The Role of Information and Communication Technology on Knowledge Sharing among the Academic Staff during COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Knowledge Sharing and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has attracted the attention of researchers during the COVID 19 pandemic and there were two factors considered as essential elements for universities during the COVID 19 situation. This is because most of the universities postponed the physical attendance at universities and used technology tools to keep the communication among the academic staff and students. ICT allows for the rapid search, access, and retrieval of information and collaboration between employees, while ICT infrastructure refers to the equipment, software, communication systems, and the human component such as experience, skills, command, principles. The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of ICT and ICT infrastructure on Knowledge Sharing among academic staff. The study was conducted at nine Iraqi public universities located in Baghdad and the sample was the academic staff at these universities. The study employed the stratified sample method to ensure equal distribution among the nine universities, and the data was collected using the questionnaire. Structural equation modelling was utilized to analyze 267 valid questionnaires. After testing the measurement model and ensuring the model fit, the study examined the structural model to find the results. The result showed that ICT and ICT infrastructure had positive and significant impact on Knowledge Sharing among the academic staff at Iraqi public universities. However, the result indicated the Knowledge Sharing was highly impacted by ICT infrastructure. The government and universities should enhance and improve the ICT infrastructure that would provide a great benefit to the Iraqi universities' reputation as well as the universities' rank.