Knowledge sharing can be defined as the activity of transferring or disseminating knowledge from one person, group, or organization to another (Lee, 2001). Knowledge sharing is often viewed as employees’ altruistic and initiative behavior and is a crucial factor in improving individual performance and the innovation capacity of organizations (Fait et al., 2023; Xiao & Cooke, 2018). First, individuals need knowledge or information to improve their creative processes, such as novel ideas, professional knowledge or skills, and job-related insights or inspirations (Černe et al., 2014). Second, knowledge sharing can reduce individuals’ psychological barriers, foster interpersonal trust and cooperation (Wang et al., 2013), and contribute to positive interpersonal connections within organizations (Gilson et al., 2013). Third, knowledge is the core source of innovation. Innovation is the result of collaborative efforts (Al-Omoush et al., 2022), in which all participants benefit from each other and create value together.

Conversely, when pursuing personal rewards or a prominent status relative to colleagues, employees may withhold their knowledge and be reluctant to share it, although they are strongly encouraged to do so (Toma & Butera, 2009; Connelly & Zweig, 2015; Siachou et al., 2021). This results in knowledge-hiding behaviors: The intentional behavior to withhold or conceal knowledge when facing knowledge requests from others. Knowledge hiding can be categorized into three dimensions: Playing dumb (pretending not knowing or unclear about the knowledge), evasive hiding (giving partial/some other knowledge or trying to delay providing help or even promising others), and rational hiding (providing reasons for the failure of knowledge sharing, such as the intention to protect the third party's interests) (Connelly et al., 2012). Some researchers have claimed that knowledge hiding is an obstructive factor in some areas. For example, studies have demonstrated that knowledge hiding directly or indirectly impedes individual creativity (Bogilović et al., 2017; Malik et al., 2019) and job performance (Nguyen et al., 2022). Moreover, these hiding behaviors may damage the interpersonal relationship and form a distrust loop causing further negative outcomes (Černe et al., 2014; Černe et al., 2017). It has been largely assumed that hiding knowledge is related to negative consequences (Siachou et al., 2021).

Recent studies regard knowledge hiding as a multidimensional construct (Khoreva & Wechtler, 2020) that does not necessarily harm an individual or organization (Connelly & Zweig, 2015). Scholars suggest considering the context that knowledge requests arise (Connelly et al., 2019), as knowledge hiding occurs in the context of dyadic interactions between the “knowledge seeker and hider” (Shrivastava et al., 2021). Moreover, some previous studies argue that knowledge hiding and sharing do not occur in isolation in organizations, but instead coexist (Ford & Staples., 2008; Peng, 2013). However, the interplay between knowledge sharing and hiding in organizations remains under-researched and under-theorized (Hadjielias et al., 2021; Siachou et al., 2021)

The coexistence of knowledge sharing and hiding is largely in line with the notion of coopetition, that is, simultaneous cooperation and competition (Brandenburger & Nalebuff, 1996; Bengtsson & Kock, 2000). The coopetition concept has developed into a compelling strategy and is recognized as one of the most complex and demanding phenomena that can emerge at the individual, intraorganizational, and inter-organizational levels (Raza-Ullah et al., 2014; Devece et al., 2019; Gernsheimer et al., 2021). Coopetition at the individual and interpersonal levels is inherent when two or more employees decide to share knowledge. Knowledge sharing allows individuals to gain and integrate knowledge, which may create synergies and generate new creative knowledge. Meanwhile, individuals face competitive value appropriation concerns because their competitors have both the motivation and the ability to absorb valuable knowledge from them (Estrada et al., 2016). Hence, knowledge sharing and hiding can be understood as cooperation and competition, respectively. Cooperative aspects are behaviors that seek joint benefits through the collective use of shared knowledge, allowing the achievement of a common goal (Gast et al., 2019). However, competitive aspects refer to exploiting shared knowledge, hiding one's own core knowledge, appropriating partners’ non-shared knowledge, outperforming partners, and pursuing private interests (Tsai, 2002). Additionally, research has revealed that coopetition helps reinforce innovation (Corbo et al., 2023) and promotes knowledge-based capabilities (Albort-Morant et al., 2018).

In summary, the existing literature on knowledge management and coopetition reveals several gaps. First, although knowledge sharing and hiding coexist, most studies treat them as separate behaviors. Second, the current research does not fully explore different types of knowledge sharing that occur in moderate organizations, nor does it mention the interplay of different knowledge-sharing types and knowledge hiding from the coopetition perspective. Third, mainstream coopetition research focuses on coopetition between competing firms at the inter-organizational level (Devece et al., 2019; Xu et al., 2021), with limited attention given to coopetition at the individual and intraorganizational levels.

Creative behaviors refer to employees taking the initiative to contribute to new processes, products, markets, or combinations in the organization (Kim & Lee, 2013). Creative employees are more likely to find customers' hidden needs (Çekmecelioğlu & Günsel, 2011), promote product design or service procedures, and increase customer satisfaction (Teng et al., 2019). In line with the service-dominant logic, customer-linking capability stresses maintaining and promoting relationships according to the current customer base; furthermore, it tries to establish and create new relationships (Lin et al., 2015). Hence, it is necessary to hire creative employees to utilize their knowledge and skills to empower positive changes in organizations (Yasmeen et al., 2020). Employees’ creative behavior is viewed as a critical performance facilitator and a striving goal for contemporary organizations (Černe et al., 2017, Zaitouni & Ouakouak, 2018). The burst of creativity is often not the result of a single person's efforts but emerges during inter-personal interactions (Çekmecelioğlu & Günsel, 2011), particularly knowledge exchange interactions.

In a knowledge-supportive culture, employees are encouraged to share knowledge, gain new knowledge, and convert knowledge into value-creation opportunities (Imran et al., 2018). It is well recognized that knowledge sharing can promote individuals’ potential creativity and creative behaviors (Akturan & Çekmecelioğlu, 2016). Accordingly, a lack of knowledge-sharing limits individuals’ capacity to leverage their experiences and expertise (Carmeli et al., 2013). Previous research has shown that most employees acknowledge the importance of knowledge sharing, and share knowledge with good intentions expecting something in return (Pereira & Mohiya, 2021).

Conversely, knowledge hiding is often deemed counterproductive (Serenko & Bontis, 2016). Nevertheless, when faced with complex decision-making tasks, employees must efficiently integrate unique, related, and diverse information. Less knowledge-redundant groups benefit more from sharing information than those knowledge-redundant groups (Mesmer-Magnus & Dechurch, 2012). A group may fail to pool and leverage members’ diversified knowledge because the discussion is usually dominated by common information or the information fits most members’ existing preferences (Stasser & Titus, 1985). Overemphasis on a common knowledge base may stifle creative ideas, and excessive team communication may inhibit innovation, as members cannot fully exert their cognitive ability and diversity (Emich, 2012).

Scholars have acknowledged the underrepresentation of knowledge hiding in extant knowledge management and business research (Serenko & Bontis, 2016). Although some studies have noticed the importance of knowledge hiding (Wang et al., 2018), the bright side of knowledge hiding has not received much attention. Particularly, little is known about the potential impact of knowledge hiding on employees’ creative performance (Fong et al., 2018), and the black box of the interplay between knowledge-sharing and hiding behaviors is yet to be unveiled.

Based on coding, we find that: First, knowledge sharing is contextual and can be divided into two types: Reactive and proactive. However, both types of knowledge sharing may promote innovative behavior among employees.

Reactive sharing refers to employees sharing knowledge only when they receive requests from colleagues, such as answering questions or providing knowledge based on requests from the organization. As illustrated by the interviewees, we found that employees support that reactive sharing is common at work; it is helpful to improve interpersonal relationships, forming long-term positive interactions, and stimulating more creative behaviors. The following quote illustrates this:

“We have different knowledge-sharing activities that are helpful, such as ‘helping each other.’ The Q&A knowledge interactions help enlarge the scope of our knowledge, and favorable interactions could also improve our colleague relationships. In this pleasant work environment, we would like to exert our potential and creativity to achieve good performance” (EM1).

Conversely, proactive sharing means that employees share knowledge of their initiatives without requests from others. Proactive sharing in the banking industry can occur in voluntary or involuntary (regulated/mandatory) settings. As addressed by the middle manager:

“In our internal organizations, there are several knowledge sharing activities. We encourage knowledge sharing activities and already organized some sharing seminars or professional skill courses in the daily work and also have the rewards for proactive sharing” (MM3).

Moreover, proactive sharing is believed to contribute to achieving a win-win situation. When employees share knowledge proactively, they are expected to receive recognition, useful information, or knowledge from others. The following two interviewees said:

“Particularly for new employees, we arrange senior employees to help them adapt to the environment as soon as possible. Senior employees would be willing to proactively share their knowledge, information, or even show the co-workers some experience, which promotes mutual progress and achieves a win-win situation” (TM3);

“In the regulated sharing contexts like regular work meetings, I want to share some knowledge/information I know proactively. Then, I am looking forward to receiving information from others and showing my good sharing performance with my superiors” (EM10).

Regarding the relationship between knowledge sharing and creative behavior, we found that sharing interactions is beneficial for enhancing creative behavior. The following managers confirm this point.

“During the process of getting a new business, employees all need to use their knowledge/working experience to be creative and try to earn more profits for the banks, such as discovering customer needs and helping customers solve problems to enhance customer loyalty” (MM6);

“Leaders are satisfied with the staff who can work creatively, and we almost all try to perform better than others. In my daily work, I pay attention to obtaining new and useful knowledge from others and external organizations” (EM3).

“We encourage knowledge acquisition, both for internal and external aspects, which are helpful for individuals’ performance, mutual trust, and friendly co-worker relationships. The purpose of knowledge sharing is to improve one's creative behaviors and experience when dealing with problems or emergency circumstances” (TM4).

Second, knowledge sharing and hiding behaviors are confirmed to be coexisting, and a certain degree of knowledge hiding is acceptable, as employees need to improve their personal performance to gain salary raises, bonuses, or promotions, and everyone has his/her own way to acquire and maintain customers to gain new businesses. The staff do not treat knowledge hiding as an entirely destructive factor. Knowledge-hiding behavior is salient particularly when it comes to vital information, as it is essential for maintaining individual advantages. As illustrated by the interviewees:

“Yes, knowledge hiding exists, we encourage knowledge sharing and organize diverse knowledge sharing activities, however, we can understand knowledge hiding” (TM1);

“I think a certain degree of knowledge hiding is acceptable; after all, employees need to maintain some individual advantages” (MM3).

Third, when referring to different knowledge-sharing conditions, the interplay between sharing and hiding behaviors seems to generate different outcomes. In reactive knowledge sharing, although the sharer deliberately hides some knowledge, the questioner still has a good impression of the sharer because he/she responds to the question and expresses their willingness to help others. However, we should realize that sharing all information creates a stronger sense of pressure on employees about their own competitiveness and value. Representative quotes for reactive knowledge sharing and hiding from interviewees are as follows:

“If I ask questions and hope to obtain knowledge from others, I cannot judge whether my colleague hides his/her knowledge from me, however, as long as he/she is patient and friendly, I feel touched. In the future, if he/she needs help, I would like to share my knowledge or experiences in return” (EM8);

“I think it depends on what the question is, if it is general, I am willing to share what I know. However, if there is special information, such as customer relationship maintenance, I think I will retain some information. Otherwise, others may know more than I do if they retain the core information. I am not the only one who thinks this way” (EM1);

“Indeed, I would feel good and competitive if I attain some knowledge, while others do not” (EM10);

“No one discloses all the information they know, at least for me. I feel stressed about this because I am afraid that I may lose my major advantage. However, if I answer others’ questions but retain some core knowledge (if it exists), I could maintain my key advantage, but I still have the opportunity to learn something from others”.

For proactive sharing, the relationship between employees becomes subtler and more sensitive because of the importance, degree of shared information, and attitude of the sharers. Therefore, the results produced under knowledge hiding are more uncertain. Representative quotes illustrate this potential problem:

“I pay attention to my colleagues' attitudes and the changes during the knowledge sharing processes. If I perceive that he/she is suddenly secretive, I feel that he/she is not willing to share knowledge and may even generate some negative thoughts; maybe I treat this as a kind of potential competition” (EM5);

“I feel uncomfortable if I find the sharers fail to share or retain important information when it comes to key issues that are also important to me, whether he/she intentionally or not” (EM8);

“I do not know if you can understand this feeling if you find your co-worker shares more information/experience about an important issue with another colleague. Whether he/she meant it or not, you feel hurt and uncomfortable. You may wonder if he/she treats you as a competitor.” (EM9).

We summarize the case findings and propose theoretical hypotheses in dialog with the extant literature for further empirical testing.

According to the cognitive evaluation theory, creativity arises from the interaction between an individual's thoughts and their sociocultural environment, emphasizing the role of context (Whitelock et al., 2008). As our qualitative analysis suggests, knowledge sharing is contextual and can take different forms, namely reactive and proactive sharing. The two types of sharing differ in terms of employees’ sharing intentions and behaviors. Having recognized the co-existence of knowledge-hiding behaviors and how sharing, particularly different types of sharing behaviors, interacts with knowledge hiding, is a key question to be answered in this study.

Proactive sharing and knowledge hiding

Our findings reveal the nuanced role of intention and perception in proactive knowledge sharing. If colleagues sense that a sharer's attitude is changed or is not entirely altruistic, for example, giving vague answers or sharing more with a third person, particularly on important issues, the sharer may get a negative impression or even distrust. The sharer's hiding behaviors are viewed as a signal of competition and further harm colleagues' perceptions of the interpersonal relationships between the sharer and themselves. This echoes studies arguing that social exchange relationships are a major determinant of individuals’ attitudes in the sharing activities (Bock et al., 2005). Reciprocity, or the mutual give-and-take of knowledge, can facilitate knowledge sharing. However, when interpersonal relationships are perceived as uncertain and insecure, employees are more reluctant to share knowledge (Ipe, 2003). In the case study, knowledge hiding behaviors are found to be more accepted when employees engage in reactive rather than proactive knowledge. Therefore, we propose that the moderation effect of knowledge hiding on the relationship between proactive knowledge sharing and employees’ creative behavior depends on the degree of knowledge hiding and other colleagues’ perceptions and expectations.

Once people obtain the required information from reactive sharers, they treat the sharer as friendly and grateful. However, for employees who often share knowledge proactively, it can produce a classic public good dilemma, which can be used by others regardless of whether they contribute in return (Bock et al., 2005). Others expect the proactive sharer to take the initiative in sharing information and become accustomed to easy access to information. Once the members sense rejection or denial from the sharer, they may be non-cooperative or fight back in the "tit for tat" approach (Singh, 2019). As mentioned in previous studies, coopetition has two sides: Promoting innovation and performance on the one hand but may be detrimental owing to opportunism and misappropriation (Bouncken & Fredrich, 2012).

Under a low degree of knowledge hiding, if an individual employee's hiding behavior is not perceived by others, he/she can retain core knowledge/information while making a good impression on others. Retained knowledge can serve as a source of individual competitiveness and facilitate employees’ creative behavior. However, as the degree of knowledge hiding rises, other colleagues may feel the “altruistic” individual––who usually proactively shares his/her knowledge—is not as trustworthy as they thought, and generates negative thoughts about the knowledge sharer.

Under conditions in which employees perceive resources as scarce or certain, they naturally believe that such resources are unavailable for equal distribution among colleagues. Knowledge serves as valuable capital to secure these limited resources, and withholding knowledge may be a rational strategy for individuals despite its potential negative impact on collaboration within an organization (Strik et al., 2021). Thus, even well-intended knowledge sharers may be perceived by their peer colleagues as potential opportunistic competitors. In other words, as knowledge can potentially leverage competitive advantages, it would be irrational for individuals to share valuable resources that potentially aid competitors in achieving their objectives (Poortvliet & Darnon, 2010). Knowledge hiding damages interpersonal relationships in organizations (Connelly et al., 2012; Connelly & Zweig, 2015). While distrust can lead to knowledge hiding, it can also be a consequence of hiding owing to reciprocal loops (Singh, 2019). These factors can easily cause a “distrust loop” among employees and harm their creative behaviors (Černe et al., 2014).

Hence, we assume that the lower the degree of knowledge hiding, the stronger the promoting effect of proactive knowledge sharing on employees’ creative behaviors. As the degree of knowledge hiding increases, the effect of proactive knowledge sharing on employees’ creative behaviors weakens. In other words, it had an inverted U-shaped moderation effect. In this context, we propose the following hypothesis:

H3: The moderation effect of knowledge hiding on the positive relationship between proactive knowledge sharing and employees’ creative behavior exhibits an inverted U-shape. Medium and high levels of knowledge hiding foster the negative relationship between proactive knowledge sharing and creative behaviors, while a low level of knowledge hiding fosters a positive relationship between proactive knowledge sharing and creative behaviors.

The model and hypotheses are depicted in Fig. 2.

Fig. 2.

Research Model.

(0.09MB).

After interviews with executives and managers from the two case banks, we presented our initial findings, and they agreed to a follow-up survey to grasp employees’ knowledge-sharing and hiding situations. The participants were informed that the questionnaires would be anonymous. They were instructed to recall their latest experiences when their colleagues asked for knowledge from them and the knowledge-sharing scenarios of their colleagues and themselves. Employees’ creative behavior in this context is more likely to be a self-referential variable and individuals have a more intuitive evaluation of themselves. Hence, we allowed employees to self-evaluate. To alleviate the common method variance concern, we kept the questionnaire items simple, specific, and concise, including the reverse questions. We sent 300 questionnaires to the employees of the two banks with the help of top executives: 120 from one bank and 180 from the other. Finally, we received 240 questionnaires, one of which was 99 and the other was 141. Excluding those with missing answers, 203 questionnaires were valid: 89 from one bank and 141 from another, yielding effective response rates of 74 % and 63 %, respectively. Table 3 describes the demographic variables.

Demographic attributes (gender, age, educational level, and working years) are used as control variables in the correlation test. The independent variables are reactive and proactive knowledge sharing and the moderator variable is knowledge hiding. The dependent variable is employees’ creative behavior. We adopt two measurement scales to ensure robustness. In addition, we apply Harman's single-factor test, and the results indicate that the total variance extracted by the factor analysis was 23.9 %, which is less than the threshold of 50 % (Podsakoff et al., 2003). Table 4 presents the descriptive statistics, reliability, and correlations. Every variable has an acceptable internal consistency coefficient (above 0.70). The results of the measurements and validity assessments are presented in Table 5.

To ensure robustness, we replaced the measurement of the dependent variable with another commonly adopted measurement scale, shown as employees’ creative behavior (2) in Table 5 (Zhang et al., 2016). Robustness check results are presented in Tables 8 and 9, reactive and proactive knowledge sharing remain positively related to employees’ creative behaviors (β= 0.261, p < 0.001; β = 0.043, p < 0.001), moreover, both the two interaction items: RSKHB (reactive knowledge sharing * knowledge hiding) and Quadratic PSKHB (proactive knowledge sharing * knowledge hiding) are significant (β= 0.166, p < 0.05; β = −0.296, p < 0.05).

This study investigates knowledge sharing types, knowledge hiding, and their interplay on employees’ creative behaviors through a case study of the banking industry with a mixed-method design. As service digitalization is promoted in the banking industry, employees are expected to achieve both organizational and individual business performance. Within an organization, individuals are required to cooperate and create outstanding common team performances through creative behaviors, as well as stand out in individual competition to ensure bonuses, promotions, and career development, which create tensions driven by the conflict between cooperation and competition.

Cooperative behavior is in line with common value creation and creates joint interests, whereas competitive behavior is connected to value appropriation, leading to private benefits (Arslan, 2018; Hoffmann et al., 2018). Knowledge exchange behaviors are a type of individual strategy from this perspective; employees need to absorb new knowledge, experiences, and skills to enlarge their knowledge pool, and their divergent thinking may be activated and motivated through knowledge sharing. Sharing activities bring valuable, heterogeneous, and complementary information to members and provide them with the opportunity to build on others' contributions (Dong et al., 2017). However, individuals can strategically hide knowledge by seeking a competitive advantage over their peers (Cho et al., 2007; Ogunlela, 2018).

A highlight of this study is that coopetition—simultaneous knowledge sharing and knowledge hiding could be regarded as a ubiquitous and win-win strategy, but the underlying conflicts need to be carefully treated (Gnyawali & Park, 2011). We found that knowledge sharing can either be reactive or proactive. For reactive knowledge sharing, that is, the individual only shares knowledge and responds based on a request, the questioner appreciates the responder, regardless of whether the responder hides the knowledge or not. In this situation, the hider can retain important knowledge and information, and achieve a more creative performance. However, when it comes to individuals that usually share knowledge proactively, their altruistic behaviors have set up a “reference point” for their colleagues: The fellows have high expectations toward the sharer based on past experiences, and they pay attention to shares’ attitudes or changes of behaviors carefully. If a sharer's behavior deviates from colleagues’ expectations (e.g., demonstrating a certain degree of knowledge hiding), others capture the changes and generate negative feelings or thoughts toward the sharer. When a proactive sharer's hiding behavior is not sufficiently salient to be detected, his/her competencies are retained. However, increased knowledge-hiding behaviors may be perceived and bring about tension in relationships between colleagues. In such situations, employees may lose the balance of coopetition; that is, competition levels increase between employees and stimulate more knowledge-hiding behaviors. Hence, the sharers’ creative behavior also suffers and declines. Therefore, under this condition, knowledge hiding exerts an inverted U-shaped effect on the relationship between proactive knowledge sharing and employees’ creative behaviors.

These findings may be related to the emerging market context of China. The powerful growth momentum of digitalization and servitization has brought great changes to financial services in recent years and has greatly emphasized both cooperation and competition between individuals. Hence, the individuals’ abilities to acquire and use knowledge are critical. Facing a rapidly changing environment, the competitive cooperative view describes a novel approach to gain advantages, however, it requires enterprises/individuals to establish effective cooperative ways to reach a winning end.

This study contributes theoretically to the literature on knowledge management and coopetition in the following ways: First, it enriches the concept of knowledge sharing by distinguishing between proactive and reactive knowledge sharing. In contrast to a previous study (Teng & Song, 2010), for proactive sharing, we emphasize both voluntary and regulated aspects, as organizations in certain sectors may arrange seminars to urge employees to share their knowledge/skills/experiences without other employees’ requests. Reactive sharing focuses on situations in which employees face knowledge requests. Different sharing patterns are associated with different peer expectations and perceptions, which in turn exhibit different impacts on sharers’ creative behaviors. This distinction is helpful for better understanding knowledge-sharing concepts.

Second, most previous studies treat knowledge sharing and hiding as independent phenomena and often regard knowledge-hiding behaviors as entirely negative factors that deteriorate organizational performance. However, in our study, we found that knowledge sharing and knowledge hiding co-exist, while knowledge hiding has a positive side in some conditions. Coopetition is a dynamic multilevel phenomenon (Maria; Bengtsson & Raza-Ullah, 2016) and most research has focused on the inter-organizational level (Chiambaretto et al., 2018; Navio-Marco et al., 2021). This study focused on individual-level coopetition within an organization and enriches the existing literature on coopetition and knowledge-hiding.

Third, employees’ creative behaviors are important for organizations, however, the literature on whether the interplay of knowledge sharing and hiding influences employees’ creative behaviors is inadequate. Informed by the notion of coopetition, we made a pioneering attempt to explore diverse knowledge-sharing types, knowledge hiding, and their interplay with employees’ creative behaviors to fill this gap.

This study also sheds light on managerial practices in terms of intraorganizational knowledge management. First, while promoting knowledge sharing among employees has become a common business practice, managers should be aware of different types of sharing to cultivate a sharing culture of fairness, openness, affiliation, and innovation. Furthermore, managers should encourage employees to proactively share their knowledge to let them know that their ideas are heard and respected, which helps employees increase their self-confidence and creativity (Wong & Pang, 2003). Similarly, establishing a “mutual learning” work atmosphere is pivotal for organizational knowledge management. Second, knowledge hiding is inevitable, and it is not necessary to treat it as an entirely negative phenomenon. Well-balanced sharing and hiding can promote employees' creative behavior. In the process of knowledge management, both managers and employees should have the mindset of coopetition in human resource design, such as providing the employees with a certain degree of freedom, independence, and discretion in carrying out the job tasks to increase their self-confidence, motivation to ultimately generate a higher level of creativity and performance (Çekmecelioğlu & Günsel, 2011). Correspondingly, reward and sanction rules, staff training, and performance appraisals must facilitate positive knowledge acquisition and utilization.

This study investigated the interactive effects of knowledge sharing and hiding on employees’ creative behaviors from a coopetition perspective. Nevertheless, this study has some limitations. First, the cases and samples adopted pertain solely to the digital transformation environment of China's banking industry. As knowledge management and coopetitive relationships are strongly related to social scenarios and cultural factors, the generalizability of the findings may be limited. Second, the reliance on questionnaires as the main data source may be associated with biases, with employees potentially overestimating or underestimating creative performance. Third, because of bank regulations and confidentiality requirements, the sample size was restricted.

This case study paves the way for future research in this field. First, future studies can generalize these findings by examining other industries. Second, considering that individuals perceive coopetition and recognize the need to share resources in response to external competition (Seran et al., 2016), it would be valuable to investigate the impact of knowledge-sharing and hiding interactions on team performance within organizations. Third, knowledge sharing and hiding are related to the characteristics of organizational and individual factors, such as personality factors, social interactions, and incentives (Anaza & Nowlin, 2017), future research can further investigate the impact of these factors. Finally, innovation activities are inseparable from knowledge creation; however, knowledge has uncertainties and risks (Rosaria et al., 2014). In the banking industry, when knowledge sharing and hiding co-exist, it is easy to generate information asymmetry between individuals or organizations. This makes it difficult for managers inside and outside a project to properly evaluate and monitor projects. Future research should explore and expand upon this concern.