Abstract
At any given time the two rival organizational values cooperation and competition coexist in any team and/or organization in different intensities and mix, depending on both internal factors (e.g., culture, task dimensions of
accuracy and speed) and external factors (e.g., market and competitive forces). However, determining that desirable intensity and mix of these two values seems to be a challenging task in the current literature and no
explicit method currently exists for measuring factors that may lead to determination of such desirable mix. Considering the crucial impacts of these values on organizational behaviours, this in turn may result in loss of
efficiency and productivity in organizations. In this study a systematic review of current literatures in the areas of knowledge management, social psychology, organizational studies and Computer-Supported Cooperative
Systems (CSCW) studies, is used to uncover a research theme for analysing the impacts of the two rival organizational values competition and cooperation on knowledge sharing behaviours through promotive
interaction between individuals. Supporting the IT-culture conflict theory, this study is considered as a research theme which investigates the impact of culture on IT application and use. More specifically, by combining the
goal interdependency theory of conflict, social learning theory, the internal organizational forces of competition and cooperation and the awareness net analysis, the present study deeply investigate the term tension between
cooperative and competitive values and their impact on organizational behaviours. It then introduces factors that can assist in finding an optimal mix of the cooperative and competitive values in organizations at any given
time. The present study also relates the above optimal mix/tension with the organization’s reward structure, the task dimensions of ‘speed’ and ‘accuracy’, group characteristics and organizational climate in order to draw inferences for attaining an optimal level of process awareness for individuals while performing their tasks within an organization.