesis 9: Available team tacit knowledge is positively related to team performance. Much absorptive capacity research has focused on the level of analysis of the rm: The ability [of a rm] to recognize the value of new information, assimilate it, and apply it to commercial ends (Cohen & Levinthal, 1990, p. 128). However, we believe there is benet to considering the role of absorptive capacity at the team level as well. In fact, this is a return to the original cognitive psychology roots (e.g., Lindsay & Norman, 1977) of Cohen and Levinthals rm level presentation. At the team level, absorptive capacity reects the teams ability to assess, assimilate, and apply new knowledge. We see these processes as occurring at the noticing or attention stage of the information processing model and continuing into the encoding portion of that process (e.g., Hinsz et al., 1997). Tiwana and McLean (2005) note that absorptive capacity does not directly engender team outcomes but rather absorptive capacity inuences performance by enhancing integration of individual knowledge at the project (team) level. Prior work has considered absorptive capacitys inuence on knowledge in general. Here we are more ne-grained in our modeling, specically considering tacit knowledge. Tacit knowledge, like absorptive capacity, has been described as the ability to apply knowledge (Nonaka, 1994) though without the focus on the knowledge being new. Polanyi (1966) offered that all knowledge has tacit dimensions (p. 20) which are critical to the application of that knowledge. When absorptive capacity is low, tacit knowledge is more critical to performance as the team will be less likely to be able to draw tacit knowledge from other sources. In cases where team absorptive capacity is high, the team has a better chance of assimilating and applying new knowledge. Thus, absorptive capacity will serve a compensatory role. Our point is that critical tacit knowledge may be available from tacit knowledge or the teams absorptive capacity and subsequent ability to assess, assimilate, and apply new knowledge; both will enhance the transformation of available knowledge to team performance. We provide Figure 2 as an illustration of this proposed relationship. While explicit knowledge might have a similar relationship with absorptive capacity, we do not believe it is as critical. Explicit knowledge can be gained from a greater number of sources than can tacit knowledge and, given its explicit nature, its application is expected to be more straightforward. We report a test of the counter perspective as a post hoc analysis in Appendix II, note 6. Hypothesis 10: Absorptive capacity moderates the relationship between available team tacit knowledge and team performance such that absorptive capacity plays a compensatory role when available team tacit knowledge is low. Individual explicit knowledge and team transactive memory Research on specic-job knowledge provides background for linking explicit knowledge with performance. While job knowledge can be either tacit or explicit (Sternberg et al., 2000, pp. 110111),
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Figure 2. Predicted form of Hypotheses 10 and 12
many studies of job knowledge focus on explicit job knowledge as tested by written measures of facts and principles related to the work (Schmidt, Hunter, & Outerbridge, 1986). Hunter and Hunters (1984) review of the predictors of job performance reports on J.E. Hunters (1982) 10 study meta-analysis nding (over 3000 workers) that specic-job knowledge tests have an average validity of 0.48 in predicting job performance. We extend this result to suggest that the more specic (i.e., explicit) the job knowledge that resides within the team, the better that team will perform. Hypothesis 11: Available team explicit knowledge is positively related to team performance. Transactive memory systems help groups effectively apply available knowledge to team performance (e.g., Liang, Moreland, & Argote, 1995). Described by Wegner (1986), transactive memory is knowing about others areas of expertise and the operation of the memory systems of the individuals and the processes of communication that occur within the group. Thus, transactive memory is knowledge about the team and how it processes task knowledge necessary to perform the job. Transactive memory describes the teams ability to store and retrieve information and the members ability to coordinate member actions based on this knowledge (e.g., Ellis, 2006; Wegner, 1986). Tansactive memory is an extension of individual information processing theory to the team-level (Hinsz et al., 1997). Transactive memory is expected to moderate the teams ability to apply what they know (Grifth et al., 2003; Lewis, Lange, & Gillis, 2005). However, Ren, Carley, and Argote (2006) found in their virtual experiment results that the effects of transactive memory were contingent on team size, team performance measures, and the volatility of the task and knowledge environments. In their work, transactive memory was more benecial (for outcomes measured by speed) in teams with dynamic task environments (tasks changed often) or volatile knowledge environments (knowledge decayed quickly). They suggest that their lack of contingent results for teams with outcomes measured by quality may be due to transactive memorys effects being overshadowed by group activities such as task coordination and group decision-making.
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While we expect a positive relationship between the available explicit knowledge in the team and team performance, we expect that in cases where explicit knowledge among team members is low, transactive memory will improve access to what explicit knowledge is available. Thus, transactive memory will serve a compensatory role. Teams with high levels of explicit knowledge may nd transactive memory less benecial simply because of the abundance of explicit knowledge. Ren et al.s (2006) work is also consistent with this view. Namely, given settings where task change and/or knowledge decay were issues, teams gained greater benet from transactive memory. This counters the perspective that greater amounts of explicit knowledge require transactive memory for their management. Instead, Ren et al. found that transactive memory was more benecial in settings where there was likely to be less relevant explicit knowledge available. When explicit knowledge is sparse, it is more important to know who holds the knowledge and how to get the knowledge applied to the group task. When explicit knowledge is abundant, it is more obvious and thus is not dependent on transactive memory to extract it from the team.1 Figure 2 illustrates this hypothesis with a similar form as proposed for Hypothesis 10. While tacit knowledge might have a similar relationship with transactive memory, we do not believe it is as critical because tacit knowledge is expected to be less prevalent in the overall transactive memory systemtacit knowledge by denition is less visible and so more difcult to assign as a specialization, assess credibility, and coordinate which are the foundational aspects of transactive memory. See Appendix II, note 6 for an alternative analysis. Hypothesis 12: Transactive memory moderates the relationship between available team explicit knowledge and team performance such that transactive memory plays a compensatory role when available explicit knowledge is low.
Methods
Sample and measures
Respondents Our focus was on the eld engineering teams of a Fortune 100 technology company which we will refer to as ComTech because the company wishes to remain anonymous. Led by a functional manager, these permanent teams consist of interdependent, highly specialized Sales Engineers (SEs) who serve as technical consultants to the customer-facing Account Managers. The teams goal is to assess, design, and sell complex software and hardware solutions to other organizations. Each team is composed of several technical personnel each of whom hold different technical specializations. The various specializations are needed because the problems are too complex for any one engineers background to support, yet the components of the problems are tightly intertwined. Members of the team interact together to design technical solutions that combine the various specializations to provide an integrated systems architecture. Thus, the team structure and interdependence among the members is needed to effectively design customer solutions. Team size varies from 2 to 17 (M 4.25, SD 5.82). The team composition is highly stable with little turnover or new hires in the three plus years preceding our study. Team goals are focused on technical sophistication resulting in high quality systems design, sales, and customer satisfaction in a
1 We caution, however, that there may be a lower limit to the ability of teams to compensate for lack of knowledge. We assume that in most work context some reasonable level of explicit knowledge exists.
J. Organiz. Behav. 31, 10031031 (2010) DOI: 10.1002/job
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competitive environment where technology and customer needs change rapidly. We sent web-based surveys to 3177 Sales Engineers (SEs) representing 536 teams. All were full-time employees at ComTech. The population included people from 47 different countries, representing four geographic regions. Teams were mostly from North America (70%) with the remaining from Europe and the Mediterranean (15%), Asia Pacic (9%), and Japan (6%). While we were not allowed to code responses based on demographics, our observations suggest that this population was predominantly male. We received completed surveys from 1252 SEs for an overall response rate of 39 per cent. We sent webbased surveys to the managers of all 536 teams and received 265 completed surveys for a response rate of 49 per cent. Five hundred seventy-seven of the responding SEs were members of the 265 teams with responding team managers. We conducted a one-way ANOVA on key model variables comparing these 577 respondents to the responses of those for whom we did not have team manager data. There were no signicant differences in the individual-level measures including years of service, face-to-face knowledge practices, technology-mediated knowledge practices, tacit knowledge and explicit knowledge suggesting that our resulting sample is representative of the larger sample. We were unable to match full archival data to all individuals and teams; thus, the effective sample sizes for some analyses were reduced, as noted in the results below (see Appendix II, Analysis Note 1 for explanation). We also compared the performance measures of teams with member respondent data to teams without member respondent data. This analysis was conducted separately for the two team performance variables. We found no statistically signicant difference between respondent and non-respondent teams on the performance measures. Individual-level and team-level variables were assessed with a combination of survey and archival data. Figure 1 again guides the presentation order with the individual-level measures presented rst.
Individual-level measures
Face-to-face knowledge practices In the particular organization we studied, the primary mode of continuing technical education is through Communities of Practice (CoP). Cadiz et al. (in press) dened a CoP as a set of people bound together through common interest and language with the goals of open communication, and exchange and retention of pertinent knowledge (p. 16). This denition is built upon foundational CoP research (Brown & Duguid, 1991; Leonard & Sensiper, 1998; Wenger, McDermott, & Snyder, 2002). In ComTech, these are technical-skill-focused CoPs formally organized around the different specic technology families the company includes in the integrated technical solutions they sell. SEs become members of CoPs through passing base-level entrance exams. CoPs are a knowledge practice outside of the team, and are focused on the individuals specialization. The majority of SEs are members of only one CoP (17% are members of two CoPs, 5% are members of three). We used the number of community of practice (CoP) meetings the SE attended in the last two years as our operationalization of participation in face-to-face knowledge support practices. These data were captured from company archives (i.e., not from self reports). While there is certainly other face-to-face interaction in the teams, the transfer and learning of specialized knowledge is formally provided through the face-to-face CoP meetings and/or the CoPs related technology resources. Technology-mediated knowledge practices We maintained the focus on CoPs within the technology use measure. CoP-related technology use was a standardized sum of self-reported CoP-related video on demand and CoP-related web portal use for the last 30 days. By bounding both the face-to-face and technology-mediated behaviors around the same general practice (CoPs), we improve our ability to address the differences between the face-toface and technology-mediated practices.
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Experience We accessed ComTech archives to collect years of service for each SE. Because technical knowledge could be brought to the company from prior work experience, we would have preferred to have total experience in the job role across the SEs career; however, these data were not available. Individual tacit knowledge We developed a custom situational judgment test (SJT) to assess tacit knowledge specic to the tasks that systems engineers must perform in this context. We carefully followed the procedures to develop a tacit knowledge SJT outlined by Sternberg et al. (2000). Numerous prior studies have validated the use of SJTs for assessing tacit knowledge (Hedlund et al., 2003). The procedures we followed have been validated both within the study of tacit knowledge (Sternberg et al., 1995) and in related areas of study (Chan & Schmitt, 1998; Motowidlo, Dunnette, & Carter, 1990). We rst conducted interviews with 27 SEs identied by management as being high performers. These interviews were used to identify the performance and situational domain. From the interviews, we then formulated multiple performance scenarios described by one paragraph statements such as the following: A customer has a data transport issue. After applying a {company proprietary} product upgrade, problems occurred with their FTP protocols. They were no longer able to transfer data via FTP. The customer could not nd the problem and calls you in to help trouble-shoot. What should you do? A panel of experts and job incumbents provided possible action responses for each of the initial 12 scenarios. Experts rated the action responses on the desirability of each response along with a rating of the centrality of tacit knowledge for each scenario. The resulting situational judgment test for SEs is composed of ve scenarios with a total of 38 behavioral options scaled by expert judgments to reect the degree of tacit knowledge represented in the response. Respondents were asked to rate each of the behavioral options on how good the advice provided in the response is for a sales engineer (1 Extremely bad, 4 Neither bad nor good, and 7 Extremely good). Ratings were analyzed for their match with the experts ratings using discriminant function analysis. The discriminant function analysis results in a single linear function that maximizes the discrimination among respondents based on their agreement with expert ratings of response categories and provides a single score for each respondent representing their degree of tacit knowledge (Sternberg et al., 1995; Sternberg et al., 2000, provide details on the development and scoring of situational judgment tests in general and tacit knowledge inventories in particular). Individual explicit knowledge Company archives provided the most recent assessment of each SEs technical competency. These competency assessments were part of ComTechs annual human resource practice. Competencies are not a measure of job performance. They are a measure of knowledge and skills obtained that are important to doing the job. This company uses competency assessments as part of its strategy for developing the talent of its systems engineers. Training and other developmental tasks are targeted at improving these competencies. Each SE selects appropriate competencies from a standardized list of technical competencies necessary to perform the work. Each competency is then self-rated, conrmed with the SEs manager, and used to compute a composite technical competency score. We were provided with the nal scores on a 1 to 5 scale, with 5 being the highest level of technical competency.
Team-level measures
Sharing practices ComTech encourages team managers to establish performance objectives related to learning and knowledge sharing activities. We asked the managers three questions to assess team sharing practices:
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The extent to which the SEs were expected, incentivized, and supported for sharing their knowledge within the team (1 Not at all, 4 Somewhat, 7 Strongly, a 0.79). This is a direct team-level measure because it is the team managers reports of the extent to which they hold the SEs accountable for sharing knowledge within the team. Absorptive capacity We used the 9-item absorptive capacity scale from Cadiz et al. (in press, see Appendix I for the items). There are three sub-scales: Assessment, assimilation, and application, each sub-scale measured with three items (1 Strongly disagree, 4 Neither agree nor disagree, 7 Strongly agree). Because the sub-scales have shown a high correlation and are associated with a single second order factor (Cadiz et al., in press), we used the overall composite scale (a 0.86). The questions are assessed at the individual level about members perceptions of the team-level process. Thus, the absorptive capacity score was aggregated to the team level by averaging team member scores. This aggregation is justied by a high mean rwg 0.94. Transactive memory We used the composite of Lewis (2003) 15-item transactive memory scale as the sub-scales (specialization, credibility, and coordination) have been shown to correlate highly (composite a 0.93). This was assessed by asking team members to report on team-level processes, and we aggregated team member scores to obtain team scores with a mean rwg 0.93. Team Performancecustomer satisfaction and assessed performance Team performance was assessed in two ways. ComTech management supplied customer satisfaction ratings associated with each team. The ratings are actual customer satisfaction ratings collected through the companys customer relations tracking process. In the rare event that a team had two associated customer satisfaction ratings, we averaged the customer satisfaction scores to obtain a team score. We also asked each manager to rate the teams performance (from 1 low to 7 high) on seven items such as: SEs in my team quickly develop system specications, quickly solve problems, meet expectations, and errors rarely occur (a 0.87).
Procedure
With the agreement and support of the executive global leadership, we used ComTechs corporate online survey tool to present the survey in ComTechs ofcial language, English. In late 2004, the Executive Vice President for the division sent a personalized email requesting participation and asking for completion within 28 days. The email explained the voluntary nature of the survey, how ComTech would use the data, and that all teams with a response rate of 80 per cent or higher would be entered into a rafe to win highly-valued ComTech prizes. We sent reminders after 10 and 20 days. We treated all subjects in accordance with approved human subject guidelines.
Results
We present descriptive statistics and bivariate correlations for the individual-level and team-level study variables in Table 1. The correlations presented in the table result from pairwise deletion of missing
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Table 1. Descriptive statistics and bivariate correlations Individual-level variables 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Face-to-face participation Technology use Tacit knowledge Explicit knowledge Experience n 577 577 577 496 577 n Mean 0.88 2.09 668.44 2.66 4.68 Mean SD 1.19 1.16 51.56 0.54 1.81 SD 1 1 0.04 0.09 0.20 0.14 2 2 3 4
0.03 0.23 0.05 3 4
0.12 0.14 5
0.16 6
Team-level variables 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.
Sharing practices Tacit knowledge (team average) Explicit knowledge (team average) Absorptive capacity (team) Transactive memory (team) Customer satisfaction Assessed performance
208 6.22 0.78 209 659.21 69.97 0.29 195 2.73 0.39 0.20 204 5.88 0.58 0.06 207 5.86 0.59 0.04 125 4.53 0.32 0.22 207 5.82 0.75 0.43
0.21 0.12 0.10 0.33 0.43
0.12 0.12 0.50 0.17 0.27 0.23 0.24 0.12 0.08 0.34
p < 0.05;
p < 0.01.
data. The subsequent analyses used listwise deletion within each particular analysis (see Appendix II, Analysis Note 2 for explanation of our treatment of missing data). The sample size for each analysis is noted in the respective tables. The correlations in Table 1 do not account for non-independence resulting from individuals being nested within teams, thus should be interpreted with caution. We conducted a conrmatory factor analysis at the individual level to afrm the measurement validity of the absorptive capacity and transactive memory scales. A rst-order factor analysis conrmed that the survey items represented six latent constructs, three absorptive capacity (assessment, assimilation, and application), and three transactive memory (specialization, credibility, and coordination), as expected (x2 718.44, df 237, CFI 0.98, GFI 0.92, NFI 0.96, RMSEA 0.05). All t indices are within the bounds that indicate good t to the data (Kelloway, 1998). We further compared two second-order factor models: Second-order model with two factors (one with the three absorptive capacity rst-order factors loading on an absorptive capacity factor, and one with the three transactive memory rst-order factors loading on a transactive memory second-order factor) versus a single common second-order factor. The two-factor model of absorptive capacity and transactive memory represented a good t to the data (x2 748.36, df 245, CFI 0.97, GFI 0.92, NFI 0.96, RMSEA 0.05). The single second-order factor model resulted in a signicant decrement in t (Dx2 329.82, df 1). Thus, we are justied in treating absorptive capacity and transactive memory as separate constructs. To conrm that team-level knowledge sharing practices is a separate construct from absorptive capacity and transactive memory, we had to rst aggregate to the team level since knowledge sharing practices was measured at the team level by surveying the team lead (note that absorptive capacity and transactive memory are measures about the team assessed by surveying individual team members). We used the subscales of absorptive capacity and transactive memory as observed indicators of the latent variables for the team-level analysis. Thus, we rst formed scale scores for each of the three absorptive capacity and three transactive memory subscales, then aggregated to the team level. We used the three items of the team leader survey that measured knowledge sharing practices. The team-level CFA conrmed three separate latent constructs consistent with absorptive capacity, transactive memory, and knowledge sharing practices (x2 39.59, df 24, CFI 0.98, GFI 0.96, NFI 0.95, RMSEA 0.06). The loadings of the observed variables on the latent constructs were consistent with the observed
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variables depicting the three latent constructs as expected. The difference in t of the three factor model compared to a single factor model was signicant (Dx2 342.49, df 3, p < 0.001), conrming that team sharing practices, absorptive capacity, and transactive memory are different constructs in this sample.
Test of team differences

We conducted a nested hierarchical analysis using HLM 6.06 (Raudenbush, Bryk, & Congdon, 2008) to determine the effects of individual and team-level antecedents on individual-level tacit and explicit knowledge (see Appendix II, Analysis Note 3, for notes on this HLM presentation). For both individual tacit and explicit knowledge, signicant variance resides between groups. For tacit knowledge the ICC(1) 0.11, indicates that 11% of the variance lies between groups (x2(207) 294.39, p < 0.01). For explicit knowledge the ICC(1) 0.33, indicates that 33% of the variance lies between groups (x2(187) 427.52, p < 0.01). We also found that the years of experience control variable differs signicantly across work teams (ICC(1) 0.09, x2(207) 259.66, p < 0.01). Because there is signicant variance between groups, HLM analysis is appropriate for these data. Hierarchical Linear Modeling allowed us to take into account the non-independence of individuals nested within teams by simultaneously modeling within-group and between-group variance (Raudenbush & Bryk, 2002). Table 2 summarizes the HLM tests for Hypotheses 18. Years of work experience was entered as a control variable for the analyses of both tacit and explicit knowledge. Experience is a signicant control
Table 2. HLM analysis predicting individual-level tacit and explicit knowledgea Individual tacit knowledge Effects Individual-level predictors Fixed effects Intercept Experience Face-to-face knowledge practices (Hypotheses 1 and 4) Technology-mediated knowledge practicesb (Hypothesis 5) R2within-group Team-level predictors Fixed effects Sharing practicesc (Hypotheses 2 and 6) Cross-level interactions Face-to-face knowledge practices slope (Hypotheses 3 and 7) Technology-mediated knowledge practices slope (Hypothesis 8) R2between-group 10.42 6.11 3.34 2.88 0.13 0.11 0.03 0.04 2.62 0.85 1.79 0.06 650.88 3.36 2.86 102.55 3.07 2.01 0.05 2.38 0.04 0.07 0.08 29.09 3.11 3.42 3.64 0.09 g t Individual explicit knowledge g t
a Analyses were based on listwise deletion. Tacit knowledge: n 573, Individual-level variables; n 208, Team-level variables. Explicit knowledge: n 492, Individual-level variables; n 188, Team-level variables. bGroup-centered. cGrand-mean-centered. p < 0.05; p < 0.01; p < 0.001.
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variable for both tacit knowledge (g 3.36, t 3.07, p < 0.01), and explicit knowledge (g 0.04, t 3.11, p < 0.01).
Antecedents of individual tacit knowledge

The results supported Hypothesis 1 in that participation in face-to-face knowledge support practices was positively related to individual tacit knowledge (g 2.86, t 2.01, p < 0.05). Face-to-face knowledge practices accounted for 5 per cent of the variance over-and-above experience (R2 0.05). (see Appendix II, Analysis Note 4 for variance calculation method.) To test Hypothesis 2, that team sharing practices have a direct effect on tacit knowledge, and Hypothesis 3, that team sharing practices will moderate the relationship between face-to-face knowledge practices and individual tacit knowledge, we entered the team-level predictor, team sharing practices, in the equations for the intercept (b0) and the slope of face-to-face knowledge practices (b1) on tacit knowledge. We grand mean centered knowledge sharing practices (Hofman & Gavin, 1998). The results supported Hypothesis 2 (g 10.42, t 3.34, p < 0.001), indicating that teams with greater use of knowledge sharing practices had greater tacit knowledge among their members. The result for the moderation effect (Hypothesis 3) was also signicant (g 6.11, t 2.88, p < 0.01). Variance components analysis indicated that the addition of the knowledge sharing practices direct and interaction effects account for 13% (R2 0.13) (Appendix II, Analysis Note 5) of the between-groups variance in tacit knowledge. However, the moderation of knowledge sharing practices with face-to-face knowledge practices was in the opposite direction from that expected. The interaction was a non-symmetric ordinal interaction (depicted in Figure 3) such that when knowledge sharing practices are low, there was a strong positive association between face-to-face knowledge practices and tacit knowledge, but when knowledge sharing practices were high, the association is non-signicant. Thus, it appears that strong knowledge sharing practices within the team makes participation in face-to-face knowledge practices outside the team irrelevant for enhancing tacit knowledge. However, when knowledge sharing practices within the team are low, engineers can enhance their tacit knowledge development by participating in more faceto-face knowledge sharing activities outside the team.
Figure 3. Interaction of sharing practices with face-to-face knowledge practices on tacit knowledge Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. J. Organiz. Behav. 31, 10031031 (2010) DOI: 10.1002/job
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Antecedents of individual explicit knowledge

Hypotheses 4 and 5 posit direct effects of face-to-face and technology-mediated knowledge practices on individual explicit knowledge. The results supported both hypotheses: Individuals participating in more face-to-face knowledge management practices were signicantly more likely to have higher explicit knowledge (g 0.07, t 3.42, p < 0.001) than those participating in fewer face-to-face knowledge practices. Similarly, there was a positive association between participating in more technology-mediated knowledge practices and higher explicit knowledge (g 0.08, t 3.64, p < 0.001). Combined, face-to-face knowledge practices and technology-mediated knowledge practices accounted for 9% of the variance in explicit knowledge (R2 0.09), over and above experience. Hypothesis 6, that a teams knowledge sharing practices positively affect explicit knowledge, was supported. The analysis shows that team-level knowledge sharing practices signicantly predicted individual explicit knowledge (g 0.11, t 2.62, p < 0.01). Hypotheses 7 and 8 posit that knowledge sharing practices would moderate the relationships between individual explicit knowledge and face-toface and technology-mediated knowledge practices, respectively. These hypotheses were not supported (g 0.03, t 0.85, p > 0.05, and g 0.04, t 1.79, p > 0.05, respectively). The betweengroups model indicated that team knowledge sharing practices accounted for 6% of the between-groups variance (R2 0.06) in explicit knowledge, over and above individual face-to-face and technologymediated knowledge practices.
Team-level performance outcome predictors

As we presented earlier, we dene the knowledge available to the team through its members as the aggregate of team member individual tacit and explicit knowledge. From thus, we computed the average tacit and explicit knowledge within each team. We consider this aggregation to be a sampling of the level of tacit and explicit knowledge available to the team. The level of agreement across members of the team was irrelevant here as not all members of the team would be expected to contribute the same level of tacit or explicit knowledge. This averaging approach implied a compensatory model in which having some members with high knowledge would compensate for other members with low knowledge. We assumed that the sampling of members within each team was a representative sample of available knowledge and that teams with high average tacit and/or explicit knowledge had more available knowledge than teams with lower average scores. Hypotheses 912 are focused on team-level outcomes. We used two ordinary least squares regressions to address the team performance outcomes: Customer satisfaction and assessed performance. This multiple methods approach, where HLM is used for the nested models and OLS is used for the pure team-level model, is similar to that used by Marrone et al. (2007). We rst standardized all variables involved in the interactions. This minimized the multicollinearity between the main effects and the associated interaction terms (Aiken & West, 1991). We then formed interaction terms by multiplying the standardized values for the relevant variables. We conducted collinearity diagnostics to assure that the standardization procedure was an adequate remedy. In the analysis using customer satisfaction as the dependent variable, all variance ination factors (VIF) were between 1 and 1.5, and the maximum condition index (CI) was 2.7. When assessed performance was the dependent variable, the VIFs were between 1.0 and 3.7; the largest CI was 3.8. These diagnostics are well under the rules of thumb of VIF > 10 and/or CI > 15 recommended as indicators of possible multicollinearity problems by Belsley, Kuh, and Welsh (1980).
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Next we conducted OLS regressions of customer satisfaction and assessed performance on absorptive capacity, transactive memory, tacit and explicit knowledge, the interactions of absorptive capacity with tacit knowledge, and transactive memory with explicit knowledge. We used a two stage analysis in which the main effects were entered in the rst stage and the interactions entered in the second stage. The main effects only model for customer satisfaction resulted in a signicant adjusted R2 0.17 (F(4,211) 10.91, p < 0.001). The main effects plus interaction model predicted 20 per cent of the variance in customer satisfaction (adjusted R2 0.20, F(6,209) 10.22, p 0.001). The DR2 0.03 is statistically signicant (F(2,209) 7.83, p < 0.01). The analysis with assessed performance (as rated by the team manager) as the dependent variable resulted in a main effects only model adjusted R2 0.22, (F(4,186) 14.67, p < 0.001. The main plus interaction effects model accounted for 24 per cent of the variance in assessed performance (adjusted R2 0.24, F(6,184) 10.98, p 0.001). The DR2 0.02 is statistically signicant (F(2,184) 4.84, p < 0.01). Table 3 lists the regression parameters for both regression analyses (see Appendix II, Analysis Note 6 for assessment of the non-hypothesized potential interactions). Hypotheses 9 and 10 focus on the relationship of team available tacit knowledge on team performance and how this effect is moderated by absorptive capacity. Hypothesis 9 was supported for both customer satisfaction and assessed performance; tacit knowledge was positively related to both customer satisfaction and assessed performance. Hypothesis 10, the moderation, was only supported for assessed performance. Figure 4a illustrates these effects with simple regressions derived from the Aiken and West (1991) procedure for interpreting interactions. The slope for tacit knowledge to assessed performance was positive and signicant (b 0.47, t 4.23, p < 0.01) for low absorptive capacity. At high levels of absorptive capacity the slope for team tacit knowledge predicting assessed performance was not signicant (b 0.07, t 0.93, p 0.35). Using Aiken and Wests method, the crossover point of the interaction occurs at 1.11 standard deviations above the mean of tacit knowledge. Thus, when team tacit knowledge was high, team assessed performance was high regardless of absorptive capacity. Assessed performance was low as a function of low tacit knowledge only when absorptive capacity was also low. Thus, high absorptive capacity compensated for low team tacit knowledge; there was a substitution effect of absorptive capacity when team tacit knowledge was low. This is in-line with the justication for Hypothesis 10. (The non-signicant effects are addressed in the Discussion section.) Hypotheses 11 and 12 focus on the relationship of team available explicit knowledge on team performance and how this effect is moderated by transactive memory. Hypothesis 11 is supported for
Table 3. Team-level regression analyses for customer satisfaction and assessed performance as outcomesa Customer satisfaction Step 1: Direct effects Predictors Intercept Tacit knowledge Explicit knowledge Absorptive capacity Transactive memory Absorptive capacity tacit Transactive memory explicit
a
Assessed performance Step 1: Direct effects b 5.89 0.28 0.13 0.08 0.03 Error 0.05 0.05 0.05 0.06 0.06 Step 2: w/ interactions b 5.90 0.27 0.12 0.09 0.00 0.10 0.02 Error 0.05 0.05 0.05 0.06 0.06 0.04 0.05
Step 2: w/ interactions b 4.55 0.09 0.01 0.04 0.04 0.02 0.08 Error 0.02 0.02 0.02 0.03 0.03 0.02 0.02
b 4.55 0.09 0.03 0.05 0.04
Error 0.02 0.02 0.02 0.03 0.03
Unstandardized regression coefcients and their standard errors are given. p < 0.02;
p < 0.001.
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Figure 4. (a) Plot of absorptive capacity by tacit knowledge interaction: Assessed performance and (b) Plot of transactive memory by explicit knowledge interaction: Customer satisfaction
assessed performance (explicit knowledge is positively related to assessed performance), but not customer satisfaction. Hypothesis 12, the moderation, is supported for customer satisfaction, but not assessed performance. Figure 4a illustrates the interaction of transactive memory with explicit knowledge on customer satisfaction with simple regressions derived from the Aiken and West (1991) procedure. When transactive memory was low, customer satisfaction was positively predicted by the amount of explicit knowledge in the team (b 0.17, t 4.05, p < 0.01). However, when transactive memory was high there is an inverse relationship (b 0.15, t 1.94, p 0.05). Greater amounts of explicit knowledge result in greater assessed performance of the teams. The extent to which this explicit knowledge results in higher customer satisfaction depends on the teams transactive memory. Using Aiken and Wests method of computing the crossover point, we nd that the slopes for high and low transactive memory cross at 0.5 standard deviations above the mean of explicit knowledge. High transactive memory appears to allow teams to nd solutions in a manner that supports customer
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satisfaction when explicit knowledge is relatively low. This may reect effective use of available knowledge. However, when explicit knowledge is high and transactive memory is also high, customer satisfaction is reduced. We offer possible interpretations of this crossover interaction in the discussion section.
Discussion
Contributions to theory
We provide a unique view of both organizational practices and technology tools for understanding individual knowledge as well as how both individual knowledge and team knowledge processing capabilities ultimately affect team performance. The knowledge practices driving team performance in our focal Fortune 100 technology rm included face-to-face activities in the form of communities of practice (CoPs), technology-mediated tools supporting these communities, and team-level practices to encourage knowledge sharing within teams. We were able to address the impact of CoP face-to-face participation and the use of CoP-related technology-mediated tools on individual tacit and explicit knowledge with consideration of team knowledge sharing practices. The individual-level knowledge practices enhanced the individual-level tacit and explicit knowledge beyond the impact of experience alone. Teams did differ in tacit and explicit knowledge available to the team, and the team-level knowledge sharing practices accounted for some of that difference. By differentiating between teamlevel knowledge sharing practices, individual-level face-to-face knowledge practices and technologymediated knowledge practices, we are able to show a richer, more complete picture of the practices used to develop individual tacit and explicit knowledge than had we used only one of these practices or analyzed some additive composite of them. We believe this is unique in that we expressly work with measures of explicit and tacit knowledge, and then model the relationships between this task knowledge and the process knowledge held by the team in terms of absorptive capacity and transactive memory. At the team level, we were able to account for an impressive 20 per cent of variance in customer satisfaction and 24 per cent of variance in assessed performance. Team tacit knowledge was related to both customer satisfaction and assessed performance, and team explicit knowledge predicted assessed performance. Of particular interest are the moderating effects of absorptive capacity and transactive memory. As predicted, absorptive capacity interacted only with tacit knowledge, and transactive memory interacted only with explicit knowledge. The pattern of the interaction suggests that absorptive capacity partially compensates for lower levels of tacit knowledge. We believe that absorptive capacity increases the chance that a team will be able to gain access to needed tacit knowledge from other sources when the extant available tacit knowledge is low. This is in line with the literature showing that absorptive capacity is supportive of the assessment, assimilation, and application of new knowledge (Cohen & Levinthal, 1990) and that showing tacit knowledge as better managed when team have experienced members (Subramaniam & Venkatraman, 2001). The shape of the transactive memory interaction with explicit knowledge went beyond our prediction. With lower levels of explicit knowledge, transactive memory is critical to extracting and coordinating knowledge from team performancethis agrees with our expectations. However, when transactive memory and explicit knowledge are both high, the coordination aspects of transactive memory may be less valuable and lead to excess coordination costs, which is perhaps a form of process loss (Steiner, 1972). While this excess coordination cost does not seem to affect assessed performance,
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it does have a negative inuence on customer satisfaction. We speculate that over-coordination may not be a problem for the effectiveness of the teams performance (e.g., system specications, meeting expectations, and low numbers of errors); however, over-coordination may be a cost in terms of efciency in problem solving and thus a detriment to customer satisfaction. While Steiner posits both excess coordination costs and reduced effort, we do not believe that in this context process loss results from reduced effort (e.g., social loang, Karau & Williams, 1993), as we would expect to see the interaction effect on assessed performance as well as customer satisfaction. Information processing theory informs the foundations of the major relationships in our model, yet we are not aware of any information processing research that concurrently addresses multiple levels and both task and process knowledge relationships. Hinsz et al. (1997) highlighted the importance of considering information processing in team settings (expanding from the prior focus on individuals) and noted particular areas where information processing could be expected to play a clear role. We combined this perspective with the acknowledgment that at the team level, absorptive capacity and transactive memory support the encoding, storage, and retrieval information processing roles, respectively. While this integration is a step forward, we believe there is an additional deeper layer to consider in future research.
Future directions for research and study limitations

We look to future research, for example, for a more detailed assessment of the absorptive capacity and transactive memory moderating effects. We acknowledge that absorptive capacity and transactive memory are both forms of process knowledge and so have both tacit and explicit components themselves (e.g., Oshri et al., 2008; Rulke & Rau, 2000). Here we examined the moderating roles that absorptive capacity and transactive memory play on task focused tacit and explicit knowledge. Future research is needed to formally model the process focused tacit and explicit components of absorptive capacity and transactive memory. Brandon and Hollingshead (2004) and Lewis et al. (2005) provide useful background considering the tacit aspects of transactive memory, as Chen (2004) does for absorptive capacity. However their work did not focus specically on these issues, so they did not delineate the relationships between tacit and explicit aspects of the constructs. It is possible that the different component parts of absorptive capacity (assessment, assimilation, and application) and transactive memory (specialization, credibility, and coordination) play different roles in the aggregation and realization of knowledge in teams. These different components may help specify the tacit and explicit attributes mentioned above. The current results provide motivation to probe deeper into these relationships. We also expect that longitudinal designs will be necessary given the focus of absorptive capacity on prior knowledge enabling the utilization of new knowledge and evidence that the effects of transactive memory change with experience (Kanawattanachai & Yoo, 2007; Lewis et al., 2005). Our research is limited in that these results come from one leading global company that has successfully attracted the best and brightest eld sales engineers. In addition, past industry-wide downturns necessitated staff reductions, forcing only the strongest performers to be retained, ultimately producing a highly competent talent pool. Thus, the variance in tacit and explicit knowledge is likely restricted to the higher end of the distribution. We suspect that our data do not allow us to generalize to organizations where teams may have lower distributions of knowledge. Further research is needed in contexts where the distribution of knowledge is broader and encompasses the lower end of the continuum. For example, a rm with high growth or turnover would certainly include in its knowledge practices introductory level training and socialization. Some forms of socialization training include job shadowing and on the job training.
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The organization of these teams also had both costs and benets regarding the power of our tests. These teams had specic tasks (analyzing, designing, and selling sophisticated hardware and software solutions) and specialized team members who had to work interdependently. Knowledge sharing and aggregation would matter less in teams where interdependence was less critical (e.g., Steiner, 1972). We suggest that these limitations to generalization are offset by the richness provided by the eld setting. Scholars, such as Johns (2006), have called for greater context in organizational research. We have provided the context of this work (the specic type of work done by the teams, the specic type of knowledge support provided to the team members) and look to future work to assess the generalizability of these ndings.
Implications for practice

This research was inspired by a discussion with a TechCo director who was concerned with how to judge the relative benets of communities of practice and technology tools for knowledge sharing. The company was providing millions of dollars of support but had no way of validating the performance outcomes. This practical question, combined with our interest in the transformation of knowledge into team performance, provided the opportunity to develop new theory in search of practical answers. At the most basic level, we offer justication for continued support of both face-to-face and technology-mediated knowledge practices. Managers are often challenged to substitute electronic learning modules for face-to-face training (Britt, 2008) and/or to reduce travel to face-to-face activities in favor of access to electronic sources (Chrisman, 2008). These results suggest that while individual explicit knowledge can be supported via technology-mediated knowledge practices, face-to-face knowledge practices are needed for tacit knowledge. In this team setting, there was also benet where knowledge sharing was supported in the form of norms and incentives. The results at the team level are more nuanced and point to the value of team process knowledge by taking advantage of the team members knowledge. While knowledge can be a signicant predictor of team performance (here team tacit knowledge predicted both customer satisfaction and assessed team performance while explicit knowledge predicted assessed performance), absorptive capacity and transactive memory also play roles in predicting performance. We note above that absorptive capacityprocess knowledge focused on how to gain new knowledge in a teamcan compensate for low levels of team tacit knowledge. This suggests two opportunities for new teams or teams with a new task and limited tacit knowledge: (1) Find face-to-face opportunities to gain the missing relevant tacit knowledge; and (2) Focus on the development of skills related to nding knowledge from sources other than their own members. The case of transactive memoryknowing who knows what, who needs what information, and how to coordinate given the knowledge distributionis more complex. At least for problem solving tasks, like providing customer satisfaction, managers should focus on increasing explicit knowledge or transactive memory but perhaps not both. In settings with high explicit knowledge, the addition of the coordination support of transactive memory may get in the way.
Conclusion
We have presented a multilevel model of knowledge support, acquisition, and resulting team performance using a large-scale eld study within a Fortune 100 technology company. The results suggest that team performance can be understood and more effectively managed by considering the
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complex relationships that organizational practices and technology tools have with individual and team-level knowledge. Communities of practice and their related technology support systems played an important role for individual-level knowledge in this environment, as did the team-level attributes of transactive memory and absorptive capacity. This multilevel model of knowledge and team performance highlights effective mechanisms for organizational action, as well as areas for future theory development around the roles of tacit and explicit knowledge. The study is distinctive given the breadth of the modeling (speaking to a call for greater examination of multilevel effects, Kozlowski & Klein, 2000), size of the eld study (over 500 individuals and 200 teams for most analyses), examination of both tacit and explicit team knowledge (Wilson, Goodman, & Cronin, 2007), and t of the eld site to the questions at hand (Edmondson & McManus, 2007).
Acknowledgements
Supported in part by NSF Grants SES-0422845 and SES-0422772.
Author biographies
Terri L. Grifth is Professor of Management at Santa Clara Universitys Leavey School of Business. Her research focuses on teams, technology, and performance, especially in virtual settings. Dr. Grifth is an Associate Editor for Group Decision & Negotiation and past Senior Editor for Organization Science. Further information is available via her blog Technology and Organizations, http://www. TerriGrifth.com/blog John E. Sawyer, Ph.D. (University of Illinois, Urbana), is Professor of Management in the Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics, and Director of the Graduate Program in Organizational Effectiveness. His research includes organizational and group inuences on knowledge transfer, decision-making, creativity and innovation, and has been published is numerous journals and book chapters. Applications of his research are in organizational practices and technological supports for enhancing corporate R&D productivity. Dr. Sawyer serves on the editorial boards of Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, and Journal of Applied Behavioral Science.
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Appendix I
Absorptive Capacity Assessment acap.1 People in my team are able to decipher the knowledge that will be most valuable to us. acap.2 It is easy to decide what information will be most useful in meeting customers needs. acap.3 We know enough about the technology we use to determine what new information is credible and trustworthy. Assimilation acap.4 The shared knowledge within my team makes it easy to understand new material presented within our technical areas. acap.5 It is easy to see the connections among the pieces of knowledge held jointly in our team. acap.6 Many of the new technological developments coming to the team t well into the current technology. Application acap.7 It is easy to adapt our work to make use of the new technical knowledge made available to us. acap.8 New technical knowledge can be quickly applied to our work. acap.9 My customers can immediately benet from new technical knowledge learned in the team.
Appendix II
Analysis Notes (1) Teams have a minimum of three members. Our Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM) software automatically removes any team with only 1 person responding or without complete data for a respondent. We accept reduced power in order to make our analysis representative. By chance alone, because the typical response rate is less than 50%, removing teams with fewer than 3 respondents would only represent teams with 6 or more members. (2) We chose not to impute missing-values or use other missing values analytic techniques for several reasons. HLM only provides the parametric multiple-imputation technique. Structural equation modeling provides maximum likelihood (ML) techniques for missing data; however, ML requires very large sample sizes to result in stable parameter estimates. Additionally, both ML and multiple imputation techniques assume that data are missing at random. In our data, some managers do not use the competency rating system described for the explicit knowledge measure. Thus, in most cases where the explicit knowledge data were missing, it was missing for all or most of the members of a given team. It would be inappropriate to apply missing at random assumptions. Newer techniques that allow selection or pattern mixture models will accommodate models when missing values are not random. However, we are not aware of multilevel data analysis methods that implement such models (Shafer & Graham, 2002). Thus,
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(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
we felt that the conservative approach would be to use listwise deletion. Where we deleted subjects who were missing the explicit knowledge measure, the number of teams was also reduced. There are multiple accepted ways of presenting HLM results. Given our combination of individual and team outcomes, we are following the strategy presented in Marrone, Tesluk, and Carson (2007), rather than Curran and Bauer (2007), or Hofman, Grifn, and Gavin (2000), which focus on HLM alone. Variance accounted for is calculated as the null model within-group variance minus the residual within-group variance of the model with individual-level predictors divided by the null model within-group variance (Bryk & Raudenbush, 1992). The covariate is included in both the null model and the individual-level predictor model so that variance accounted for reects just that variance accounted for by the hypothesized relationships. Calculated as the (total between-group variance per the null model residual between group variance after considering team-level predictors)/total between-group variance per the null model (Raudenbush & Bryk, 2002). In a post hoc analysis we tested in a separate analysis the interaction of absorptive capacity with explicit knowledge and transactive memory with tacit knowledge and found no effect. This conrmed our expectation that absorptive capacity would moderate only tacit knowledge and transactive memory would moderate only explicit knowledge.

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Journal of Organizational Behavior J. Organiz. Behav.

Multilevel knowledge and team performance

Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Received 27 May 2008 Revised 11 July 2009 Accepted 21 July 2009

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

Figure 1. Conceptual model of individual-level knowledge, team-level effects, and performancea

A Multilevel, Multimodal Perspective on Knowledge

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

Individual tacit knowledge

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

Individual explicit knowledge

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

From individual knowledge to team performance

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

Figure 2. Predicted form of Hypotheses 10 and 12

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

J. Organiz. Behav. 31, 10031031 (2010) DOI: 10.1002/job

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

0.03 0.23 0.05 3 4

0.21 0.12 0.10 0.33 0.43

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

Test of team differences

Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

J. Organiz. Behav. 31, 10031031 (2010) DOI: 10.1002/job

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

Antecedents of individual tacit knowledge

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

Antecedents of individual explicit knowledge

Team-level performance outcome predictors

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

b 4.55 0.09 0.03 0.05 0.04

Error 0.02 0.02 0.02 0.03 0.03

Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

J. Organiz. Behav. 31, 10031031 (2010) DOI: 10.1002/job

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

Future directions for research and study limitations

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

Implications for practice

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

J. Organiz. Behav. 31, 10031031 (2010) DOI: 10.1002/job

MULTILEVEL KNOWLEDGE & TEAM PERFORMANCE

Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

J. Organiz. Behav. 31, 10031031 (2010) DOI: 10.1002/job

T. L. GRIFFITH AND J. E. SAWYER

Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

J. Organiz. Behav. 31, 10031031 (2010) DOI: 10.1002/job