Cross-cultural Knowledge Transfer

Knowledge and Process Management Volume 11 Number 2 pp 127–136 (2004) Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/kpm.198

& Research Article

Why Cross-Cultural Knowledge Transfer is a Form of Translation in More Ways than You Think Nigel J. Holden1* and Harald F. O. Von Kortzfleisch2 1 2

Nottingham Business School, Nottingham Trent University, UK Business Research Group on Innovative Technologies, University of Cologne, Germany

Knowledge transfer is often likened to acts of translation. It is argued that translation is a very robust analogue of knowledge transfer and that theory provides insight into cross-cultural sharing processes. Three issues which affect the quality of translation and, hence, knowledge transfer are highlighted: ambiguity, interference (intrusion from one’s own cultural background) and lack of equivalence. Other terms from translation science, which can serve as a useful reference for knowledge management experts, are discussed: translation as a networking activity, process and end-product quality, levels of accuracy and constraints on the production of good translations. A new concept is introduced to the knowledge management community; namely convertibility, which refers to the perceived utility of a knowledge source and the availability of domain experts to reveal its import to final users. Two models representing knowledge transfer as translation are presented, the second of which incorporates Nonaka’s SECI model. Copyright # 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. INTRODUCTION Knowledge management is becoming increasingly the management of the transfer of knowledge generated by cross-cultural teams (Bertels and Savage, 1999). As Doz and Santos (1997) have correctly pointed out, this ‘involves the management of knowledge in a single administrative system, but residing in a dispersed and differentiated locations’. When we specifically consider the international or global transfer of knowledge, then, as Bresman et al. (1999) have noted, with respect to international acquisitions, the lack of personal relationships, the absence of trust and ‘cultural distance’ all conspire to create resistance, frictions, and misunderstandings. The literature on mergers and acquisitions points in the same direction. In a study of 121 acquisitions *Correspondence to: Nigel J. Holden, Nottingham Business School, Nottingham Trent University, Burton Street, Nottingham, NG1 4BU, UK. E-mail: [email protected]

Copyright # 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

in other EU countries by UK firms, Schoenberg (1999) demonstrates that ‘firms’ ability to successfully transfer functional knowledge consistently falls short of their expectations’. For example, in the key function of marketing he found that ‘while 79% of acquirers who sought ‘‘some or more’’ knowledge transfer from the acquired firm, only 63% attained this level’. This observation is consistent with the conviction that ‘a significant source of dissatisfaction in organizations today is the poor structures and networks for mediating and diffusing knowledge, values and experience within the organizational environment’ (Claes, 1999). These initial comments in turn reinforce the conviction that cross-border—hence cross-cultural— knowledge transfer can founder, among other things, on what Szulanski (1996) calls ‘the arduous relationship’ between the source of the knowledge and the recipient. All this suggests that knowledge measurement, which aims to place a value on knowledge management work from one or more perspectives, may be especially difficult in

RESEARCH ARTICLE cross-cultural settings because, as Venzin (1998) has noted, knowledge is ‘generated in different language systems, [organizational] cultures, and [work] groups. If the context changes [e.g. culture], knowledge also changes.’ Davenport and Prusak (1998) are at pains to point out that ‘knowledge sharing must be encouraged and rewarded’, while Harvard Business School’s Rosabeth Moss Kanter (quoted in Executive Excellence, 2000) emphasizes that knowledge work requires ‘a new style of management that is more magnanimous’. Management, she says, ‘has turned into coaching and encouraging, rather than ordering and directing’. And this development forces ‘managers and leaders . . . to be open to being taught things by their employees’. For people interested in extending those issues from parochial settings to inter-organizational cross-cultural interactions on the grand scale—that is, after all, what a cross-border merger or acquisition is—the scene is being set for new cross-cultural behaviours. Of course, the cross-cultural transfer of knowledge is nothing new. As a practice it goes back centuries. What is new is the study of the cross-cultural transfer of knowledge from a knowledge management perspective. And a feature of this newness is a lack of conceptual tools and guiding notions to gain deeper understanding. Schoenberg (1999), for example, in a study of cross-border acquisitions in the EU by UK firms, has concluded that ‘we still know little regarding the relative ease of implementation of different types of knowledge transfer and resource sharing’. Yet these observations are not entirely true. There is one area of the cross-cultural transfer of knowhow which has received a considerable amount of attention in the form of academic research publications, project reports and journalistic articles. This concerns the transfer of Western management know-how to Russia and other former socialist countries and republics of the USSR.

A SPOT LESSON IN HOW NOT TO TRANSFER KNOWLEDGE CROSS-CULTURALLY This mammoth crusade of enlightenment, costing Western governments, funding agencies and foundations millions of dollars since the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989, has almost been a spot lesson in how not to transfer knowledge. A number of authors have noted that the misconceptions of educators about local learning styles and expectations as to the value of the know-how in particular circumstances have been non-productive and there-

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Knowledge and Process Management fore a substantial waste of money (Economist, 1993; Hibbert, 1990; Holden and Cooper, 1994; Holden et al., 1998; Jankowicz, 1994; Lee et al., 1996). Significantly, we now find authors who are writing about these processes from a knowledge management perspective (e.g. Husted and Michailova, unpublished, 2000; Hollinshead and Michailova, unpublished, 2000). Hollinshead and Michailova (2000), in study of transfer of management knowhow to Bulgaria, note that both educators and trainees need to undergo a process of learning and unlearning ‘if ‘‘a bridge’’ is to be created between East and West’ (added emphasis). This is an important insight—an insight of the kind that is not likely to emerge without direct experience in training processes and a sympathy towards local socio-cultural conditions (see Camiah and Hollinshead, 2003). Creating a knowledge transfer system (such as a management training course) using that insight would be intellectually very demanding; but using a knowledge transfer system without it would not be likely to convince local people ‘of the long-term benefits of the Western market-economy system or of the absolute desirability, let alone superiority of the Western way of life’ (Holden, 2001). For knowledge management researchers who want evidence of how arduous relationships between the source of the knowledge and the recipient negatively affect knowledge transfer, let them take the next plane to Moscow, Kiev or Bucharest. What all this suggests is that there is ample knowledge about the implementation of knowledge worldwide; the problem appears to be how to tap this knowledge so that organizations do not—often unwittingly—reinvent the wheel in their international operations. All in all knowledge management authors and practitioners have problems integrating the impact of ‘culture’ as a theoretical construct and as an empirical reality (Holden, 2001, 2002). No wonder that Gupta and Govindarajan (2000) argue with specific reference to the challenges of knowledge management in international business, that ‘conceptual work in this area is still in the early stages and empirical work is almost literally at the stage of infancy’. The problem is: where can the knowledge management community go for insights that can help theory-building, on the one hand, and practice enhancement, on the other? This paper proposes a completely unexplored, yetpotentially highly fertile source of analogy and conceptual enlightenment: namely, the science and practice of translation. Translation, it may be said, is by far the oldest universal practice of conscientiously converting knowledge from one domain (i.e. a

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Knowledge and Process Management language group) to another. We are going to argue first that translation as a practice is a valuable analogy for knowledge transfer.

TRANSFER OR TRANSLATION? It is striking to note that several authors refer to the act of knowledge transfer as a form of translation. They appear to mean this as a metaphor, but actually translation in this respect is better conceived of as an analogy. By metaphor we understand an imaginative construct without literal applicability, while an analogy refers to a parallel phenomenon. It is worthwhile exploring the relationship between international knowledge transfer and translation because the two are very much the same thing! A good starting point for this discussion are the following observations. Hurn (1996) has referred to international management activity in terms of ‘translating one’s own knowledge from one’s own cultural context’. In a similar vein, in a contribution in Harvard Business Review about knowledge management, Garvin (1988) has noted that firms must become ‘adept at translating new knowledge into new ways of behaving’ (Garvin, 1988; emphasis added). Dixon (2000), another US authority on knowledge management, has recognized that in knowledge management as an activity ‘knowledge is translated into a form usable by others’ (emphasis added). Nonaka (1991), the Japanese knowledge management guru, sees knowledge management as knowledge conversion for the purpose of creating ‘common cognitive ground’; which is exactly what translation, a form of interlingual communion, is. Proceeding from here, we may say that translation is indeed a kind of knowledge conversion which seeks to create common cognitive ground among people, among whom differences in language are a barrier to comprehension. In this sense translation is a good analogy rather than a metaphor for international (cross-cultural) knowledge management. But more than that: translation in the sense of transposing a text in one language in terms of another is a notable form of converting tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge. Consider the following text: Schu¨tzenpanzer und Lkw, die Munition, Essenrationen oder Wasser geladen haben, Mannschaftswagen mit Infanteristen, Kipplaster mit Kies ziehen ihre Spuren durch die Wu¨ste. Dazu kommen Sattelschlepper, Kranwagen, Sanita¨tafahrzeuge. Es ist Donnerstag, nur wenige Stunden bis zum D-Day, dem Tag der amerikanischen Bodenof-

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RESEARCH ARTICLE fensive. Auch Captain Scott Figlioli ist auf dem Weg zur Front, denn ohne ihn ko¨nnten auch die mutigsten Ka¨mpfer in diesem Krieg nicht viel ausrichten. If you are a native speaker of English, the text above is in a foreign language. If you do not know the language in question, the content and meaning remain largely tacit. We say largely tacit because non-specialists may at least recognize the language by virtue of some generally known features of the language: the length of some of the words and the fact that a high proportion of the words begin with a capital letter. But anyone with a minimum knowledge of foreign languages will be aware that the language in question is German owing to the high frequency of words beginning with a capital letter. In German all nouns are capitalized (except in texts such as advertisements and poetry which deliberately employ lower-case letter special effect); no other European language adopts this practice. Furthermore, the reference to D-Day in the text, the string of letters ‘-offensive’ and the close association of the words Captain and Front in the same clause all could lead the perceptive non-reader of German to conclude that the text is about the Second World War. Indeed one could go further and date the major event and its location which the text discusses: 6 June 1944, D-Day, when allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy to roll back the German armies from Nazi-occupied France. The deductions are sound, but are mistaken because the text is taken from an article in the German news magazine Der Spiegel of 24 March 2003 about the war in Iraq. All this supports the well-known conviction among knowledge management specialists that context is everything. It is axiomatic: if you do not understand the context, you will always misinterpret the embedded situation to a greater or lesser extent. If someone had told us beforehand that the article was about the war with Iraq, then even without any kind of knowledge of German the perceptive non-specialist could have deduced that Captain Scott Figlioli is either British or American (but with a remote possibility that he might be a member of the small, token Australian contingent). As he did not appear in the text as Hauptmann (Captain) Figlioli, we can be certain that he was not German. It might occur to us that Figlioli is an Italian name, but the Captain is unlikely to be Italian because (a) Italy has not committed troops to the war and (b) Scott is a highly unusual Italian christian name. It might be added that Scott is far more common in the USA and the UK, so the

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RESEARCH ARTICLE probably is that the captain is American. We might deduce, but possibly quite mistakenly, that he is of Italian and Scots lineage. Suddenly, then, this text ceases to be for the perceptive non-specialist completely tacit. It becomes an information source not because it raises certainty, but because it raises doubt. As such our decoding of the text is an extremely good illustration of Cherry’s (1980) brilliant summation of information as ‘a potential of signals’. The potential was revealed through a kind of translation process which converted largely tacit to explicit knowledge which was not unambiguous. Thus we hope to have shown by means of a simple example how translation is a form of knowledge transfer with its own hazards. But, as we shall presently see, translation serves the knowledge management community not just as a useful analogy; translation theory in its own right is a useful source of concepts for elucidating inefficiencies in cross-cultural knowledge transfer.

USEFUL CONCEPTS FROM TRANSLATION THEORY But there is more to this than arguing that translation is a highly applicable analogy for exploring the nature of knowledge transfer. Translation theory, which has hitherto been largely ignored by the knowledge management community, can be of further value because it can throw light on knowledge transfer processes from at least four advantageous perspectives:





translation as a networking activity; process and end-product quality; levels of accuracy; constraints on the production of good translations.

It will be argued that each of these perspectives, derived from translation theory, supplies a useful analogy with knowledge management processes. Taking the first perspective, translation theorists agree that translation is more than linguistic transcoding from one language to another. In the highly relevant words of Vermeer (1992): ‘It has become common sense to integrate translation into a wider network of social relations’. This point applies to knowledge transfer because knowledge is not just transferred by means of transcoding from head to head, but also into the networks of knowledge receivers. This is consistent with the sole purpose of knowledge management: to get needed knowledge diffused into firms’ internal and external networks. Concerning the second perspective, translation theory is primarily concerned with two principal

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Knowledge and Process Management characteristics of translation: the quality of the final product and the actual translation process itself. The first aspect deals with issues of quality, accuracy and impact on readers; the second focuses on cognitive issues and the competencies of translators. We may also say that the process is part of the final product and influences its quality. Again translation theory offers direct insights into aspects of knowledge transfer. Then from Pinchuk (1977) comes the useful notion of levels of accuracy of translation, which is the third highlighted perspective from translation theory:





the general idea (of the original) is conveyed; sufficient information is conveyed; most of the information is conveyed; virtually all the information is conveyed.

Again, this simple typology can be applied to knowledge management processes. Whether we are concerned with a translation or an act of corporate knowledge transfer, the vital challenge lies in being able to convey sufficient information so that receivers can make sense of it. The above discussion leads us to a key question: how can we determine what is enough information for making sense among, say, multicultural project teams, at multiple receiving ends? For, just as it is very difficult to say what is ‘a good translation’, so it is difficult to determine or quantify a successful knowledge transfer exercise. Do then translation concepts help top elucidate aspects on crosscultural knowledge transfer processes? The answer is ‘yes’, because the cross-cultural transfer of knowledge literally involves translation on the part of participants. Participants translate knowledge into their own language and culturally influenced frame of reference. But, in organizational settings this translation process is not just a personal experience, but a collective sense-making process. The fourth perspective is an analogy which complements that ever growing area of the knowledge management literature which is concerned with constraints on smooth transfer of knowledge. Translation theory has identified three constraints on the production of good translations. These constraints, which are dealt with at some length, are:
ambiguity (confusion at the source);
interference (intrusive errors from one’s own background);
lack of equivalence (absence of corresponding words or concepts). Each of these terms will be discussed from a general translation point of view and then used as analogies to explain constraints on the international

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Knowledge and Process Management (cross-cultural) transfer of knowledge. From the point of view of communication theory these three constraints on translation may be regarded as ‘noise’. In a technical sense noise is ‘any disturbance or interference, apart from the wanted signals or messages selected and being sent’ (Cherry, 1980). In translation noise is anything that distorts the translation process and influences variously the accuracy of the final product. So, by analogy, in the intra- or inter-organizational transfer of knowledge, noise is anything that distorts this process and constrains the convertibility of knowledge: in other words, its relative transferability into domain experts’ networks based on its perceived utility. The concept of convertibility will be discussed later in this paper.

AMBIGUITY To the translator the word ‘ambiguity’ is a precise term. It refers to words or expressions that are capable or being understood in two or more ways. If we assume that the translator is dealing with texts in which—say, unlike the novels of Kafka or Eco— ambiguity is a feature of the original, then his task is to ensure that the translated version does not give rise to unintended ambiguity. In the organizational sciences ambiguity is an overworked word, referring to any general vagueness or uncertainty. In writings on culture and international management it is customary to urge ‘tolerance of ambiguity’ as a cross-cultural competence. It is a characteristic of cross-cultural writing not to define the word closely; which means, perhaps not inconveniently, the word remains ambiguous. We can all understand it as we wish. In his book International Management: Cross-cultural dimensions Mead (1994) has 13 indexed references to ambiguity and has a section on ‘avoiding conflict by exploiting ambiguity’ and another on ‘interpreting ambiguity’, but the word itself is not defined; or rather it is, but only elliptically. What we do find in the literature are definitions and characterizations of tolerance to ambiguity. Guirdham (1999), who in fact discusses ambiguity and language, describes tolerance for ambiguity as involving ‘managing the feelings associated with unpredictability’. For Harris and Moran (1996) it ‘refers to the ability to react to new, different and at times, unpredictable situations with little visible discomfort’. To Hofstede (1994) and his followers tolerance for ambiguity is associated with uncertainty avoidance, which is premised on a wish to avoid future unpleasantness. Hofstede (1994) suggests that uncertainty avoidance is a key variable

Cross-Cultural Knowledge Transfer

RESEARCH ARTICLE in differentiating (national) cultures. In their book Culture clash US authors Seelye and Seelye-James (1996) have this under ‘U’ in their index: Uncertainty avoidance vs. Tolerance for ambiguity. It is impossible to read about tolerance for ambiguity and not come to the conclusion that virtually all commentators adopt an ontological position, which prefers to see culture as a hostile feature of the business environment and not a resource rich in tacit knowledge (see Holden, 2002). This unhealthy distortion of the core term is regrettable and unhelpful. Knowledge management experts do better to remind themselves that ambiguity is better seen as something which proceeds from perceived confusions about a message source. Tolerance of ambiguity as popularly conceived implies accepting something misunderstood at face value. It negates disorientating phenomena as potential information sources. In the earlier discussion about the text from Der Spiegel there was no question of ambiguity tolerance. We did not say: ‘something is in a foreign language, so we cannot understand it’. This example showed that some information was recoverable and that critical to understanding was contextual knowledge.

INTERFERENCE In translation theory (and practice) interference refers to the transfer of usages peculiar to the source language to the target language. This happens when words look the same in different languages, but mean something else. Here are some confusables between English and French. The French word licence does not always coincide with its apparent counterparts in English. It can mean, among other things, a university degree or membership of a sports federation (Thody and Evans, 1985). Conjurer has nothing to with sleight of hand in French. It can variously mean to entreat, exorcise (demons) and to stave off (danger) (Thody and Evans, 1985). Conversely the English word ‘banger’ might suggest to an unwitting French translator a type of firework. But it might in a particular context refer to an English sausage, for, which, by the way, an attested French translation is ‘pre´parations de porc, recette britannique (pork speciality, British recipe)’ (Gaskell, 1999). But interference does not just affect translators. Almost all learners of foreign languages are influenced to a greater or lesser extent by the pronunciation, grammatical structures and vocabulary of their own languages. These factors are carried into the foreign language. These are received as ‘errors’ in the target language, marking the speaker

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RESEARCH ARTICLE as a foreigner. Sometimes these deviations, including actual errors, may be so severe as to make a person unintelligible or to create literal ambiguities. For example, a French speaker having an unsure command of English may say: ‘I work here since three years’ ( ¼ ‘I have been working here for three years’). A German also with a relatively weak command of English might say: ‘I worked here for three years’. In this case he means ‘I worked there three years ago’ (German ‘vor’, meaning ‘ago’ being confused with, and pronounced the same as, the English word ‘for’ as a temporal adverb.) Sometimes the interference can have its amusing side. Often foreigners have difficulty distinguishing between the English ‘u’ sound and ‘a’ sound (for example, in butter and batter). This conversation was once overheard between a Russian and an English person. The latter: ‘We have a lot of Russians in England’. The former (shocked): ‘You still have rations in England?’ (For Anglo-Russian management confusions, see Holden et al., 1998.) It goes without saying that these kinds of confusions creep into millions of cross-cultural conversations worldwide everyday. Most are overcome or ignored. Some may have more complicated consequences. For examples, Japanese speakers of English are influenced by Japanese notions of politeness. Rather than categorically refusing a request, a Japanese might say: ‘I’ll think about it’ (which means ‘there is no way I am going to do anything about it’; or, often with a great sucking of breath between clenched teeth: ‘That’s very difficult’, meaning that something is a sheer impossibility. As Nathan (1999) has pointed out, ‘no language is better suited to obfuscation than Japanese’. Often Japanese speakers of foreign languages carry the obfuscation into new sociolinguistic domains where for the most part the foreign interlocutors do not understand the rules of obfuscation. How many foreigners are aware, for example that, when an English person says ‘We must meet up some time’, it conveys in English society precisely the opposite intention. It is a polite way of saying that a further meeting is not especially desirable.

LACK OF EQUIVALENCE Equivalence can be a very useful concept for knowledge managers. We discuss the term in relation to translation theory and language and then apply it to cross-cultural interactions, using the material from the case studies as examples. As Sager (1994) has noted: ‘Translation consists of producing in the target language the closest natural

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Knowledge and Process Management equivalent of the source language message, firstly with respect to meaning and secondly with respect to style’. What is meant by equivalence has been the subject of much scholarly debate, but according to Sager (1994) ‘it is generally recognized that the relationship of a source and target is one cognitive, pragmatic and linguistic equivalence’. This provides us with a useful insight into the cross-cultural conversion and transfer of knowledge. By way of considerable simplification we may say that human languages differ from each other formally in four principal ways: in their syntax (the way in which words are arranged and combined ‘grammatically’); in their morphology (which refers to the study of ways in which the forms of words change according to context (e.g. walk, walked, walking; big, bigger, biggest); in their lexis, which refers to the vocabulary items of a language; and in their phonology, which refers to the speech sounds of a language. Anyone who has studied foreign languages will be aware of the complicated ways in which these four ‘systems’ deviate from each other among languages. To quote the great American linguist, Edward Sapir (1956): ‘No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality. The worlds in which different societies live are distinct worlds, not merely the same world with different labels attached.’ In other words, there is not only distance among languages owing to similarities and differences in the four basic systems of language, but distance as a function of language as a repository of knowledge, experience and impressions and a device for facilitating social interaction. The challenge for the translator in finding equivalence is not just to render the words of one language into a second one, but also to re-express psychological and related factors with in the terms of reference of that second language. The translator of technical texts must find the precise equivalents of formal specialized terms, if they exist in the target language. If they do not exist, he or she may decide that a sentence or even an entire text, dependent on a key word, may be untranslatable. One option may be to abandon the project. Another (possible in conjunction with the writer of the text) may be to create a specific paraphrase. This requires resourcefulness, as does the translation of poems, whose rhythms and rhyme test the translator to the ultimate degree. Here are some examples. The very word ‘manager’ in (American) English does not find straightforward counterparts in modern European languages. In French and German one encounters

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Knowledge and Process Management ‘le manager’ and ‘der Manager’ respectively. There is a tendency in such languages to depersonalize manager into an abstract noun meaning management, e.g. French ‘la gestion’, German ‘Unternehmungsfu¨hrung.’ The Danish word ‘ledelse’ carries connotations of ‘leading’, but without a soupc¸on of the grand American sense of business leadership. The word marketing is not easily translatable into various languages of the former socialist word, not to mention Japanese (Holden, 1998). Hence the word ‘marketing’ remains in English form in such languages, each one overlaying distinctive nuances. While Arabic may have countless words for particular formations of sand and Inuit languages all manner of words to describe kinds of snow, (American) English is triumphant in the number of words and expressions—many of which are pure euphemisms—for describing forms of reorganization and dismissal of employees. There is, it seems, no limit to what Collins (2000) terms ‘the lexicon of downsizing’ to the number of ways you can be told that you have been ‘de-hired’. If we regard the transfer of knowledge as a kind of collective interactive translation, then it follows that the purpose of international knowledge transfer is to find cross-cultural equivalence: the state of achieving harmonization of view, purpose and priorities. Let us present a clear example of crosscultural equivalence and the difficulties of achieving it in the arduous endeavour of communicating Western management know-how into the Russian frame reference. The quotation, emphasizing the Russian desire for equivalence as distinct from equality, is based on personal experiences in Russia from 1991 to 1996. Everything we read about Russia today does not suggest that the quoted information is out of date nor will become out of date in the near future. ‘At the heart of this desire for equivalence is a Russian conviction that Russians are no less intelligent, educated or competent than people elsewhere, but Russia has a lot of problems which make it difficult at the moment to harness all her talents. At the same time, Russia still has undisputed potential as an economic and technological powerhouse. It is, the Russians will point out, the selfsame potential which transformed a largely backward agricultural country into the second most powerful country on Earth in a matter of decades; was instrumental in defeating Nazi Germany; launched the world’s first artificial satellite, created a scientific establishment which in its hey-day (in the 1970s) comprehensively rivalled achievement in the Western world (Graham, 1996), and presented, over many decades, a fully fledged alternative model of global economic development.

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RESEARCH ARTICLE ‘The fact that the communist leadership sacrificed millions of Russians and non-Russians in the gulags (see Conquest, 1992) kept the rest behind the country’s borders and deprived them of what we consider to be basic necessities of life over several decades—all this does not reduce the force of the argument. The Russian businessman who used the example of Russia’s launch of the first sputnik (in October 1957) to impress a would-be joint venture partner from the UK is using a past—and world-famous—technological achievement to demonstrate contemporary potential. He knows that his enterprise, is not technologically equal to the UK firm now, but it has the potential to be. This ‘posture’ requires of a foreign business partner a recognition of equivalence in the situation. Awareness of a Russian need for equivalence is one thing, but building this need into a viable business arrangement is something else.’ From the above discussion we may assume that successful international knowledge transfer is predicated on so-called ‘cultural literacy’: the ability to value and leverage cultural differences (Rosen, 2000). But what does that mean in practical terms? It means that the challenge is to achieve cross-cultural equivalence, which stems from harmonizing the linguistic, cognitive and pragmatic elements at interfaces where knowledge, values and experience are transferred into multicultural domains of implementation. After that explanation of our three key terms (ambiguity, interference and lack of equivalence), we can introduce them into a model (Figure 1), showing them as a set of influences on the knowledge transfer process and using Pinchuk’s simple typology of translation accuracy to reflect notionally the level of information converted into social networks. Note how we position ambiguity as an input into the source. So where does this analogy between translation and knowledge transfer actually lead us? It draws our attention to three important factors:
Knowledge transfer, like translation, is a sensemaking activity.
Knowledge transfer, like translation, is literally concerned with personal cognition and the interlingual transfer of knowledge from head to head and into social networks.
Knowledge transfer, like translation, is subject to constraints which affect not just transfer, but rather transferability: the extent to which knowledge can be transmitted to others. As it happens, this analogy between knowledge transfer and translation can be seen in Nonaka’s

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Figure 1 Model of knowledge transfer as translation

well-known and influential model of knowledge transfer (Figure 2). The first mode in this model describes the sharing of tacit knowledge. This is where individuals interact and create tacit knowledge through sharing experiences (Nonaka and Takeuchi, 1995). Together with Konno, Nonaka and Konno (1998) argues that non-verbal self-transcendence is the key for facilitating the sharing of tacit knowledge. Simply put, individuals must be willing to share and exchange knowledge internally in the organization as well as externally with suppliers, customers and other stake-holders on a non-verbal basis. The second mode in Nonaka’s model describes externalization: namely, the conversion of tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge. For the externalization of tacit knowledge to succeed, Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) emphasizes the importance of group commitment and the fact that it is mainly based on verbal communication. The third mode in Nonaka’s model describes the combining and systemization of explicit knowledge (Nonaka and Konno, 1998). At this stage in the process, the tacit knowledge that has been explicated

in the previous mode of the model is now the subject of verbal sorting, combination and categorization (Nonaka and Takeuchi, 1995). The fourth mode in Nonaka’s model describes the process of embodying explicit knowledge into tacit knowledge (Nonaka and Takeuchi, 1995). He calls this internalization. Here it is assumed that employees broaden, extend and reframe their own tacit knowledge as they internalize the explicit knowledge that is shared throughout the organization (Nonaka, 1991). This process requires ‘finding one’s self in a larger entity. [And] Learning-bydoing, training, and exercises allow the individual to access the knowledge of the group and the entire organization (Nonaka and Konno, 1998). A lot of knowledge in this mode is again transferred by non-verbal communication. Each mode of the model involves sense-making and knowledge transfer from head to head and into networks. But we argue that there also exist in knowledge-sharing activities constraints on efficiency which relate to knowledge translatability and convertibility. We will discuss these terms, which are new to the knowledge management community, then build them into a modified model of knowledge transfer that also incorporates the notions of socialization, externalization, combination and internalization into a modified model of knowledge transfer.

TRANSLATABILITY AND CONVERTIBILITY

Figure 2 Nonaka’s four modes of knowledge transfer

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Transferability of knowledge is of course an analogue of translatability. But translatability is not solely a property of the text; it is also a statement,

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Figure 3 Extended model of knowledge transfer as translation

as it were, about the translator’s own competence to effect an accurate translation. A translator must also be a domain expert both in terms of the languages which he can translate and the subject matter. Hence, the successful translator of Scott Fitzgerald or Ernest Hemingway into, say, Japanese, may not be equally competent to translate, say, In Search of Excellence (Peters and Waterman) into that language because he may not have sufficient grasp of management concepts and the nature of business. Unless the translator has an understanding of the content of the subject matter, he cannot assess what we call the convertibility of a text. Convertibility is not just a property of the text. It also refers to its perceived utility and the availability of domain experts (of whom one would be the translator) to reveal its import to the final user. It is not the act of translation alone that makes tacit knowledge explicit: it is the wider conversion into users’ existing knowledge domains. By applying the analogy, therefore, the transferability of knowledge is a function of convertibility in the sense described. A successful knowledge transfer act may be proof that the knowledge content was transferable in the usual sense understood by the knowledge management community, but its successful implementation is the measure of its convertibility. Having clarified that distinction between those two terms, we can present the modified model of knowledge transfer incorporating socialization, externalization, combination and internalization (Figure 3). We see that these processes form the heart of the knowledge transfer process where they are subject to the influences of ambiguity, interference and lack of equivalence. The resulting translated knowledge is then conveyed into social networks with the information content ranging from the general idea to more or less full disclosure.

Cross-Cultural Knowledge Transfer

CONCLUSION This article has discussed knowledge transfer in its international contexts and has brought to bear concepts of translation theory. This appears to be a comparatively rare example of the application of linguistics to an understanding of organizational processes. We have argued that concepts from translation provide uncomplicated, yet immediately useful analogies for understanding the nature of the transfer of knowledge from its source into networks. The value of these analogies will possibility be greater for members of the knowledge management community who have had experience of translation, especially in terms of the four modes of knowledge transfer developed by Nonaka. Sadly, that intellectually enlightening experience has been denied to the vast majority of those people in English-speaking countries, whose knowledge of foreign languages ranges from non-existent to translation at a very basic classroom level. Nevertheless, a questing, open mind, even with that impediment, may find the analogy useful for gaining insights into the pragmatics of knowledge transfer. Not only that: an understanding of how and why things, as they say, ‘get lost in translation’ within multicultural projects groups and within the wider arrays of firms’ internal and external networks can give insights into communication breakdowns before they happen.

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N. J. Holden and H. F. O. Von Kortzfleisch