Inclusive Leadership and Knowledge Sharing in Vietnamese SMEs: The Mediating Role of Organizational Trust and Moderating Role of Organizational Culture

Abstract

In today's knowledge-based economy, effective knowledge sharing among employees has become essential for organizational success, particularly for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in emerging markets. However, understanding how leadership styles facilitate knowledge sharing remains limited, especially in the Vietnamese context where hierarchical management practices and collectivist cultural values shape workplace dynamics. This study develops and empirically tests a moderated mediation model examining how inclusive leadership influences knowledge sharing behaviors in Vietnamese SMEs, drawing upon social exchange theory and psychological safety theory as complementary theoretical foundations. Specifically, we propose that organizational trust serves as the key psychological mechanism transmitting the effects of inclusive leadership to two distinct dimensions of knowledge sharing—knowledge collecting (acquiring knowledge from others) and knowledge donating (sharing one's own knowledge with others)—while organizational culture acts as a critical boundary condition moderating these relationships. Using structural equation modeling with bootstrapping techniques on survey data collected from 432 employees across 100 SMEs in Hanoi, Vietnam, our findings reveal that inclusive leadership strongly enhances organizational trust (β = 0.67, p < 0.001). Organizational trust partially mediates the relationships between inclusive leadership and both knowledge sharing dimensions, with a notably stronger indirect effect on knowledge donating (indirect β = 0.35) compared to knowledge collecting (indirect β = 0.32), reflecting the higher perceived risks associated with knowledge donation behaviors. Furthermore, organizational culture significantly moderates these pathways (interaction β = 0.19–0.24), indicating that supportive cultural contexts amplify the effectiveness of inclusive leadership in fostering knowledge exchange. Theoretically, this research extends social exchange theory by empirically identifying trust as the primary psychological mechanism through which inclusive leadership operates, enriches psychological safety theory by clarifying organizational culture as a salient boundary condition, and advances knowledge management literature by providing a nuanced, context-sensitive framework specifically tailored for emerging economies. Practically, these findings offer actionable insights for SME leaders and policymakers seeking to leverage inclusive leadership practices and cultivate supportive organizational cultures to unlock knowledge potential amidst digital transformation and global competition.