Linking online and offline intergenerational knowledge transfer to younger employees’ innovative work behaviors: evidence from Chinese hospitals

Little is known about when younger employees’ intergenerational knowledge transfer (IGKT) – behaviors of acquiring knowledge from older employees – improves their innovative work behaviors (IWB), especially in hospitals. Taking into consideration the moderating roles of individual absorptive capacity (AC) and organization size, this study aims to develop a theoretical model to account for the associations of both online and offline IGKT with younger employees’ IWB.

The model was tested with a survey of 202 Chinese younger doctors (40 years old and below). Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to analyze the data.

The results showed that both online IGKT and offline IGKT have significant positive relationships with younger doctors’ IWB. Individual AC can strengthen the relationship between offline IGKT and IWB, and organization size can weaken the relationship. However, both individual AC and organization size do not significantly moderate the relationship between online IGKT and IWB.

The findings extend the understanding and application of individual-level knowledge-based view and media synchronicity theory by exploring the relationship of knowledge acquisition from older doctors through both online and offline communication channels with younger doctors’ IWB.