An Empirical Study of the Complex Relationship between KMR and Trust in GSD

In GSD, trusting working relationships is critical for the success of the strategic goals of the organization. In order for an organization to build and maintain this relationship there must be a process in place. This paper outlines the use of a KMS which integrates the overall knowledge of an organization and helps in easy access and sharing of this knowledge among the distributed development teams, and ultimately helps in the development of trust. Most investigations have focused on how trust helps in knowledge sharing and acceptance by examining the impact of trust on knowledge management. In this study we focus on the dynamics of knowledge management system in the development of trust among GSD teams. This paper first investigates the relationship between KM and trust through literature review. Secondly, it aims to evaluate the role KM plays in the development of trust. Finally, we conducted a controlled experiment in academic settings with four groups of students located into two different countries to study the impact of KMS in the development of trust. The results indicate that applying KMS in GSD projects positively affects the trusting working relationship among GSD teams. An evaluation of the results is presented along with a proposal for future work.