Interaction between Job Design and Extrinsic Motivation in KnowledgeManagement Behavior: A Comparison Study

This study examined how job design influences employees' use of knowledge management (KM) systems. This is one of the first studies to theoretically and empirically examine the role of job design on KM system use. For practitioners, the findings indicate how jobs can be designed to promote KM system use.Polynomial regression and response surface analysis of data collected from Japan and Singapore has shown that job design influences KM system use through enhancing employees' affective commitment. Specifically, the job design aspects of job autonomy, skill variety, task identity, and task significance have significant effects. Interestingly, except for job autonomy, these aspects have non-linear effects. When their levels exceed employees' preferences, they generate stress and decrease affective commitment and KM system use. Their effects differ across cultures: skill variety has stronger influence on employees in Japan while job autonomy has stronger influence on employees in Singapore.Further, the results have shown that when extrinsic motivation such as bonus and higher chance for promotion is present, the effects of job autonomy, skill variety, and task identity are stronger. However, this enhancing effect of extrinsic motivation is weaker in Japan compared to Singapore.Overall, this study highlights which aspects of job design to focus on and how they should be managed to promote KM system use. The key finding is that job design is a double-edged sword in promoting KM system use that must be managed carefully.