FTP

Role of Transformational Leadership in Effective Organizational Knowledge Creation Practices: Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement
Ji Hoon Song, Judith A. Kolb, Ung Hee Lee, Hye Kyoung Kim
Engagement as an area of increasing interest has been discussed in terms of a wide array of organizational policies, practices, and outcomes. This study focuses on a specic aspect of work engagement and its relationship with leadership practices and the outcome of knowledge creation. The mediating effect of employees work engagement level was assessed to explain the relationship between transformational leadership and organizational knowledge creation practices in the Korean business context. A total of 432 cases were collected from Korean for-prot organizations. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis and structural equation modeling were used along with basic descriptive analysis and interconstruct correlation analysis to examine the structural relationships and the mediating effect among the constructs. Results found transformational leadership to be a statistically signicant construct that has an impact on employees work engagement and organizational knowledge creation practices. Additionally, employees work engagement was found to be a statistically signicant mediator that explains the relationship between transformational leadership and organizational knowledge creation practices. In our current knowledge-oriented economy, creating new knowledge is an essential activity for a rms long-term success (Davenport & Prusak, 1998; Gherardi, 2009; Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995). Newly shared and acquired knowledge among employees could serve as a foundation for new product development and effective process innovation in the workplace (Cummings & Worley, 2009; Skerlavaj, Song, & Lee, 2010; Song & Kolb, 2009). Employees
HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT QUARTERLY, vol. 23, no. 1, Spring 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/hrdq.21120
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today often work in teams, which places a spotlight on the leaders role in promoting dynamic interactions among employees as well as providing visionary guidelines to the organization (Northhouse, 2010; Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Moorman, & Fetter, 1990). According to Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995), leadership could be instrumental in encouraging both team members work engagement for effective knowledge creation practices and dynamic collaboration for constructive knowledge acquisition. Furthermore, interconnected collaboration based on the employees work engagement has been reported to play a key role, along with more diverse approaches, in creating new knowledge, which leads to more practical eld-oriented applicable knowledge creation (Dixon, 2000; Nonaka, Toyama, & Konno, 2000; Yoon, Song, & Lim, 2009). Work engagement is the subject of considerable discussion within organizations and of burgeoning interest to researchers (Halbesleben, 2010; Schaufeli & Bakker, 2010; Shuck, 2011). Amabile and Kramer (2011) stated, Employee engagement may seem like a frill in a downturn economy. But it can make a big difference in a companys survival (p. 7). Leiter and Bakker (2010) likewise stressed the importance of engagement: [Modern organizations] need employees who feel energetic and dedicatedi.e., who are engaged with their work. . . . [W]ork engagement can make a true difference for employees and may offer organizations a competitive advantage (p. 1). Amabile and Kramer (2011) collected electronic diary entries from 238 professionals in seven different companies. They asked participants to describe one event that stood out each day. Amabile and Kramer then examined these diary entries for insights into what they called participants inner work lives, which they found had an inuence on workers creativity, productivity, commitment, and collegiality. Their results revealed that in one-third of the nearly 12,000 diary entries, the writer was unhappy and/or unmotivated or both. Drawing on data collected from this study, the authors concluded that employees performed better when they were engaged in what they did. Amabile and Kramer use terms such as happiness and well-being in their discussion of engagement. This conceptualization is but one of many used to describe engagement (see Sweetman & Luthans [2010] for a review of psychological capital and work engagement), which is one of the difculties scholars encounter when attempting to compare results across studies. Schaufeli and Bakker (2010) referred to the existence of myriad denitions of engagement as putting new wine in old bottles (p. 12). They concluded, however, that work engagement is a distinct concept differentiated from related concepts of extrarole behavior, organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and workaholism. As a body of academic research on engagement emerges, clarity of denition is important. In this research, we use the three-factor denition of the term engagement that includes vigor, dedication, and absorption (Schaufeli & Bakker, 2003). Although vigor, in particular, is theoretically associated with
HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT QUARTERLY DOI: 10.1002/hrdq
Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement
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job performance and organizational effectiveness (Cote, 1999; Frederickson & Losada, 2005; Lazarus & Cohen-Charash, 2001), there is a need for workplace studies that examine ways in which clearly dened components of engagement inuence aspects of organizational life. The importance of leadership within organizations is well documented. Transformational leadership, a construct of interest in this study, is related to higher levels of work engagement (Brief & Weiss, 2002), to the concept of psychological well-being as related to meaningful work (Arnold, Turner, & Barling, 2007), and also to organizational performance (Bass, 1985; Howell & Frost, 1989). Transformational leadership has been described as energizing emotions exhibited by leaders that ultimately encourage similar emotions in subordinates (Avolio, 1999; Bass & Riggio, 2006). Studies (Neumann & Strack, 2000; Totterdell, Wall, Holman, Diamond, & Epitropaki, 2004) have found that employees inuence each others mood. In terms of our focus here, these inuences between supervisor and employees and among employees have implications for the overall climate of a unit or workplace. Ultimately, supportive factors in the workplace promote more voluntary, dynamic, and systematic collaboration among the employees to create organizationally applicable new knowledge (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995; von Krough, Ichijo, & Nonaka, 2000). Leadership that builds channels to bridge communication between subordinate employees and top management decision makers could inuence knowledge creation. The study of engagement at work and the ways in which engagement, transformational leadership, and knowledge creation practices interact can offer insights and provide directions for both human resource development (HRD) practice and research. The primary purpose of the current research was to examine interactive relationships among three proposed research variablestransformational leadership, level of employees work engagement, and organizational knowledge creation practicesin the Korean business context. According to the GLOBE study of 62 societies, which is the most popular cross-cultural comparison research study, the Korean business rms collectivism score at the societal level was ranked second among the subgroups in the world, indicating that Korean business rms have an organizational climate that encourages employees to view themselves as highly interdependent with their organizations (Gelfand, Bhawuk, Nishii, & Bechtold, 2004). Furthermore, in the same GLOBE study, the Korean business rms tended to have greater power distance than many of the European countries from the perspective of leadership and organizational climate (Carl, Gupta, & Javidan, 2004), which could be caused by organizational hierarchy and center-oriented organizational structure. In addition, in terms of performance-oriented leadership characteristics, the Korean business rms were ranked as number 1 among the same target groups, which suggested that leaders in Korean business rms play a critical role in performance improvement ( Javidan, 2004). Also relevant are ndings by Jung and Sosik (2002), Jung, Bass, and Sosik (1995), and Jung,
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Yammarino, and Lee (2009) that transformational leadership could positively play a critical role in enhancing group effectiveness and cohesiveness by encouraging empowered employee engagement in Korean organizations, which exhibit a high group collectivistic tendency. From these results of reliable cross-cultural studies, two issues emerged as research assumptions for this study: (1) Korean employees as compared to those from other cultures could perceive higher work-related engagement, and (2) Korean employees could perceive a greater organizational obligation along with powerful performanceoriented leadership. Accordingly, we assumed that transformational leadership could strengthen employees feelings of work engagement by enriching the overall voluntarily collaborative work climate in the Korean business context. Finally, due to geographic limitations and lack of natural resources in Korea, human-oriented knowledge-based business strategies are quite popular in Korean business rms, which encouraged us to identify organizational knowledge creation as the expected outcome variable of the current research (Song, 2008; Song & Kolb, 2009). The mediating effect of employees work engagement was examined to explain the relationship between transformational leadership and effectiveness of organizational knowledge creation practices in the Korean business context.
Review of Literature
This study has two primary objectives: (1) to examine overall relationships among transformational leadership, employees work engagement, and knowledge creation practices; and (2) to examine the mediating effect of employees work engagement to explain the relationship between transformational leaders and knowledge creation in the Korean business context. Based on these research objectives, the following review of relevant literature was performed. Transformational Leadership. In our turbulent economic situation, leaders are considered one of the most effective and essential components of an organization for overcoming limiting socioeconomic issues and remaining current on changing business trends (Finkelstein, Hambrick, & Cannella, 2010; Northhouse, 2010). The traditional roles of leaders include providing visionary direction, providing a communication channel, nding the way forward, and leading change based on mutual trust with organization members (Bass & Riggio, 2010; Martocchio & Judge, 1997; Yukl, 1989). Over the decades, numerous studies have been conducted on the behaviors and roles of leaders, which include charismatic leadership and transactional leadership (Bass, 1985; Bass & Riggio, 2010; Yukl, 1989). More recently, the focus of leadership research has shifted to transformational leadership, which has an impact not only on organizational performance and task-related role performance but also on employees positive attitude change and emotional encouragement (Bass & Riggio, 2010; Northhouse, 2010; Podsakoff et al., 1990).
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Since the 1980s, transformational leadership has been one of the most popular approaches to leadership (Northhouse, 2010). Historically, the concept of transformational leadership, rst coined in 1973 by Downton, emphasizes the importance of the relationship between leaders and followers in leading effective teamwork-based performance, whereas transactional leadership focuses more on an instrumental approach that uses rewards or punishments to motivate subordinate efforts (Bass, 1985). In contrast, according to Glynn and DeJordy (2010), charismatic leadership relies on leaders personal abilities and talents to inuence followers to infuse work and organizations with meaning and a value-driven mission (p. 125), which is more relevant to the institutional environment of business (Khurana, 2002). Bass and Riggio (2006) asserted that the popularity of transformational leadership might be due to its emphasis on aspects of intrinsic member motivation, follower development, and emotional caring in the workplace. Specifically, transformational leaders behaviors include articulating vision, providing an appropriate business model, encouraging the acceptance of teams goals, holding high performance expectation, and providing individualized support and intellectual stimulation (Bass & Riggio, 2010; Podsakoff et al., 1990). More important, and also differing from general transactional leadership, the key element of the transformational leader could be dened as collaboration with followers that is accomplished by raising the level of motivation and morality in the workplace (Howell & Avolio, 1993; Northhouse, 2010). According to research conducted by Bass (1985) and Howell and Frost (1989), transformational leaders behaviors showed a positive impact on several organizational performance improvement factors, including job satisfaction, in-role performance improvement, self-reported effort, constructive process innovation, and employees work engagement. Recent doctoral studies (Sarah, 2009; Wefald, 2008) examined the relationship between transformational leadership and work-engagement related concepts such as employees job-related engagement and work-related ow in the workplace. Results indicated that transformational leadership has strong links between followers engagement, vigor, absorption, intrinsic motivation, and personality. These four factors are considered the fundamental characteristics of transformational leaders: (1) idealized inuence, (2) inspirational motivation, (3) intellectual stimulation, and (4) individualized consideration. Briey, idealized inuence refers to the role modeling of the leaders in the workplace, exhibiting desirable behaviors to be emulated by team members. Inspirational motivation describes inspiring followers to become more engaged and to lead taskoriented commitment through sharing the vision, encouraging higher performance expectation, and appealing to followers on an emotional level (Hickman, 2010; Kelly, 2010). Intellectual stimulation describes the characteristics of leaders for stimulating team creativity and innovative efforts of followers. Last, the concept of individualized consideration is related to creating a supportive atmosphere in which leaders can support two-way communication with followers
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and serve as coach and mentor, providing well-rounded support for followers to complete given tasks effectively and also to overcome the personal challenges (Kelly, 2010). Transformational leadership also is practical and applied, according to Jung, Chow, and Wu (2003). Transformational leadership has a positive inuence on organizational innovation as measured by empowerment and taskoriented commitment of team members (Bass & Riggio, 2010). In addition, transformational leadership plays a key role in creating a collaborative team environment based on mutual respect among team members, self-determined sense of identity, and self-efcacy based on employee condence (Avolio & Gibbons, 1988; House, 2004). From a practical performance-oriented standpoint, Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) emphasized the importance of middle managers transformational leadership behaviors on effective and dynamic organizational knowledge creation through encouragement of collaboration, visionary business direction, and promotion of supportive organizational environment. In summary, transformational leadership in the form of an intuitive leadership approach has a positive and effective impact on several types of organizational- and individual-level performance improvement measures in the workplace (Lowe & Gardner, 2001; Moxley & OConnor, 1998; Schein, 2010). Additionally, through the strong emphasis on followers needs, values, and morals, transformational leaders encourage supportive collaboration among team members, which is the key for the innovative team process and ultimately for organizational performance improvement (Burns, 1978; Howell & Avolio, 1993; Schein, 2010). Based on this literature, this research hypothesis is proposed: HYPOTHESIS 1: Transformational leadership positively inuences the level of employees work engagement and knowledge-based performance. Employees Work Engagement and Knowledge Performance. A research focus on employees work engagement is relatively new in both management (Kahn, 1990) and HRD elds. Kahn (1990) coined one of the most recognizable denitions of engagement: the harnessing of organizational members selves to their work role (p. 693). This view focuses on the personal engagement of organizational members to emphasize aspects of work-performance improvement through employing and expressing themselves on physical, cognitive, and emotional levels during their role performance. Similarly, employees work engagement has been considered as a concept of employees work passion in the workplace for improving performance (Zigarmi, Nimon, Houson, Witt, & Diehl, 2009). Furthermore, the concept of employees work engagement has been examined in relation to critical factors of interest to the HRD eld, including the effectiveness of informal workplace learning (Lohman, 2005); workplace optimism and individual performance (Medlin & Green, 2009); job resources, opportunities for development, and job performance
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(Bakker & Bal, 2010); service climate and job performance (Salanova, Agut, & Peiro, 2005); colleague support and job performance (Xanthopoulou, Bakker, Heuven, Demerouti, & Schaufeli, 2008); job performance and turnover intention (Halbesleben & Wheeler, 2008); performance and innovativeness (Schaufeli, Taris, & Bakker, 2006); and personal-level behavioral performance improvement (DAbate & Eddy, 2007). In related denitions, the concept of employee engagement has similarities with the concepts of job satisfaction, employees work-related passion, and organizational commitment (Federman, 2009; Leiter & Bakker, 2010; Zigarmi et al., 2009). Job satisfaction has been dened as the primary affective reactions of an individual to various facets of the job and to job experiences (Igbaria & Buimaraes, 1993, p. 148). This and other denitions of job satisfaction all stress the affective nature of the construct. As contrasted to job satisfaction, employees work engagement is considered a voluntary emotional commitment that can be inuenced by organizational support, mutual trust among team members, and personal enthusiasm and willingness (Schaufeli, Bakker, & van Rhenen, 2009; Taris, Van Horn, Schaufeli, & Schreurs, 2004). Under this perspective, trustful leaders and supportive peers could increase the level of employees work engagement and ultimately lead to organizational performance improvement. Thus, employees work engagement includes involvement with the organization that goes beyond the affective focus of job satisfaction (Leiter & Bakker, 2010; Winter, 2003). In addition, organizational commitment and engagement are similar concepts in terms of expected outcomes. However, many engagement researchers have emphasized that the concept of engagement is related to employees voluntary behavioral aspects (Bakker & Schaufeli, 2008; Macey & Schneider, 2008; Saks, 2006) whereas organizational commitment appears to be more attitudinal in nature including affective, continuance, and normative domains (Meyer & Allen, 1997; Song & Kim, 2009). Generally, engagement is viewed as a more holistic construct than commitment. Organizational commitment and job satisfaction are subsumed within the construct of organizational engagement (Bakker & Schaufeli, 2008; Saks, 2006). There are also negative aspects of engagement as exemplied by the terms close association with workaholism, although engagement is generally considered a distinct positive concept (Taris, Schaufeli, & Shimazu, 2010). Workaholism has been dened in a number of ways but at its essence it is viewed as a strong inner drive that results in excessive expenditures of work-related time. Taris et al. (2010) made this distinction between the two: Engaged workers are pulled to work because they enjoy it for its own sake, whereas workaholics are pushed to work because they have to obey their obsession (p. 42). Most denitions of engagement similarly stress the positive nature of the concept. Robinson, Perryman and Hayday (2004) dened engagement as the positive attitude held by the employees towards the organization and its values (p. 9). Focusing on employees perceptions, employee engagement has been dened
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as a mutual positive relationship between employees and their organization that promotes more dynamic participation of employees in performing given tasks in the workplace (Galpin, Stairs, & Page, 2008). For HRD practitioners and scholars, keeping in mind the line between positive engagement and negative workaholism appears particularly important. From the eld of management, Kahn (1990) is generally credited with the rst denition of the term engagement. This view focused on physical, cognitive, and emotional aspects of work engagement. Using a similar focus, Shuck and Wollard (2010) developed this denition of employee engagement specically for the eld of HRD: an individual employees cognitive, emotional, and behavioral state directed toward desired organizational outcomes (p. 103). This latter denition is relevant for this research as it focuses on the workers job task performance in achieving desired organizational outcomes, operationalized in this study as knowledge creation practices. We consider this in conjunction with the next denition that directly relates to the conceptualization of work engagement in this study. Schaufeli, Salanova, Gonzalez-Roma, and Bakker (2002) dened work engagement as the contrastive concept to burnouta positive, fullling, work-related state of mind characterized by vigor, dedication, and absorption of the employees that is related to a more persistent and pervasive affective-cognitive state. These components are linked to the three states described by Shuck and Wollard (2010) in this manner: vigor, dedication, and absorption represent, respectively, behavioral-energetic, emotional, and cognitive states (Schaufeli & Bakker, 2010). Thus, our operational denition considers the three dimensions of vigor, dedication, and absorption as they are directed toward desired organizational outcomes. Vigor refers to levels of energy and mental resilience, the willingness to invest effort in work, and persistence. Dedication is an individuals deriving a sense of signicance from work, feeling enthusiastic and proud about the given job, and feeling inspired and challenged by the job. The last component, absorption, captures the general level of happiness and the degree to which one becomes wrapped up in a task and loses track of time. This conceptualization of work engagement is based on the theoretical approach of Maslach and Leiter (1997), which assumed that employees engagement and task-related burnout comprise the opposite sides of a continuum of work related well-being, with burnout representing the negative pole and engagement the positive pole (Schaufeli & Bakker, 2003). Shuck (2011) suggested that the approach used to study engagement should match the question, denition, and chosen measurement tool and, for HRD, be grounded within an HRD context (p. 320). Maslach, Schaufeli, and Leiters (2001) burnout-antithesis approach used here was one of four primary approaches to engagement identied by Shuck (2011) after an examination of 214 relevant publications. Other approaches were: Kahns (1990) need-satisfying; Harter, Schmidt, and Hayess (2002) satisfaction-engagement; and Sakss (2006) multidimentional. Each has their proponents and critics (Schaufeli &
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Bakker, 2010; Shuck, 2011) but none has been shown to be more acceptable than the others (Christian & Slaughter, 2007; Shuck, 2011). Saks (2006) applied the lens of social exchange theory to an examination of engagement within a research framework and found that employees work engagement positively predicted job satisfaction and organizational commitment and negatively predicted intent to quit. In this work, he distinguished between job engagement (psychological presence in ones job) and organizational engagement (psychological presence in ones organization). Harter et al. (2002) used the Gallup Workplace Audit (GWA, or Gallup Q 12), an instrument that has been described, alternatively, as a measure of the antecedents of job satisfaction (Schaufeli & Bakker, 2010) and a scale that assesses the experience of engagement as illustrated by employee involvement, satisfaction, and enthusiasm (Harter et al., 2002). Findings from Harter et al. (2002) indicate that engagement was positively related to protability, productivity, safety, customer satisfaction, and turnover. In an earlier study, Maslach et al. (2001) reported that six factors affected employees work engagement: (1) workload, (2) control, (3) rewards and recognition, (4) community and social support, (5) perceived fairness, and (6) values. In our study, the burnout-antithesis approach (Maslach et al., 2001) makes sense in terms of our questions and the focus on collaborative practices and knowledge-based performance. According to Bakker, Demerouti, and Schaufeli (2005, p. 663), employees who are burned out lack the energy to work adequately and poorly identify with their work. This problematic situation creates distant, negative attitudes toward work, and poor relationships with team members, which in turn leads to poor performance in the workplace (Bakker et al., 2005). Increasing the level of work engagement has been identied as a key factor in preventing or at least reducing the effects of burnout (Bakker et al., 2005; Leiter & Bakker, 2010). Burnout in teamwork and, specically, barriers to collaborative work give clues as to the importance of the employees work engagement concepts of vigor, dedication, and absorption (Schaufeli, Taris, Le Blanc, Peeters, Bakker, & De Jonge, 2001). Not everyone participates equally in work, creating conditions that might negatively affect work engagement. Group members may come to resent a person who fails to do his or her fair share of the work; other members likely increase their own workload to ll the gap left by the nonparticipant. This failure by all members to contribute equally, or at least adequately, to a group task has been addressed in the teamwork literature. A free rider is dened as a group member who receives benets from group membership but who does not bear a fair share of the costs of producing these benets (Albanese, Franklin, & Wright, 1997, p. 512). In a recent study, Kolb and Gray (2007) identied individuals not pulling their weight on a project as a top barrier to collaborative effort, second only to missing or unclear goal. In work teams, poor or unacceptable performance by team members has long been a problem (Kolb, 1996; Larson & LaFasto, 1989). Employees expect leaders to handle performance problems and become
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frustrated when these problems are ignored. As we continue to study work engagement, the question of what realistically should be expected of workers will arise. From the behavioral standpoint, employees work engagement is a positive attitude in their given job and task held by organization members toward the organizations mission, vision, and business strategies (Bevan, Barber, & Robinson, 1997; Leiter & Bakker, 2010). Positively engaged and collaborative employees are aware of strategic business plans, context, and the direction of the given task and work with team members to complete the tasks for performance improvement in the workplace (Armstrong, 2008; Demerouti & Cropanzano, 2010). In summary, employees work engagement is a key component for creating a collaborative and engaged atmosphere through the trustful relationships between employees and their organization in the workplace (Zigarmi et al., 2009), which is instrumental in attaining the goal of long-term organizational performance. Also, employees positive and engaged behaviors could be stored as a tacit asset or organizational norms of the entire organization (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995). In practical terms, employees work engagement is an essential factor for continuous organizational innovation in terms of process change and change management through self-oriented involvement, not only in workplace task-oriented activities but also in the emotional and trustful relationship among members (Maslach et al., 2001; Shirom, 2002; Zigarmi et al., 2009). Based on this review covering areas of employees work engagement and knowledge-based organizational performance, the next research hypothesis is posited: HYPOTHESIS 2: Employees work engagement positively inuences the level of knowledge-based performance. Knowledge Creation Practices. In this knowledge-oriented economic era, organizational knowledge is gaining acceptance as the fundamental and critical source for organizational long-term success (Song & Kolb, 2009). The concept of organizational knowledge creation practices is not new. Since the 1990s, Nonaka and his colleagues have studied organizational knowledge creation through the use of a knowledge conversion process in which individuals tacit knowledge can be transformed into organizational explicit knowledge for application in the workplace (Nonaka, Konno, & Toyama, 2001; Song & Kolb, 2009). Four phases are included in the process: (1) share individuals knowledge (socialization of tacit knowledge), (2) externalize shared knowledge (externalize tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge), (3) combine and justify knowledge (combine explicit knowledge), and (4) internalize explicit knowledge (internalize explicit knowledge into tacit knowledge) for organizational future applications (Nonaka, 1994; Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995). Figure 1 summarizes all four phases with key actions of each phase.
Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement Figure 1. Knowledge Creation Practices and Key Actions
Socialization Tacit & Tacit Externalization Tacit & Explicit Combination Explicit & Explicit Internalization Explicit & Tacit
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Sharing Experience Mental model Creative Dialogue Mutual trust
Concept Creation Continuous Dialogue Collective reflection Metaphor and analogy
Systemizing Concept Reconfiguration of Knowledge Middle-manager Documenting Computerized database
Embodying Tacit Knowledge Learning by Doing Indirect experiences Re-experience and Enriching tacit knowledge
Source. Song (2008, p. 92).
Along with this basic Knowledge Conversion SECI theory, Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) suggested the concept of initial knowledge creation supportive factors including intention, autonomy, creative chaos, redundancy, and requisite variety, which could strengthen each component of SECI and the transition between the components. However, due to criticism regarding confusion and abstractedness (Gourlay, 2006), von Krogh et al. (2000) rened the previous work and dened ve knowledge enablers: (1) instilling the organizational mission, (2) managing conversation, (3) mobilizing knowledge activists, (4) creating a supportive context, and (5) leveraging local knowledge. These ve knowledge creationenabling factors enrich the effective practice of knowledge creation in the workplace. Based on this knowledge creationenabling concept and to ensure more dynamic organizational knowledge creation practices from a supportive system standpoint, the roles of managers and employees collaborative participation have been examined (von Krogh, 1998; von Krogh et al., 2000). Managers in the workplace provide leadership to share the organizational vision and to stimulate dynamic communications across all levels of organization structures (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995). In addition, leaders need to spur collaborative employees work engagement for various creative activities in the workplace, as Song and Chermack (2008) suggested. Furthermore, although the roles of leaders are critical in knowledge creation practices, voluntarily engaged employees play the most critical and fundamental roles in creating organizational explicit knowledge through a trust-based collaborative work climate and innovative work processes (von Krogh, 1998; von Krogh et al., 2000). In accordance with the literature just cited, our nal research hypothesis was developed:
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HYPOTHESIS 3: Employees work engagement plays a mediating role in linking transformational leadership and knowledge performance. This interdisciplinary review of literature provides the theoretical rationale that supports our proposed research framework.
Conceptual Framework
Based on an integrative literature review of the areas of transformational leadership, employees work engagement, and knowledge creation practices, our research conceptual framework was developed along with the theoretical foundations and the three proposed research hypotheses. Theoretical Foundation. A vital step in building the theoretical foundation and determining the purpose and hypotheses of the current research was an examination of several streams of literature. Previous studies were reviewed and integrated in the areas of general management, organizational behaviors, organizational performance, and leadership. Our thinking was inuenced by the tenets of social exchange theory (Berscheid, 1985; Homans, 1958), leadership and followership (Kelly, 1988, 2010) and group-process oriented contingency leadership theory (Vroom & Yetton, 1973). All three stress that two-way communication-oriented mutual respect is the core factor for successful leadership application in various business situations. Transformational leadership, the construct chosen for this study, encourages two-way communication and the development of mutual respect. Briey, social exchange theory refers to the condition and quality of friendly membership and interpersonal addictiveness in the workplace among the groups, which inuence social interactions and interpersonal care for the job process (Berscheid, 1985; Young-Ybarra & Wiersema, 1999). Based on social interactionoriented social exchange theory, leadermember exchange is dened as the quality of social relationships between a leader and group members; the focus is on the differing respective status among the group members (Dansereau, Cashman, & Graen, 1973; Liden, Sparrowe, & Wayne, 1997). Finally, the leadership and followership concept refers to the willingness and quality of group members in following and supporting leadership to perform the mission-based task process (Kelly, 1988, 2010). Similarly, employees work engagement has been considered as a concept of employees work passion in the workplace for improving performance (Zigarmi et al., 2009). Furthermore, the concept of employees work engagement has been examined in relationship to a variety of performance outcomes of interest to the HRD eld (Bakker & Bal, 2010; Bakker & Schaufeli, 2008; DAbate & Eddy, 2007; Lohman, 2005; Medlin & Green, 2009; Salanova et al., 2005; Xanthropoulou et al., 2008). All these theoretical foundations of leadership aim at performance improvement through a collaborative work process that is based on mutual
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and constructive relationships among the group members. According to the concept of work engagement (e.g., Leiter & Bakker, 2010), supportive leadership and mutually respectful relationships among group members increase the level of voluntary employees work engagement in performing an effective taskrelated process (Bass & Riggio, 2010; Finkelstein et al., 2010). Thus, in the current research we focused on the supportive inuential impact of transformational leadership on the level of employees work engagement in the workplace. In addition, according to knowledge conversion theory (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995), the roles of supportive and transformational leaders are a fundamental component for creating new knowledge, which is the basic component for organizational long-term success (Nonaka et al., 2001; Song & Kolb, 2009). According to Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) and von Krogh et al. (2000), the roles of supportive leaders account for effective knowledge creation practices along with employees creative work engagement. Furthermore, a voluntarily engaged collaborative work process among group members is essential for creative organizational explicit knowledge creation (Yoon et al., 2009). Thus, according to knowledge conversion SECI theory, leadership inuences the quality and quantity of organizational knowledge creation as one type of organizational performance (von Krogh et al., 2000), and group members collaborative and engaging characteristics, such as mutual trust, voluntary collaboration, and respect for diversity, are other variables that can mediate knowledge-oriented outcomes in the workplace (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995). Conceptual Framework Development. In order to develop our conceptual research framework, the performance-oriented HRD approach and new roles and boundaries of HRD were considered along with the theories discussed earlier. From the performance-oriented HRD standpoint, HRD practitioners need to focus on employees organizational behaviors and practical approaches that can be connected to organizational performance improvement (Gilley & Maycunich, 2000; Swanson & Holton, 2009). A problem-based, troubleshooting, reactive training, and development-oriented HRD approach has limitations in the nonlinear structure of modern organizations and in this rapidly changing socioeconomic era (Lee, 2010; Song & Kolb, 2009). More recently, according to Lee (2010), HRD is not a subset of human resource management (HRM) in terms of new boundaries of HRD in the organization. In this economically struggling era, HRD practices need to play key roles, not only for training-oriented human workforce development but also for overall organizational innovation and change and organizational management strategies (Lee, 2010). Today, broader and more performance-oriented approaches need to be considered (Swanson & Holton, 2009). Examples include macro-level organizational structure innovation, process-level knowledge-creating practices beyond the simple learning process, and micro-level employees behavior changes (Song, 2008; Yoon et al., 2009).
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Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim Figure 2. Research Conceptual Framework
Transformational Leadership (TL)
H1 Organizational Knowledge Creation (OKC) H2
H1 H3 Employees work Engagement (EE)
Note. Dotted line indicates indirect path between TL and OKC through EE
Our research framework is presented in Figure 2. Multidisciplinary research constructs were examined and adapted for the research framework proposed in this article. Components include transformational leadership as an input variable, employees work engagement as behavioral mediating factors, and creating organizational knowledge practices as an outcome and a practical variable beyond the simple learning process. This conceptual model could lead to multiple approaches in the learning-focused HRD discipline and shed light on more performance-oriented HRD strategies for developing HRD competency modeling, organizational structure innovation, and human interactionoriented knowledge management and creation practices. In addition, as mentioned in the previous section, the research conceptual framework presented in Figure 2 was developed based on the theoretical foundations of leadership, employees work engagement, and knowledge conversion theories.
Design of the Study

In this section, general processes and techniques for research are described, including sample framework and data collection procedures, instruments for measuring proposed constructs, and data analysis strategies to test the hypotheses. Data Collection. The target samples were low-level employees and middle-level managers of six major for-prot organizations, all of which were Fortune 100 companies, in the central area of South Korea. Responses were drawn from six different types of organizations: construction, manufacturing, information technology IT/communication, nance, business service/solution, and
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electronic industries. Purposive sampling was used for collecting data for the current research. For data collection, one of the researchers contacted human resource (HR) directors in each organization, and each of the HR directors randomly recruited potential survey participants via their in-house intranet system. Approximately 2,000 invitation letters were sent out to recruit voluntary survey participants; 432 cases were collected, indicating a 21.6% response rate. Online Web-based self-reported survey data were collected using a 5-point Likert-type scale (1, strongly disagree, to 5, strongly agree). With regard to distribution of sample demographic variables, almost 70% were male; approximately 36% were involved in IT support and research/development, 31% were in HRD and management, and 28% were in marketing and manufacturing. More than 35% were management-level employees; the remaining respondents were assistant managers (23%) and general employees (29%). Finally, regarding education level, approximately 27% had college- or graduate-level degrees, about 51% had 2-year vocational college-level degrees, and 21% had high school diplomas. Instruments. Based on the proposed research framework, these three research constructs were employed: transformational leadership, employees work engagement, and organizational knowledge creation practices. To measure transformational leadership, the short version of the multifactor leadership questionnaires (MLQ MLQ Short Form 6S; Bass & Avolio, 1992a), which includes four transformational leadership-related factors, was used. The short form contains a total of 12 items to measure four subdimensions: Idealized Inuence, Inspirational Motivation, Intellectual Stimulus, and Individualized Consideration; the original full version of MLQ (Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire) Form 6S has 21 items with seven leadership factors measuring multitype leadership factors. MLQ Form 6S has been used in several studies (e.g., Elenkov, Judge, & Wright, 2005; Krishnan, 2003). Carless, Wearing, and Mann (2000) validated the MLQ in terms of its factor convergence with other types of transformational leadership measures, such as the Global Transformational Leadership scale (GTL) and the Leadership Practice Inventory (LPI). Results show that all three different forms of transformational measures show acceptable convergent validity. (The correlation between the GTL and the MLQ and LPI ranges from 0.76 to 0.88.) MLQ Form 6S version was used in this study because of its recognition as one of the most reliable and valid instruments and most utilized measures of leadership (Lowe, Galen, & Sivasubramaniam, 1996). Equally important, prior evidence of the reliability of the items and validity of this form of the MLQ has been demonstrated in the Korean context (Choi, 2011; Hwang, 2006). Furthermore, even though a newer version of MLQ Form 5X has been developed, we used MLQ Short Form 6S, which is the more publicized instrument. The original wording of MLQ Form 6S measures self-rated leadership. In accordance with the purpose of the current research, the wording was changed from I to our leader to allow followers to measure the level of transformational
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leadership of their leaders (e.g. I make others feel good to be around me was modied to Our leader makes me feel good to be around him/her). This change is permissible with MLQ Form 6S (e.g., Avey, Hughes, Norman, & Luthans, 2007). This four-dimensional transformational leadership measurement was empirically validated in various contexts in terms of general scale reliability and convergent and discriminant validity (e.g., Den Hartog, Van Muijen, & Koopman, 1997; Lievens, Van Geit, & Coetsier, 1997; Sivanathan & Fekken, 2002). For example, in the research of Den Hartog et al. (1997), Cronbachs alpha of the transformation leadership was 0.95; and the interconstruct correlation among the four subdomains of the transformation leadership measure were highly correlated (above 0.74), indicating that the four domains of the leadership measure were converged into one single factor (Lievens et al., 1997). Sample items included Leaders help us nd meaning in our work and Leaders provide appealing images about what we can do. In order to examine the perceptional level of employees work engagement, the short version of the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9; Schaufeli, Bakker, & Salanova, 2006) was used. The original 17-item UWES scale was developed by Schaufeli and Bakker (2003) based on the theoretical approach of Maslach and Leiter (1997), which assumed that employees engagement and task-related burnout comprise the opposite sides of a continuum of work related well-being, with burnout representing the negative pole and engagement the positive pole (Schaufeli & Bakker, 2003). The UWES-9 measure was validated in terms of construct validity, cross-national invariance, and item internal consistency (e.g., Salanova & Schaufeli, 2008; Schaufeli & Bakker, 2004; Schaufeli, Martinez, Marques-Pinto, Salanova, & Bakker, 2002; Schaufeli, Taris, & Van Rhenen, 2007). In terms of the construct validity, conrmatory factor analyses show that the hypothesized three-factor structure of the UWES is superior to the one-factor model and ts well to the data of various samples from the several business areas, including the insurance sector, occupational health and safety service, and pension fund companies (Schaufeli & Bakker, 2004). This nding is in contrast to Sonnentags (2003) decision to use the composite UWES score after failing to nd a clear three-factor structure. However, numerous studies have reported support of the UWES as a threefactor instrument (Hallberg & Schaufeli, 2006; Salanova et al., 2005; Seppala, Mauno, Feldt, Hakanen, Kinnunen, Tolvanen, & Schaufeli, 2009; Storm & Rothmann, 2003; Yi-Wen & Yi-Qun, 2005). Regarding the cross-national invariance, according to Schaufeli et al. (2002), UWES is largely invariant across samples from Spain, the Netherlands, and Portugal, showing that the loadings of the maximum three items differed signicantly among the samples of the three countries; and, nally, UWES shows values of Cronbachs alpha for the scales ranging between 0.80 and 0.90 (Schaufeli et al., 2007). Furthermore, according to the results of cross-cultural research on UWES-based engagement research, international validity and convergent validity were also examined in the European context along with variables
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of job resources and proactive behaviors of employees (Salanova & Schaufeli, 2008). In discussing the wide use of the UWES, Schaufeli and Bakker (2010) stated, The factoral structure of the UWES with three strongly related underlying factors seems to be invariant, both across nations as well as across occupational groups (p. 17). Three key domains of employees work engagement are included in the UWES scale: vigor, dedication, and absorption. Briey, vigor measures levels of energy and mental resilience, the willingness to invest effort in work, and persistence. Dedication assesses the level of deriving a sense of signicance from ones work, feeling enthusiastic and proud about the job, and feeling inspired and challenged by the job. The scale of absorption measures the general level of happiness with work and the overall level of being engrossed to the extent that time passes quickly. A total of nine items were used for measuring employees work engagement level, and sample measurement items include: At my work, I feel bursting with energy (vigor); I am enthusiastic about my job (dedication), and I get carried away when I am working (absorption). As might be expected given the diversity of approaches, there have been criticisms of this and other scales (Christian, Garza, & Slaughter, 2011; Shuck & Wollard, 2010). Shuck (2011) asked whether an employee who is not bursting with energy can still be engaged. Rich, LePine, and Crawford (2010) criticized the UWES scale as not capturing the essence of Kahns original conceptualization of engagement. Shirom (2006) viewed work engagement as consisting of vigor (energy) alone. Demerouti and Cropanzano (2010) supported the singular importance of vigor, stating that [f]or all the strengths of the three-part model of work engagement, it seems that the vigor aspect is most crucial for performance (p. 158). To summarize, the three-factor UWES scale is widely used as a method of measuring engagement (Halbesleben, 2010; Schaufeli & Bakker, 2010; Shuck, 2011), has been validated in a number of studies, and has been used in countries other than the United States (Bakker & Bal, 2010; Salanova et al., 2005; Xanthopoulou et al., 2008). Although we acknowledge the existence and value of other approaches and scales, we believe the UWES is an appropriate measure for use in this study. A newly developed measurement of organizational knowledge creation practices was adapted for this study. This scale has 10 items for measuring ve modes of organizational knowledge conversion processes (Song, 2008; Song, Uhm, & Yoon, 2011). Although the measurement is in the development stage, several studies have been conducted regarding measurement development and convergent research in the Korean context (e.g., Song, 2008; Song & Kolb, 2009; Song et al., 2011; Yoon, Song, Lim, & Joo, 2010). Regarding construct validity, according to Song, Uhm, and Yoon (2011), the results of the conrmatory factor analysis supported a well-dened model data t (root mean square error
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of approximation [RMSEA] 0.062; goodness of t index [GFI] 0.98); and in terms of the item internal consistency, the Cronbachs alpha values ranged from 0.91 to 0.94 (Song & Kolb, 2009; Yoon et al., 2010). Finally, the concept of knowledge creation showed acceptable convergent validity with several input and outcome variables, including creativity, performance improvement, and learning organization culture (Song & Kolb, 2009; Yoon et al., 2010). Sample measurement items include: Our team develops new ideas through constructive dialogue by using gures and diagrams and Our team members use newly learned knowledge as the sources for the next time application. More important, all measurement scales were initially developed in the U.S. context. Thus, in order to use the scales in the current research, systematic translation procedures were performed. According to Hui and Triandis (1985), forward and backward translation procedure is recommended to secure linguistic equivalence between the English and Korean versions of instruments (Brislin, 1970; Cha, Kim, & Erlen, 2007; McGorry, 2000). The forward-then-back translation procedure was completed in multiple steps. First, two university professors in the United States, one professor in a Korean university, one a Korean Industry Cluster Agency ofcer, and two graduate students were involved independently in the examination of the translation of the English version of the instruments into the Korean version. After the initial translation, the three Korean-translated versions were gathered and compared to develop a consolidated version. Once this task was completed, the consolidated Korean version was backtranslated into another English version by two other bilingual Korean graduate students. Finally, based on comparisons between the two versions of the translated instruments, the nal version of the Korean instrument was developed. Data Analysis Strategies. Several multivariate data analysis approaches were used in this study, including hierarchical multiple regression and structural equation modeling (SEM), along with basic descriptive analyses to ensure basic assumptions. In order to ensure the general reliability of the entire data analyses, basic reliability of the observed instrument items and construct validity of the proposed three constructs were assessed. Although all measurements were adapted from previously cited literature and have been validated in several contexts, reassessing basic issues in item reliability and construct validity should be considered when applying the measurements to different sample data sets (DeVellis, 2003; Thompson, 2004). To examine the magnitude of the independent variables (transformational leadership and employees work engagement) to predict the dependent variable (organizational knowledge creation) based on the increasing pattern of the R2 magnitude change by adding additional predictor variables, hierarchical multiple regression was adapted. According to Leech, Barrett, and Morgan
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(2008), hierarchical multiple regression is a useful approach to see if each new variable adds anything to the prediction produced by the previous blocks of variables. SEM analysis also was employed to see interactive inuential relationships among all three proposed research constructs simultaneously. As the rst stage of SEM, the overall statistical model t with collected responses was conrmed, based on the examination of multiple modeldata t indices, which include Jreskog and Srboms (2001) GFI and root mean square residual (RMR), Bentlers (1990) CFI, Steigers (1990) RMSEA, along with general chi-square (x2) estimates. Next, to evaluate the overall magnitude of the interconstructs inuential relationships in a research model, standardized path coefcient (SPC) estimates were considered along with t-value criteria for signicant effect size determination.
Results
Results of several data analyses are presented to test the proposed hypotheses based on the research framework. Basic Assumption, Reliability, and Construct Validity Tests. First of all, according to the central limit theorem (Schneeberger, 2009; Urdan, 2005), the normal and bell-shaped data distribution assumption (n 400) was met. A total of 21 system-error and missing values were deleted. Furthermore, based on the values of the Mahalanobis D2 test, which measures the distance of a case from the centroid (multidimensional mean) of a distribution, given the covariance of the distribution, the 11 response scores above |3.0| were deleted as outliers (Kline, 2005). In addition, all responses (Z values ranged from 0.609 to 0.362 for skewness and from 0.507 to 0.684 for kurtosis) are within the range for normal distributions at the signicance level of 0.05 (Hair, Black, Babin, Anderson, & Tatham, 2006). Second, as the basic process for any type of quantitative research design, the observed items internal consistency estimates were calculated by Cronbachs alpha t value-based scale reliability. In addition, interconstruct correlation coefcient estimates were also performed to examine interconstructs convergent reliability. The results of the initial item reliability tests are described in Table 1. As shown in Table 1, all constructs have statistically acceptable ranges of observed item internal consistency level in terms of Cronbachs alpha coefcient values (a ranges from 0.71 to 0.90). Although the correlation among the variables in the same constructs is a bit strong (r ranges from 0.683 to 0.809 for four variables of transformational leadership; r ranges from 0.613 to 0.657 for three variables of employees work engagement; and r ranges from 0.417 to 0.703 for ve variables of knowledge creation practices), interconstructs correlation coefcients were found to be in the moderate-level ranges at a significance level of p-value 0.001. These results support general construct
Table 1. Descriptive Analysis, Inter-Item Correlation, and Internal Consistency Estimates

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15
Variables
SD
1. Idealized inuence (TR1) 2. Inspirational motivation (TR2) 3. Intellectual stimulation (TR3) 4. Individualized consideration (TR4) 1 0.771** 0.756** 0.389** 0.428** 0.373** 0.331** 0.374** 0.445** 0.355** 0.385** 0.040 0.059 0.041 0.042 0.039 0.031 0.050 0.055 0.030 0.037 0.055 0.085 0.086 0.009 0.037 0.052 0.007 0.045 0.355** 0.389** 0.540** 0.516** 0.563** 0.337** 0.331** 0.493** 0.486** 0.503** 0.381** 0.415** 0.457** 0.479** 0.466** 0.417** 0.503** 0.521** 0.051 0.038 0.078 0.335** 0.363** 0.538** 0.520** 0.533** 0.586** 0.298** 0.268** 0.484** 0.496** 0.516** 1 1 0.634** 0.633** 0.659** 0.005 0.087 0.019 1 0.666** 0.627** 0.001 0.078 0.027 1 0.360** 0.374** 0.657** 0.637** 1 0.393** 0.408** 0.613** 1 1 0.759** 0.326** 1 0.384** 1
3.105 3.212 3.211 3.225
0.753 0.728 0.740 0.735
0.86 0.83 0.86 0.85
1 0.809** 0.684** 0.683**
5. Vigor (EE1)
3.533
0.614
0.76
0.309**
6. Dedication (EE2)
3.508
0.623
0.71
0.408**
7. Absorption (EE3)
3.536
0.609
0.74
0.344**
8. Sharing knowledge (KCP1)
3.494 0.724
0.76
0.292**
9. Creating concepts (KCP2)
3.358 0.705
0.72
0.329**
10. Justifying concepts (KCP 3)
3.296 0.690
0.71
0.378**
11. Building archetypes (KCP4)
3.271 0.692
0.70
0.288**
12. Cross-leveling knowledge (KCP5)
3.331 0.724
0.75
0.331**
0.703** 0.031 0.074 0.081
1 0.081 0.046 0.060 1 0.343** 0.020 1 0.196** 1
13. Age
2.130
0.814
0.20
14. Gender 15. Educational level
1.300 2.840
0.459 0.776
0.092 0.033
Note. All correlation coefcient estimates are signicant at the 0.01 level.
Cronbachs alpha coefcient estimates, TR stands for transformational leadership, EE stands for employees work engagement, and KCP stands for knowledge creation practices.
Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement Table 2. Results of Conrmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)
Model Fit Indices Measurement model df 51 x2 153.91 x2/df 3.01 RMSEA 0.064 RMR 0.016 GFI 0.95 CFI 0.98
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NNFI 0.98
validity of the instruments. However, the higher level of correlation coefcient among the variables of employees work engagement and organizational knowledge creation could result in multicollinearity issues in further multivariate data analyses. Thus, empirically, this issue was examined by using Tolerance values and Variance Ination Factor (VIF) values. According to Kutner, Nachtsheim, and Neter (2004), the results support that no violation of the multicollinearity issue was found (tolerance value 0.770/VIF 1.298); furthermore, no auto (serial) correlation violation was found (Durbin-Watson value 1.930). Finally, in order to examine the construct validity of the measurement model, conrmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed based on the facet scores of each subscale to check the construct validity between the latent variables and their own summative subscale variables. The CFA results are shown in Table 2. As shown in Table 2, lower values of error-term detection support the well-dened measurement model in terms of the good t between the measurement model and the collected responses (RMSEA 0.064/RMR 0.016). In addition, although the chi-square estimate does not support the acceptable measurement model, in the current research due to the statistical nature of the chi-square (sample size sensitivity), three additional model t indices were examined. All other model t indices were found to be acceptable in terms of goodness of t (GFI 0.95), comparative t index (CFI 0.98), and nonnormed t index (NNFI 0.98). Specically, approximately 95% variance and covariance of the measurement model could be explained by collected research responses. Finally, all factor-loading values of the summative items of each latent variable were acceptable, ranging from 0.65 to 0.85. Hierarchical Multiple Regression. In order to examine the variables magnitude of explanation for the amount of shared variance between independent variables and the dependent variables, three-step hierarchical multiple regression analysis was employed. Table 3 describes the results of hierarchical multiple regression by adding each independent variable while blocking one variabletransformational leadership and employees work engagement. As shown in Table 3, hierarchical models are described along with regression coefcient estimates, and R2 changes by adding additional predictors including three controlling variables. In the second model, transformational leadership independently played as a signicant predictor to explain the dependent variable [F (1, 398) 108.080, p 0.001; R2 0.219]. By adding
Table 3. Results of Hierarchical Multiple Regression

SE B 0.008 0.038 0.069 0.038 0.219 0.034 0.061 0.034 0.039 0.026 0.048 0.027 0.035 0.043 0.048 0.047 0.025 0.167 0.625 1.306 1.239 0.694 4.211** 15.747** 1.139 1.191 1.050 1.302 1.304 0.031 0.071 0.057 0.463 0.647 1.469 1.255 10.396** 1.138 1.189 1.046 1.009 0.520 247.970** 0.301 0.050 0.112 0.086 0.943 2.068 1.680 1.136 1.181 1.043 108.080** 0.211 b t VIF R2 F 2.004 R2
Predictor
0.036 0.142 0.064
Step 1 Age Gender Education Step 2 Age Gender Education Transformational leadership Step 3 Age Gender Education Transformational leadership Employees work engagement
0.022 0.090 0.043 0.405
0.035 0.059 0.018 0.146 0.677
Note. **p
0.001; VIF stands for variance ination factor. Dependent variable: organizational knowledge creation.
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the additional predictor construct, employees work engagement, the third model increased the adjusted R 2 value to 0.301 [R2 0.520 p 0.001, ( R2 0.301)]. In summary, approximately 52% variance of the criterion variable could be explained by the proposed two predictor variables jointly. In general, this hierarchical regression analysis showed that both independent variablestransformational leadership and employees work engagement independently play as signicant constructs to explain the outcome variable, organizational knowledge creation, in terms of the amount of shared variances after controlling three demographic variables: age, gender, and education level of the participants. Furthermore, according to the considerable pattern of adjusted R2 change based on the comparison between regression models 2 and 3, the construct of employees work engagement was found to be a mediating construct to explain the direct relationship between the constructs of transformational leadership and organizational knowledge creation in the workplace. Structural Equation Modeling Analysis. In order to examine the complicated inuential relationships among the proposed research constructs, SEM analysis was conducted. To determine the effect size of the path among the constructs, SPC estimates were mainly considered. SPC estimates are statistically signicant when their t-value is greater than |1.96| (Byrne, 1998; Hair et al., 2006; Kline, 2005). The results of inuential relationships among the constructs along with each t-value are shown in Figure 3. All direct paths among the constructs were found to be statistically significant at t-value |1.96|. In more detail, the direct impact of transformational leadership on organizational knowledge creation (SPC 0.11, t |1.96|) was found to be signicantly smaller than the indirect inuence of transformational leadership on organizational knowledge creation through the employees work
Figure 3. SEM Results with SPC Estimates
Transformational Leadership 21 t 0.54 10.80 31 t 0.11 2.58
Employees Work Engagement
32 t
0.75 11.32
Organizational Knowledge Creation
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Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim Table 4. Decomposition of Effects

Standardized Path Coefcient
Path Transformational leadership
Direct Indirect Total effect effect effect 0.41 0.54 0.52 0.75
S Employee engagement 0.54 Organizational knowledge creation 0.11 Employees work engagement S Organizational knowledge creation 0.75
engagement variable (indirect SPC 0.41). According to the comparison between direct and indirect path coefcient estimates, we would conclude that employees work engagement plays a signicant mediating role in explaining the inuence of transformational leadership on organizational knowledge creation, although the direct relation was found to be signicant ( SPC 0.30). Table 4 describes the inuential path decomposition along with individual effect and total effect size among the constructs relationships in more detail. According to the results in Table 4, based on the comparison between direct and indirect path coefcient estimates, the construct of employees work engagement was found to be a signicant mediating variable to increase the effect size of transformational leadership to the construct of organizational knowledge creation. In order to identify the mediating effects of employees work engagement, the next process was performed based on a comparison between the full structural model and the controlled structural model (Baron & Kenny, 1986; Hair et al., 2006; Kline, 2005): 1. Comparison correlation coefcient estimates among all three research variables 2. Examining the linear and direct path among the three variables (controlling the direct path between transformational leadership and organizational knowledge creation). 3. Comparing the model t changes between the full model (Figure 2) and the controlled model along with chi-square change As shown in Table 5, the two models were not changed signicantly based on the comparison of several model t indices. However, results found the model t between the two models to be somewhat statistically changed ( x2 3.84) according to chi-square differences between the models [ x2 7.9 ( df 1, p 0.05)]. This result indicates that although the full mediation of employees work engagement was not supported, the partial mediation effect was statistically signicant (Bae, 2006; Baron & Kenny, 1986; Kline, 2005).
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Table 5. Model Comparison Between Full Model and Controlled Model

Model Fit Indices Full model Controlled model df 51 52 x2 153.91 161.81 x2/df 3.01 3.11 RMSEA 0.064 0.065 RMR 0.016 0.019 GFI 0.95 0.94 CFI 0.98 0.98 NNFI 0.98 0.98
Summary of Results. The measurement model and the structural model in the current research were found to be valid concepts to apply to the sample context. The observed items were also found to be reliable scales to examine the proposed research questions in the Korean business context. Regarding Hypotheses 1 and 2, the construct of transformational leadership showed a statistically signicant impact on both the constructs of employees work engagement (SPC 0.54, t |1.96|) and organizational knowledge creation (SPC 0.11, t |1.96|) independently based on the results. Furthermore, both independent variables showed signicant impact on the dependent construct (R2 0.522, p 0.001). In addition, employees work engagement showed signicant inuence on organizational knowledge creation independently as well (SPC 0.75, t |1.96|). Finally, regarding Hypothesis 3, employees work engagement was found to be a statistically partially signicant mediating construct to explain the relationship between transformational leadership and organizational knowledge creation, based on the results of both hierarchical multiple regression (R2 pattern change: R2 0.301) and SEM (comparison of path decomposition: SPC 0.30 and chi-square differences between two models: x2 7.9).
Discussion
This section provides a discussion of conclusions, implications, and limitations, followed by future research recommendations. Conclusions. Various previous studies have addressed the role of leaders behaviors in increasing employees task-oriented participation and the inuence of these behaviors on organizational performance improvement (Bass & Riggio, 2010; Hickman, 2010; Schein, 2010). In this research, transformational leadership was employed as the input factor, and employees work engagement level was proposed as the mediating factor, while organizational knowledge creation was utilized as a performance-oriented outcome construct. Organizational knowledge is the fundamental component for an organizations process innovation and product development (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995; Nonaka et al., 2000). Although previous literature supports the positive and signicant inuence of transformational leadership on organizational performance improvement, less attention has been focused on what we consider one of the
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primary roles of leadership in the organizationthe communication channels to bridge subordinate employees and top management decision makers. Thus, we posited that the transformational leadership, along with employees work engagement level, could inuence performance improvement in the workplace. Three hypotheses were empirically examined. As shown in the current research, employees level of work engagement has a powerful impact on performance improvement in terms of organizational knowledge creation, which requires employees diverse and creative thinking processes as facilitated by constructive communication and collaboration. These results provide support for previous studies on the collaborative nature of transformational leadership (Avolio & Gibbons, 1988; House, 2004) and its relationship to employee work engagement and task-related commitment (Bass, 1985; Brief & Weiss, 2002; Howell & Frost, 1989; Kelly, 2010). Other studies have examined engagement in relationship to a variety of performance outcomes (Bakker & Bal, 2010; Bakker & Schaufeli, 2008; DAbate & Eddy, 2007; Lohman, 2005; Medlin & Green, 2009; Salanova et al., 2005; Xanthropoulou et al., 2008). This study expands that focus to include organizational knowledge creation. Specically, organizational knowledge creation practices, as a form of organizational performance, can be enhanced by transformational leadership (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995; von Krogh, 1998; von Krogh et al., 2000), which increase the level of employees work engagementthe mediating construct for knowledge creation practices. Transformational leadership was measured in this study with a 12-item scale used in previous studies (Bass & Avolio, 1992a, 1992b; Bass & Riggio, 2010). The scale includes four subdimensions: Idealized Inuence, Inspirational Motivation, Intellectual Stimulus, and Individualized Consideration. Given the results of this study, these behaviors related to the dimensions (Kelly, 2010) appear important and worthy of future study: role modeling, inspiring followers to become more engaged and to lead task-oriented commitment by appealing to workers on an emotional level, stimulating team creativity and the innovation of followers, and creating a supportive atmosphere in which leaders can support two-way communication with followers and serve as coach and mentor. An important reminder here is that data for this study were collected from Korean business rms. As reported by Gelfand et al. (2004), Korean businesses have a collectivist organizational climate that encourages employee interdependence with their organizations as well as a demonstrated respect for individuals in leadership positions that is higher than what exists in many other countries. These factors created conditions favorable for this study. Leaders in the Korean business rms play a critical role in performance improvement ( Javidan, 2004). Additionally, human-oriented knowledge-based business strategies are quite popular among Korean business rms, which favor organizational knowledge creation, the expected outcome variable of the current
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research (Song, 2008; Song & Kolb, 2009). For these reasons, testing our hypotheses and conceptual model in the Korean context made sense. The next step will be to see if similar results related to the constructs of interest are attained when research is conducted in countries that have organizational climates and conditions less favorable than those that exist in Korea. Implications. What do the results mean for HRD professionals working in todays organizations? First, we need to pay greater attention to the relationship between leader behaviors and employees level of work engagement. Although engagement has received a great deal of attention in the popular press, the term is not clearly understood. As a result, employees work engagement often is touted as the answer to whatever problem arises in an organization (Federman, 2009). Rigorous empirical studies that examine specic aspects of engagementsuch as the focus on vigor, dedication, and absorption in this studyare needed in order to tease out behaviors related to increased engagement in the workplace. Additionally, engagement needs to be examined in relationship with other constructs in order to develop theories that have both theoretical and practical implications. Care should be taken to explain the cultural context for these studies. The empirical link between transformational leadership and employee engagement is an important contribution of this study. The relationship between leader and subordinates has been a central area of study since the early days of leadermember exchange theory. The literature reviewed earlier in this article provided support for the importance of the leader in terms of engagement and performance. Results reported here are an important step forward in identifying ways in which leaders can help engage employees and thus inuence organizational knowledge creation. Additionally, and importantly, ndings provide support for the performance link with engagement. This performance link should focus management attention on the social and nancial benets of having an engaged workforce. Future studies should continue to explore the link with performance. In this study, organizational knowledge creation practices were the performance outcome measured. Relationships between engagement and other types of performance should be examined. The construct of work engagement and specically the three domains of vigor, dedication, and absorption were examined here using the UWES scale. To review, vigor refers to levels of energy and mental resilience, the willingness to invest effort in work, and persistence. Dedication, as assessed here, measures deriving a sense of signicance from ones work, feeling enthusiastic and proud about the given job, and feeling inspired and challenged by the job. The last component, absorption, measures the general level of happiness and the degree to which one becomes wrapped up in a task and loses track of time. As reported earlier, Shirom (2006) believed that vigor (energy) alone captures the concept of work engagement. Demerouti and Cropanzano (2010) agreed that vigor is the most crucial of the current three-dimension model of work engagement.
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Practical reasons exist for paying close attention to vigor, especially in relationship to teamwork, since engaged members frequently are discussed as both a component and a goal of teamwork. People often resist teamwork, believing perhaps that they will be asked to do more than their share of the workload. A free rider, as dened earlier in this article, is one who does not complete a fair share of the work. It is unrealistic to believe that organizational policies will result in all employees having increased work engagement. As we move forward with theoretical frameworks and organizational strategies dedicated to studying and increasing employees work engagement, we need to pay heed to the individual who fails to become engaged and the effect of this behavior on attitude and increased workloads of peers. One person not pulling his or her individual weight on a project can negatively inuence other workers (Kolb & Gray, 2007) and become a challenge for the leader. A larger question beyond the scope of the questions examined here but suggested by them is the extent to which engagement should be encouraged. At what point and in what forms does absorption in particular become excessive and perhaps detrimental to worker well being as well as individual productivity? There may be a level of work engagement in which the positive aspects take a negative turn toward workaholism (Taris et al., 2010). Highly engaged individuals might become absorbed in their work to the extent that worklife balance becomes an issue that affects both the worker and his or her contribution to the organization. Little is known on the relationship between engagement and workaholism (Taris et al., 2010). To improve knowledge-oriented performance, business strategies for promoting employees work engagement need to be developed in terms of supportive resource systems, care-oriented workplace climate, and collaborative work environment that go beyond simple reward-oriented human resource support. Leaders who encourage and inuence their subordinates and team members in achieving learning- and performance-oriented goals might create a cycle that fosters creative decision making and an environment that is both stimulating and caring. Transformational leadership has been described as energizing emotions exhibited by leaders that ultimately encourage similar emotions in subordinates (Avolio, 1999). Employees also inuence each others mood (Neumann & Strack, 2000; Totterdell et al., 2004). Harnessing positive energizing emotions that exist between supervisor and employees and among employees have organizational implications for knowledge creation and other forms of performance. From the HRD standpoint, competency-based leadership training programs need to focus on building leadership skill sets that have critical inuences on building care-oriented workplace relationships with employees and a climate that fosters engagement, dialogue, and innovation. Limitations and Future Research. Individual differences in reactions to leader behaviors need to be acknowledged and addressed. We know that individuals are motivated by different things. We should expect that individuals would react differently to a leaders attempts to encourage work engagement.
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Future research could examine the dyadic relationships between leader and employee. It very well might be that attempts to encourage work engagement in individuals who already are highly motivated by the job might have a negative effect on that persons level of work engagement and job performance. More data are needed on the important leadersubordinate relationship as well as on the effect of peer behaviors on levels of work engagement. In our study, work engagement was considered a counterconcept to burnout. To maintain the positive aspects of engagement, we need to be mindful of conveying realistic and healthy expectations to our workers. There may be a level at which work engagement becomes unhealthy for the individual and in turn for the organization (Taris et al., 2010). Given the focus here on performance, operationalized by knowledge creation practices, an examination of optimal levels of work engagement as related to well-being, creativity, and productivity would be useful. Also, because of layoffs and unlled or merged positions, todays workers may be completing their own work as well as that of previous colleagues. Thus, workload issues are particularly important. Identifying workers who might be at risk for either physical exhaustion or mental or emotional burnout or both would allow for preemptive measures to be taken. Further exploration of this topic appears warranted. Interviews with highly engaged individuals that touch on issues of balance would add another dimension to our knowledge of work engagement. Furthermore, the link between leader behaviors, employees work engagement, and performance outcomes should continue to be explored. This study found a relationship with organizational knowledge creation, an important component for an organizations process innovation and product development. Future research that examines links with aspects of knowledge creation or other performance-related outcomes will draw attention to work engagement as a valuable, measurable construct. An additional question for future research is how to convert knowledge creation practices into organizational nancial revenue and other measures of long-term success. Finally, regarding measurement and research design issues, the purposive sampling approach used in this study limits generalization of the results. However, within the Korean population, major Korean rms were targeted for data collection. In addition, translated versions of measurement scales were used for data collection. Even though a rigorous back-and-forward translation process was followed to ensure the linguistic equivalence of the translated measurements, further examinations of the Korean versions of the measurement should be considered before instruments are used in additional studies. Also, the limitation of the self-administrated survey approach, which may result in response bias, needs to be acknowledged. In future research, to reduce survey bias and to enhance more reliable and objective data collection, a multi-angle oriented data collection strategy could be adapted in terms of dyadic or matched evaluative survey collection, especially for the criterion variable.
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Ji Hoon Song is an assistant professor at Oklahoma State University. Judith A. Kolb is an associate professor at the Pennsylvania State University. Ung Hee Lee is a director in the Korea Industrial Complex Corp. Hye Kyoung Kim is a doctoral student at Oklahoma State University.

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Role of Transformational Leadership in Effective Organizational Knowledge Creation Practices: Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

Sharing Experience Mental model Creative Dialogue Mutual trust

Concept Creation Continuous Dialogue Collective reflection Metaphor and analogy

Systemizing Concept Reconfiguration of Knowledge Middle-manager Documenting Computerized database

Source. Song (2008, p. 92).

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim Figure 2. Research Conceptual Framework

Transformational Leadership (TL)

H1 Organizational Knowledge Creation (OKC) H2

H1 H3 Employees work Engagement (EE)

Design of the Study

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Table 1. Descriptive Analysis, Inter-Item Correlation, and Internal Consistency Estimates

3.105 3.212 3.211 3.225

0.753 0.728 0.740 0.735

0.86 0.83 0.86 0.85

1 0.809** 0.684** 0.683**

8. Sharing knowledge (KCP1)

9. Creating concepts (KCP2)

10. Justifying concepts (KCP 3)

11. Building archetypes (KCP4)

12. Cross-leveling knowledge (KCP5)

0.703** 0.031 0.074 0.081

1 0.081 0.046 0.060 1 0.343** 0.020 1 0.196** 1

14. Gender 15. Educational level

Table 3. Results of Hierarchical Multiple Regression

0.036 0.142 0.064

0.022 0.090 0.043 0.405

0.035 0.059 0.018 0.146 0.677

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Figure 3. SEM Results with SPC Estimates

Transformational Leadership 21 t 0.54 10.80 31 t 0.11 2.58

Employees Work Engagement

Organizational Knowledge Creation

HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT QUARTERLY DOI: 10.1002/hrdq

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim Table 4. Decomposition of Effects

Path Transformational leadership

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Table 5. Model Comparison Between Full Model and Controlled Model

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT QUARTERLY DOI: 10.1002/hrdq

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT QUARTERLY DOI: 10.1002/hrdq

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

Song, Kolb, Lee, Kim

HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT QUARTERLY DOI: 10.1002/hrdq

Mediating Effects of Employees Work Engagement

1 0.809 0.684 0.683**

1 0.081 0.046 0.060 1 0.343 0.020 1 0.196 1