Millennials showed great concern in the following factors affecting tacit knowledge transfer: being in a time-stressed situation which does not allow for the transfer process to happen, not having awareness about the know-how they could transfer, facing an unsecure situation where their knowledge may be used in a negative way, being in a virtual environment as they prefer face-to-face interactions; having enough time to transfer knowledge, being in informal settings, receiving formal organizational recognitions and financial rewards for their knowledge transfer efforts. Xers and Boomers show similar patterns in evaluating the factors which might affect tacit knowledge transfer: they would adapt their communication styles and methods to meet the other person’s preferences and styles, and although they showed a preference for a written and structured way to transfer tacit knowledge, they also value coaching and tutoring as being an effective method; they are motivated by their contribution to support the business objectives of the company, and by being recognized as Subject Matter Experts. Within the questions about technologies and Web 2.0 adoption, although there is no statistical evidence of relationship, the low value of p, slightly higher than ,05, indicates that there might be some diverging patterns in the way different generations approach Web 2.0 technologies. Millennials expressed that wikis, blogs, and forums are an efficient way of transferring tacit knowledge, while Boomers mostly disagreed with this statement. Millennials also reported being comfortable in the usage of new technologies, while Boomers expressed lower comfort in using new technologies. The usage of Professional Social Networks is highly valued by Xers, more than Boomers and Millennials.
4.7 Conclusions of the Qualitative and Quantitative Analysis In this section we will compare the results from the qualitative and quantitative phases’ results.
Gabriella COLOMBO – 2012
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