Workplace ostracism and knowledge hoarding
Researchers in earlier studies stated that knowledge hoarding is one of the most critical problems that is being faced by organizations because it hinders organizational success hindered organizations from success [26] and also effects the process of individuals’ growth within organizations [14]. Scholars defined knowledge hoarding as the intentional and strategic concealment of information and knowledge by an individual [16].
Connelly, Zweig, Webster and Trougakos [12] highlighted that knowledge hoarding is a completely different phenomena from knowledge hiding. Scholars stated that knowledge hiding is based on other individuals’ request to provide relevant knowledge. Whereas, in knowledge hoarding, as such no request is made by others regarding sharing of accumulated knowledge [47]. Research suggests that knowledge hoarding and hiding are not inherently negative behaviors like incivility or any other counter-productive work behavior. People can hoard knowledge with a self-benefit goal rather having an objective to conceal deliberately [46].
One of the important factors leading toward knowledge hoarding behavior at workplace is employee’s frustration due to some unpleasant event. Scholars in providing the directions to future researchers documented that workplace ostracism might be a potential determinant of knowledge hoarding at workplace because the phenomena of ostracism at workplace is not new and employees experience it generally [19, 55].
Workplace ostracism (WOS) refers to the extent to which employees are ignored and excluded by other organizational members, and as a result, the coworkers do not welcome their ideas, opinions and suggestions [43]. According to Yang and Treadway [53], ostracism is an excruciating phenomenon at workplace with or without any malicious intentions. Scholar further stated that the outcomes of ostracism are both behavioral and psychological, and they create risk at workplace, especially in the service-oriented organizations. Thus, based on conservation of resource theory (COR) [32] the present study attempts to examine the association between workplace ostracism and knowledge hoarding.
COR theory postulated that an employee would protect his or her remaining resources in an organization by using specific measures such as depersonalization, reducing efforts and knowledge hoarding. Nowak [42] stated that employees at workplace hoard their knowledge by dint of fear that if they share their knowledge, then their power over it curtails. In the similar manner, Evans et al. [16] argued that the ostracized employees at workplace hoard knowledge because they feel that controlling more knowledge to increase personal bargaining power could be a better way to deal with workplace ostracism. Thus, based on aforementioned arguments it is hypothesize that:
Hypothesis 1
Workplace ostracism is positively associated with knowledge hoarding.
Mediating role of defensive silence
Gkorezis, Panagiotou and Theodorou [21] stated that employees become silent and withhold significant information due to the practice of workplace ostracism in organizations. Dyne et al. [15] documented that employee silence is a multi-dimensional construct and has three dimensions, i.e., acquiescent silence, defensive silence and pro-social silence. Milliken, Morrison and Hewlin [40] define defensive silence as withholding relevant ideas, information or opinions as a form of self-protection, based on fear. Although, the term ostracism has gained popularity and researchers have studied its outcomes at workplace through various underlying mechanisms, e.g., conflict, organizational identification, self-esteem and envy [9, 10, 49] but still as such no study has examined the intervening role of defensive silence; a dimension of employee silence with ostracism and its outcomes. Milliken, Morrison and Hewlin [40] argued that defensive silence is detrimental within organizational context as it generates negative work-related outcomes. Similarly, when employees feel that their information and opinions will not be appreciated by others or may bring negative or unpleasant results so then they do not express themselves fully and engage in defensive silence.
In line with conservation of resource theory (COR) [32], ostracized employees at the workplace have a fear of losing valued resources such as social relationship, social support and the opportunity for quick growth at workplace in organizations. Thus, after this unexpected situation employee becomes more proactive and used defensive silence as a strategy for the restoration of lost resources by consciously refraining them from sharing their knowledge and opinions with others [52]. The individuals also claim that the knowledge they gained and possessed during their working tenure as their “property right” and to maintain their existence in the organizational context and to regain their “personal mastery”, they indulge in defensive silence and withhold information rather than to share it with others in an organization [33]. Thus, by integrating the aforementioned arguments, this study has hypothesized that:
Hypothesis 2
Defensive silence mediates the relationship between workplace ostracism and knowledge hoarding.
Experiential avoidance as moderator
Hayes, Strosahl and Wilson [29] defined experiential avoidance as the propensity to engage in behaviors that seeks to change the form, frequency or content of unwanted thoughts, feelings and sensations. Extant research has theorized and conceptualized experiential avoidance as a negative behavior that is highly correlated with self-harm [4]. Scholars further stated that experiential avoidance results in several negative mental health consequences such as high levels of stress, hopelessness and psychosocial dysfunction [28].
On contrary, few scholars suggested that the phenomenon of experiential avoidance is unique in its nature to stress coping mechanism [34] because experiential avoidance as a regulating strategy mitigates the intensity of stressors that affect individuals’ behaviors [22].
Extensive literature on ostracism revealed that it has several physical, psychological and organizational outcomes [43, 48, 55]. According to scholars, workplace ostracism experience is very painful as individuals have a fear that their ideas and views will not be appreciated due to which they have to face stress, hopelessness and embarrassment; thus, for self-protection from this fear individuals indulge in silence [25]. Prior researchers stated that coping is a best way to deal with stressful events as it refers to the way an individual approach or respond to the stressful situations [37]. Furthermore, Carver et al. [7] stated that along with other dimensions of coping like problem focused and emotions focused, the avoidance focused coping is also a significant dimension that is used for coping with stressful situations, as the basic purpose of this approach is to dampen the thoughts and emotions associated with stressful events.
Thus, based on conservation of resource theory (COR) [32] energy as an intrinsic resource of employees at workplace should be replenished often to perform assigned tasks and people must invest resources in order to protect against potential resource loss, recover from resource losses and gain resources. Thus, at workplace the employees use experiential avoidance as a coping strategy to replenish the lost resources by regulating their thoughts, behaviors and feelings and disengage them mentally from the stress caused by ostracism at workplace. Therefore, based on aforementioned arguments it is asserted that those employees who would not opt experiential avoidance as a regulating strategy than their resource depletion would be high. Whereas, those employees who adopt experiential avoidance as a deliberate tactic then their energy and resource depletion would be low and resultantly they would not go toward defensive silence. Hence, researchers hypothesized that:
Hypothesis 3
Experiential avoidance mitigates the effect of workplace ostracism on defensive silence in such a way that the relationship is weak when experiential avoidance is high.