The Role of Social Media in Employee Knowledge Sharing

Abstract

Social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn have become incredibly popular today as they have billions of registered users who share millions of units of data with each other. Yet, only a miniscule part of it is recognized as leading to some form of organizational knowledge sharing and exchange, which is a critical component of every organization's success. Employees in organizations explore social media applications to disseminate their tacit knowledge. The present study is an attempt to investigate the role of social media networks in professional knowledge sharing and building the bridging social capital of employees. Data were collected from employees working in manufacturing units in India through an empirical research design. The study's major findings revealed that social media usage enhances employees' proficiency at work by enabling knowledge sharing. On the other hand, the data uncovered an important finding that social networking sites might not build employees' bridging social capital.