Qassim Al-RammahiUniversity of JyväskyläMaster’s Programme in Mobile Technology and Business

Introduction Motivation Research Questions Research Purposes Methodology and Scope Empirical Studies Hypotheses Limitations of Research Schedule for Completing the Thesis List of References

Trust play great role on success of sharing and exchanging knowledge among members of organization. Trust considered to be an essential attribute in organizational culture for co-workers to share knowledge Politis (2003) .

Social ties among employees have great role on building trust processes to transfer complex and tacit knowledge (Hansen, 1999) .

Creating, sharing and distributing knowledge play big role on speeding up and succeeding open innovation.

Trust is reflected through individuals’ behavior, culture, values and personal relationship in organization and then it will affect the process and result of knowledge sharing ( Zand ,1972; Hart & Saunders, 1997; Butler, 1999;).

There is great connection between processes of creating and sharing knowledge with high level of trust and mutual respect among employees of an organization (Nahapiet and Ghoshal ,1998)

With the impact of globalization, companies are depending on multinational team members to create and share knowledge.

Great role of knowledge in organization to survive among competitors in last decade.

Knowledge is the most valuable asset of most productive resources for organizations ( Grant, 2002) .

Trust is reflected through individuals’ behavior, culture, values and personal relationship in organization and then it will affect the process and result of knowledge sharing.

As knowledge facilitates development of the organization, trust can facilitate complexity of sharing knowledge among organization members and groups.

What is the role of trust in transferring and exchanging knowledge within members of multicultural background organization?

What factors increase trust among multicultural employees when sharing and exchanging knowledge ?

What is the influence of the organizational culture on process of knowledge sharing?

How trust effect workers’ knowledge-sharing behaviors in multicultural organization?

Qualitative method is used in this research to establish better understanding of trust among multinational people on how to communicate, to create and to share knowledge within one organization.

This study starts with investigating and analyzing some theories concerning trust and knowledge management.

Using semi structured interviews to collect some data for qualitative information case studies.

These interviews are about some IBM companies between Nordic countries and Middle East countries. I chose Finland as typical example of Nordic countries, while Kuwait and UAE for Middle East countries to represent great cultural differences.

According to Yin (2003) when using case studies, the goals are to explain general explanations that to fit these cases, later we compare these cases to find gabs and similarities.

To clarify the role and the importance of trust in different perspective when cross-cultural team members and groups are sharing and disributing knowledge for the purpose of open innovation.

To facilitate trust among individuals and groups when sharing and exchanging knowledge in multicultural organization.

To give better understanding of knowledge management when dealing with multicultural teams.

This study is supported by empirical studies using semi constructed interviews with IBM in Nordic countries and Middle East countries.

Interviews done in:1. Kuwait, Khorafi Business Machines W.L.L.

(Mr. Piero Corsini – General Manager) 2. UNITED ARAB EMIRATES , Gulf Business

Machines . (Mr. Cesare Cardone,Chief Executive Officer).

3. Oy IBM Finland Ab (…..still in process)  

Trust between team members will increase knowledge sharing.

Interpersonal trust of others in the team will be positively associated with the amount of knowledge sharing within the team and that knowledge will be positively associated with team effectiveness.

Different knowledge requires different level of trust.

There is a connection between interpersonal trust and number of team members behaviours.

Including organizational citizenship behaviours, trust plays huge role on the desire for future interactions between team members, team performance and information sharing.

Richer media can increase level of trust and performance among team member over geographical dispersed virtual team.

It is not dealing with knowledge itself, but about dynamic and nature of knowledge management among employees of multinational organization.

This study starts with investigating some theories concerning creating and sharing knowledge and moving to collect some qualitative information from case studies using semi structured interviews.

Semi constructed interviews of IBM companies (in Kuwait, United Arab Emirates and in Finland) are selected to represent cultural point of view in Middle East Countries and in Nordic Countries.

80% of literature review part is finalized, now collecting data of the enterviews is in progress.

Planning to finalize the thesis in summer (April -June 2014)

Politis,J.(2003),‘‘Theconnectionbetweentrustandknowledgemanagement:what are its implications for team performance’’,Journal of Knowledge Management,Vol.7No.5,pp.55-66.

Hansen, M.T. (1999). “The search-transfer problem: The role of weak ties in sharing knowledge across organization subunits”. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44, 82-111.

Alexei V. Matveev and Paul E. Nelson, “Cross Cultural Communication Competence and Multicultural Team Performance Perceptions of American and Russian Managers”, International Journal of Cross Cultural Management2004 Vol 4(2): 253–270

Claude-Hélène Mayer, 2011 “The Meaning of Sense of Coherence in Transcultural Management: A Salutogenic Perspective on Interactions in a Selected South African Business Organisation”, Waxmann Verlag GmbH

Juan C. Rivera-Vazquez, Lillian V. Ortiz-Fournier and Felix Rogelio Flores, “Overcoming cultural barriers for innovation and knowledge sharing”, JOURNAL OF KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT,VOL. 13 NO. 5 2009.

Butler, J.J.K. (1999) “Trust expectations, information sharing, climate of trust, and negotiation effectiveness and efficiency”. Group and Organization Management, 24, 217–238.

Sai Ho Kwok;Gao, Sheng (2006), “ATTITUDE TOWARDS KNOWLEDGE SHARING BEHAVIOR” The Journal of Computer Information Systems; Winter 2005/2006; 46, 2; ProQuest Central pg. 45

Grant, R. M. (2002). The knowledge-based view of the firm. In N. B. Chun Wei Choo (Ed.), “The strategic management of intellectual capital and organizational knowledge “(pp. 133-148). New York: Oxford University Press