Despite its prevalence, there is a lack of understanding regarding the effect of telework on an organization’s knowledge base. Recognizing the enabling role of electronic communication media, this article therefore addresses the interaction effects of media synchronicity and temporal as well as spatial separation among colleagues on sharing in knowledge networks. Special attention is paid to knowledge awareness (a form of metaknowledge representing “who knows what”) as well as homogeneous and heterogeneous knowledge sources to further explicate the relationship between coworker separation and knowledge sharing. Multiple surveys were placed between two smaller ethnographic investigations and combined with whole network data to form an in-depth study of 64 knowledge workers at a medium-sized European research and advisory organization. The results reveal that spatial separation directly reduces the frequency of knowledge sharing between colleagues, whereas temporal separation affects knowledge sharing through reduced knowledge awareness, resulting in lower job and proactive performance. The use of asynchronous media can serve to mitigate most of the negative effects of spatial separation on knowledge sharing but may also exacerbate the negative effect of temporal separation on teleworkers’ knowledge awareness of colleagues with identical expertise.

中文翻译：

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没有远程工作者是一座孤岛：时间和空间分离以及媒体使用对知识共享网络的影响

尽管它很流行，但人们对远程办公对组织知识库的影响缺乏了解。认识到电子通信媒体的推动作用，因此本文讨论了媒体同步性和时间以及同事之间的空间分离对知识网络共享的交互影响。特别关注知识意识（一种代表“谁知道什么”的元知识形式）以及同质和异质的知识来源，以进一步阐明同事分离与知识共享之间的关系。在两次较小的人种学调查之间进行了多次调查，并结合全网数据，对一家中型欧洲研究和咨询组织的 64 名知识工作者进行了深入研究。结果表明，空间分离直接降低了同事之间知识共享的频率，而时间分离通过降低知识意识影响知识共享，从而导致较低的工作和主动绩效。异步媒体的使用可以减轻空间分离对知识共享的大部分负面影响，但也可能加剧时间分离对远程工作者对具有相同专业知识的同事的知识意识的负面影响。