The Effect of Organizational Structure, Organizational Culture and Applying Information Technology on Knowledge Sharing in the Public Agencies of Isfahan City

Nowadays, applying organizational knowledge and its effective sharing among public sector employees have turned into a strategic source to achieve and retain competitive advantage. To achieve to such advantage, public agencies need to develop solutions which enable them to improve knowledge sharing and help them in gaining a better position. Based on such a presupposition, the purpose of this study, at hand, is to investigate the effect of organizational structure and culture as well as applying (Information Technology) IT on sharing knowledge among executive agencies in Isfahan city. The study is an "applied" research from the goal-oriented point of view and a descriptive-survey one from the methodological standpoint. The statistical sample size of the study consists of 59 executive agencies while a questionnaire was made use of as the data collection tool. Meanwhile, Partial Least Square (PLS) technique was used to test the research hypotheses. Research findings demonstrated significant effect on the following areas: (consistency's effect on sharing knowledge / involvement and mission's indirect effect on sharing knowledge); (concentration's effect on sharing knowledge / the effect of applying IT on formality); (involvement's effect on applying IT / the indirect effect of applying IT on sharing knowledge). Involvement (as an organizational culture aspect) indirectly exerts a significant effect on formality while applying IT appears to take an intermediary role in the relationship between "involvement" and "knowledge sharing".