Exploring the role of national culture on knowledge practices: A comparison between Spain and the UK

In the context of a competitive knowledge-based economy, the knowledge provided by a firm's founders is one of the most important measures of success. This paper aims to identify the role of national culture on a founder's knowledge practices in a modern organisation. Using data collected from 258 Small to Medium sized Enterprises (SMES) in the Spanish and UK telecommunication industries (130 from Spain and 128 from the UK), we propose three knowledge management practices to be analysed; namely transfer, transformation and open-mindedness. This paper provides evidence that while Spanish SMEs are more positively associated with higher levels of transfer and transformation of knowledge, UK SMES are more positively associated with higher levels of open-mindedness. Hence, this study serves as an important contribution to the small amount of literature currently available in this field by examining different practices that can be explained by the cultural characteristics of both countries.