How and when employee mindfulness influences employees’ knowledge sharing behavior: A resource conservation perspective

Despite research has identified several social resources to promote employees’ knowledge sharing behavior, studies on the effect of personal resources are limited. Thus, our research intends to contribute by examining the role of employee mindfulness as an essential personal resource in influencing their knowledge sharing behavior. Based on the conservation of resources (COR) theory, we propose that employee mindfulness can promote employees’ knowledge sharing behavior through enhancing their thriving at work, and this effect is moderated by abusive supervision. Using a field study with multi-wave data, we found that employee mindfulness was positively related to employees’ knowledge sharing behavior through their thriving at work, and this positive effect was stronger when abusive supervision was high than low.