Preventing knowledge loss when employees expect to leave

The prevention of knowledge loss is a pressing issue in the era of the knowledge-based view of the firm (Grant, 1996, 1997), not only due to the large cohort of baby boomers now starting to retire, but also because turnover rates among the younger generations are on the rise. Increased knowledge sharing can be one strategy to counteract organizational or group knowledge loss prior to employees’ turnover, but knowledge sharing is a discretionary behavior which can be encouraged, but hardly demanded of employees intending or expecting to leave the organization. The objective of the present work was to investigate the effects of voluntary turnover intention and expected involuntary turnover on employees’ knowledge sharing within teams, as well as to examine a buffering effect of perceived supervisor support on the presumably negative relationship. Results of a cross-sectional survey study in three branches of a German public administration with 281 participants revealed the hypothesized negative effect of expected involuntary turnover on knowledge sharing, but a positive effect of turnover intention. The influence of perceived supervisor support (PSS) was two-fold; beyond a direct positive effect on knowledge sharing, PSS buffered the negative relationship between expected involuntary turnover and knowledge sharing.