Knowledge hiding as the dark side of competitive psychological climate

Purpose Previous studies suggest that competitive psychological climate at workplace may influence employee's attitudes and behaviors. The purpose of this paper is to explore whether competitive psychological climate leads to increased knowledge-hiding behavior. Design/methodology/approach Drawing upon the conservation of resources theory, we developed a conceptual model which we empirically tested using survey data collected from 296 salespersons from one of the largest distribution market expansion companies in Myanmar. Findings We performed hierarchical regression analyses on the data obtained from 296 salespersons to confirm our hypotheses: competitive psychological climate is positively related to knowledge hiding. This relationship becomes weaker when there is high level of organizational justice and high level of optimism. Research limitations/implications The findings shed light on the dark side of competitive psychological climate, such that it translates into knowledge hiding, which is not beneficial for favorable organizational outcomes. To mitigate that, management needs to focus on promoting organizational justice and recruit more optimistic employees. Originality/value Although there are many previous studies on competitive psychological climate and its positive and negative impacts, this paper, to the authors' best knowledge, is the first to study its specific effect on knowledge hiding in the sales context.