Overcoming cultural barriers for innovation and knowledge sharing

Purpose - This paper aims to identify the cultural barriers that set back knowledge production and sharing in organizations of the Municipality of Caguas at the Commonwealth of the Puerto Rico in order to find effective ways to overcome them. The purpose is to explore how the enterprise promotes efficiency among employees and how they develop a suitable environment for knowledge production and sharing. Design/methodology/approach - The qualitative research consists of in-depth interviews, carried out to management personnel, and questionnaires submitted to the employees. Two hypotheses are developed and tested using the results obtained from four organizations, public and private. Findings - The interview responses show that at the managerial level both private and public agencies have overcome the identified barriers that set back the knowledge sharing, while from the questionnaires it is found at the employee level that several cultural barriers such as organizational environment, emotional intelligence and managers' commitment are still present. Research limitations/implications - Although limited by the small sample of critical actors, this study includes international and regional organizations that serve the Municipality of Caguas. The results may set a basis to develop a methodology to analyze the presence or absence of cultural barriers in other organizations, and municipalities of Puerto Rico. Originality/value - This investigation maybe used to develop standard procedures to cope with culture differences when establishing a suitable environment for knowledge production and sharing among employees.