The impact of knowledge management on business performance with emphasis on the role of accounting information quality (Case study: financial institutions listed on the Tehran Capital Market)

Purpose: Today, the performance of financial institutions is important for many investors and users of financial information to make decisions. Therefore, it is necessary to examine the performance of financial institutions in the capital market. The purpose of the present study is to examine the impact of knowledge management on business performance with emphasis on the role of accounting information quality.
Methodology: The statistical population in this study is the managers of 19 financial institutions in the capital market of Tehran, which were selected purposefully. In fact, the number of statistical population with the number of samples for each variable is equal to 19. The present study is descriptive-correlational in terms of applied purpose, quantitative in terms of process, quantitative in terms of information collection and analysis method, and inductive in terms of logical dimension. This study was conducted in terms of data collection method, library and field. In this study, the data required to test the hypotheses were extracted from the standard questionnaire of Al-Damour et al. (2023) of the five-Lakeit spectrum and financial statements available in the capital market. The reliability of the questionnaire was tested through (Cronbach's alpha coefficient and composite reliability), whose values ​​were above 0.7 and were approved. And the validity of the questionnaire was tested through convergent validity (AVE) and divergent validity (Fornell and Larker matrix) and were approved. Also, to measure knowledge management, three indicators of knowledge acquisition, knowledge use and knowledge integration were used, to measure the quality of accounting information, four indicators of comparability, relevance, understandability and fair presentation were used, and to measure business performance, two indicators of return on assets and return on equity were used. In this study, after drawing the conceptual model, data analysis was performed using structural equation modeling with a partial least squares approach and through SEM-PLS and SPSS24 software. Structural equation modeling, which has three main stages: Stage 1) Measurement model fitting, Stage 2) Structural model fitting, Stage 3) Overall model fitting, in the first stage, 5 criteria were used to examine the measurement fit: the first and second criteria are the measurement model (Cronbach's alpha coefficient and composite reliability), the values ​​obtained for both indicators were higher than (0.7), so all research constructs are acceptable. And the third and fourth criteria related to convergent validity (AVE) are above 0.4 and cross-validity (positive value and the total average of this index is 0.390, which indicates the desirable quality of the research measurement models. And the fifth criterion of the measurement model: divergent validity (Fornell and Larker matrix) is that the amount of latent variables on the main diagonal of the matrix is ​​greater than the amount of correlation between them located in the lower and left cells of the main diagonal, meaning that the structures (latent variables) in the model interact more with their questions than with other structures, so the divergent validity of the model is at an appropriate level. In the second stage, four criteria were used to examine the fit of the structural model: the first criterion is the structural model, path coefficients (beta) and significance coefficients (t-value) which the obtained value, path coefficients and significance between all independent and dependent variables in the model are greater than 0.4 and 1.96 and at the confidence level 95% were significant, which showed the suitability of the structural model. The second and third criteria of the structural model are the coefficient of determination index (R^2) and the predictive correlation index (Q^2) of the endogenous latent variables. The obtained value of the coefficient of determination for the main endogenous variable of performance is 0.514. This means that the knowledge management and accounting information quality indicators, in total and in cooperation, have been able to predict about 50% of the performance changes, and about the other 50% depends on other factors and variables that are not in the model. Also, the value of the Q2 index for the main endogenous variable of business performance is 0.419, which indicates that the predictive power of the model regarding this variable is at a desirable and strong level. And the fourth criterion of the structural model is the effect size index (f^2). According to the values ​​obtained in the research, it can be said that the effect size of the independent variable and the moderating variable on business performance is moderate. Finally, in the third stage, a GOF criterion was used to examine the overall model fit, and the obtained value was 0.599, which indicates the overall suitability of the model and allows entry into the hypothesis testing section.
Findings: The results of the research, according to the first hypothesis, showed that the path coefficient of the effect of knowledge management on business performance is (0.741, 0.578) and the significance value (t-value) is equal to (9.35, 7.23) and is greater than 1.96; we concluded that this path coefficient is significant at the 0.05 error level; that is, knowledge management has an effect on business performance. Also, the results of the research, according to the second hypothesis, showed that the path coefficient of the effect of accounting information quality on business performance is (0.654, 0.421) and the significance value (t-value) is equal to (8.06, 3.95) and is greater than 1.96 and at a confidence level of 0.95; we concluded that this path coefficient is significant at the 0.05 error level; that is, accounting information quality has an effect on business performance. On the other hand, examining the moderating effect coefficient of the accounting information quality variable on the relationship between knowledge management and business performance is (0.461, 0.594) and the significance value (t-value) is (4.04, 7.69) and is greater than 1.96 and at a confidence level of 0.95; we concluded that this path coefficient is significant at an error level of 0.05; that is, accounting information quality moderates the relationship between knowledge management and business performance.
Research limitations/implications: Among the limitations we faced during the research are: Due to the nature of the methodology, this research required the cooperation of the respondents to complete the questionnaire, and some of the respondents refused. Considering the importance of the issue expressed by the interviewers, we tried to minimize the rate of refusal, the time-consuming nature of completing the questionnaires by financial managers and marketing managers of financial institutions, and the lack of sufficient theoretical foundations for some of the research variables.
Originality/value: This research is the first to measure the effect of accounting information quality as a moderating variable on the relationship between knowledge management and the performance of financial institutions in the Tehran capital market. Also, as a scientific achievement, this issue can provide useful information to financial analysts, users of financial statements, and accounting students and professors.