Analysis of the Effect of Knowledge Hiding on Educational Innovation of Primary School Principals: The Role of Knowledge Flow as a Moderating Variable

The aim of the present study was to analyze the effect of knowledge concealment on educational innovation of elementary school principals: the role of knowledge flow as a moderating variable using a descriptive-correlational structural equation modeling method. The target population in this study consisted of 152 elementary school principals in Ardabil, of whom 109 were selected using a simple random sampling method using the Cochran formula. To collect information, the overt and covert concealment questionnaire (Conley et al., 2012); the standard innovation quality questionnaire of Wang and Wang (2012), the standard knowledge flow questionnaire using the Hemmati questionnaire (2010) were used. The structural equation model was used to analyze the data. The test results indicated that overt and covert knowledge concealment has a negative and direct effect on the innovation quality of school principals. The results also showed that knowledge flow has a positive moderating role in the impact of "explicit and tacit knowledge concealment" on "the quality of innovation of school principals". This means that; at high levels of knowledge flow, the intensity of the impact of explicit and tacit knowledge concealment on the quality of innovation of school principals is stronger and vice versa. Accordingly, it can be concluded that educational innovation is not simply a product of the individual skills of principals, but a function of the quality of knowledge flow in the school. Therefore, policymakers and education managers should reduce the incentive to conceal knowledge by creating platforms for effective knowledge circulation, including the formation of learning communities, knowledge networks, and a culture of organizational trust, and provide the basis for the development of schools' innovative capacities.