Knowledge Management
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Knowledge Management: A Framework for building a Knowledge Sharing Culture
by Palvinderjit Kaur
April 2007
UCTI Working Paper WP-07-04
Knowledge Management: A Framework for building a Knowledge Sharing Culture Palvinderjit Kaur Asia Pacific University College of Technology & Innovation Technology Park Malaysia Bukit Jalil, 5700 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia April 2007 [email protected] Abstract Knowledge management has now become the ultimate goal and business strategy in many organisations to gain the competitive edge. Knowledge is known to be the most powerful and intellectual asset in organisation which require managing and sharing capabilities. Organisations will be able to upgrade their position by becoming knowledge intensive organisations if they start valuing knowledge and use it as a powerful tool to meet business challenges. Knowledge repository implementation will add value to the success of knowledge management by providing a new platform for continuous learning process. The process of creating, managing and storing knowledge requires a new shift that now focuses on knowledge sharing to leverage the organisational capital asset which is the knowledge. The entire concept of knowledge management will not work if a knowledge sharing culture is not established. This paper describes concepts such as the 3C‟s and CoPs which need to be incorporated to guarantee the success of knowledge management. By examining the application of models and frameworks for knowledge management a framework for a building knowledge sharing culture is recommended. No knowledge can be managed if sharing capabilities are not supported with the cultural and technological shifts. With this understanding, the framework includes 5 key enablers which are simplified and presented as a checklist to guide organisational interest in implementing knowledge management. Methods which can be adopted to encourage the success of the recommended framework are then discussed. Knowledge management with the strong support of a knowledge sharing culture will raise any organisation to a new level for meeting business challenges This can be achieved with the creation of knowledge repositories and generating knowledge workers as part of their business strategy. Keywords: Knowledge management, knowledge sharing, models, framework and key enablers.
1.
Introduction
Organisations in today‟s world are viewing a new business strategy which includes knowledge management as their ultimate goal for competition advantage and success factors. According to the Head of Knowledge Management in Hindustan Lever Limited, “knowledge management refers to all systematic activities for the creation and sharing of knowledge that connect people to people and people to information” (Murty, 2004). Knowledge management is not just about capturing and disseminating knowledge but it Palvinderjit Kaur
is also about the sharing element that is the most important aspect that is still difficult to be established and achieved by organisations. The reason for this is that knowledge is known to be the most powerful asset to an individual. Authors such as Koulopoulas and Frappaolo (1999) and Polanyi (1964) highlight that the only irreplaceable capital organisations possess is their knowledge. Regardless of the fact that knowledge is either explicit or tacit, it is important to be shared and improved continuously. Churman (1971) mentions that knowledge is a collection of information that resides in the person‟s mind.
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2.
Knowledge
It is true, explicit knowledge can be easily stored compared to tacit knowledge. Explicit knowledge concentrates on formal and systematic documentation that is made public to all domain users (Conway and Silgar, 2003) but it is the tacit knowledge which evolves from experience and intuition which is not being shared and explored (Cornell et al, 2003). It is now incredibly important for organisations to value and manage both the explicit and the tacit knowledge and should seek ways creating, storing, finding and acquiring this knowledge with the model suggested by Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995). This model allows conceptualisation of knowledge which is crucial as it is known as “justified belief and commitment based on the individual capacity to take the effective action” stated by Alavi and Leider (2001). In addition Davenport and Prusak (1998) noted that organisations should view knowledge as a “fluid mix of frame experiences, values, contextual information and expert insight that provides a framework for evaluating and incorporating new experiences and information”. Therefore organisations should focus on sharing their knowledge especially using documentation and repositories. The knowledge should include tacit knowledge from business processes, routines and norms which encapsulate the application of best practices to become knowledge intensive organisation as suggested by Malhotra (2004).
2.1 Knowledge Organisation
Intensive
“A knowledge intensive organisation relies on human capital and knowledge as being a source of competitive advantage, where knowledge has more importance than other inputs such as physical or financial capital” (Starbuck, 1992). Knowledge is an intangible resource for an organisation (Svieby, 1977), utilising this resource becomes the source of innovation and strategic renewal for the success criteria of knowledge sharing. Nonaka and Takeuchi‟s model can be used to focus on the creation of knowledge, known as the Knowledge Value (KnoVa) (Tissen, et al, 2000) to start the knowledge sharing culture. David Owens, Vice President of Knowledge Management at Unisys Corp quoted “Only 2% Palvinderjit Kaur
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of information gets written down and the rest is in people‟s heads” (Hickins, 1999). He is concerned as he believes that the need to create a knowledge intensive organisation becomes crucial because the organisation‟s risk will include the loss of knowledge when an employee leaves the organisation. Therefore the individual should be allowed and encouraged to share knowledge. Knowledge storing and sharing should be supported with repositories that can be accessed by all employees suggested by Brown and Woodland (1999). Swart (2003) defines “knowledge intensive organisations in terms of their emphasis on the nature and quality of their highly skilled human capital. In addition, work processes that create market value through knowledge and the deployment of the knowledge involving innovation, initiative and competence should be built into the organisation”. Therefore it becomes extremely important for the survival of any organisation to be knowledge intensive with the establishment of knowledge repositories that can be shared by the employees in the organisation.
2.2
Knowledge Repositories
The relationship between data, information and knowledge is important to be understood (Furlong, 2001). Data are raw facts such as figures that can be stored easily. The data becomes information when the human mind interprets the combination of data in a more meaningful format, such as a report. As information resides in human minds it will become knowledge only when more and more valuable ideas, insights and interpretations are created, stored and shared. This is only possible if knowledge repositories are created as discussed by Marchand (2000) and Stewart (1999). Authors such as Davenport and Marchand (2000), Bukowitz and Williamns (1999), Davenport and Prusak (2000), Stewart (1999), Nonaka and Takeuchi (1999) and Koulopoulos and Frappaolo (1999) all state that knowledge repositories are “a set of knowledge categories, the location of the knowledge and in some cases its condition and value”. (Davenport T.H, 1999) Therefore organisations should make these knowledge repositories accessible using knowledge maps or expertise directories to Page 2
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enhance knowledge sharing capabilities. The Knowledge Life Cycle model can be used for knowledge creation and is good for identification of tacit and explicit knowledge (Polanyi, 1997). Based on a review of the ABCs of Knowledge Management compiled by Santosus and Surmacs in 2001 “explicit knowledge consists of anything that can be documented, achieved and codified often with the help of Information Technology (IT) but it is harder to grasp the concept of tacit knowledge the know-how contained in people‟s heads”. The challenges are to create knowledge repositories that will recognise, generate, manage and share tacit knowledge. This will provide an excellent solution for competitive edge within the organisation ensuring that best practices and knowledge are safe and will be just one click away.
2.3
Importance of Knowledge Management
In a nutshell, organisations needs to recognise the power of knowledge management as it is a way to obtain the most valuable intellectual assets as confirmed by Santosus and Surmacs (2001). The advantages of knowledge management that they identify are: 1.
The fostering of “innovation by encouraging the free flow of ideas”.
2.
Improvement in “customer service by streamlining response times”.
3.
Boosting revenue by getting products or services to market faster.
4.
Enhancing “employee retention” rates by recognising “the value of employees‟ knowledge and rewarding them for it”.
5.
“Streamlining operations and reducing costs by eliminating redundant or unnecessary processes”.
The same review was supported by Robert.E.Cole (2002) by the claims that organisations will benefit in areas such as globalisation, global integration, increased growth and scope and networking, as employees will be able to manage, share and retain their knowledge. This becomes possible with knowledge repositories and Information Technology which allows collaboration and
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sharing to work with the power of the internet and networking. One clear discovery is that if organisations are not moving forward to knowledge management then they will face some of the following warning signs that are not healthy for their business‟ success. The warning signs are: 1.
Repetition of mistakes.
2.
Duplication of work.
3.
Failure to share good ideas.
4.
Loss of competitive position in the market place.
5.
Inefficiencies technology.
in
launching
new
It becomes equally reflective that with the incorporation of knowledge management, warning signs can be reduced and organisations should obtain benefits such as having a dynamic and ever growing number of activities and knowledge that can be freely shared if knowledge sharing culture is cultivated in their organisation.
3.
Knowledge Sharing
Hjelmsoe (2003) stated that “knowledge management is 5% technology and 95% management”. The prime aim of “knowledge sharing is to share and enrich organisational knowledge by cultivating the culture of sharing at the individual level right up to management level” (Gurteen, 1999). Knowledge management includes sets of principles, processes, organisation structures and technology applications which are required to be shared and leveraged if the sharing culture is cultivated. Webster‟s New Collegiate Dictionary (Gurteen, 1999) defined culture as “the integrated pattern of human behaviour that includes thought, speech, action, and artefacts and depends upon man's capacity for learning and transmitting knowledge”. This culture (Gurteen, 1999) should be transparent in organisation and the establishment of community of practices should be formed (Amin, et.al,.20001). Research was conducted in Sugar Land Texas, USA, where a team was set up with common or community goals to a problem solving situation. The team was reported to be highly
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motivated and was experiencing a new situation where multiple ideas, expertise and skills was seen being discussed and shared among the team members to decide on the suggested solution to the problem domain. The team was also reported to be collaborating, pooling and disseminating their collective experiences using the knowledge repositories made available. It is noted that the knowledge sharing process will not only encouraged the team member but will lead the organisation to become knowledge learning organisation. Senge (1999) suggests that “the rate at which organisations learn may become the only sustainable source of competitive advantage”. Generative learning or double loop learning (Argyris, 1997) can be applied by organisations where any experiences or feedback that had improved from the existing knowledge is made compulsory to be stored in knowledge repositories. This application will encourage continuous learning and will be the base for ongoing examination which can be part of evaluation and measurement process. This is required for the benchmarking and checking the optimisation of the knowledge and the way the organisation goes about using the knowledge for defining and solving problems. As many organisations are rigorously adopting knowledge management with the best people producing and applying the best technology, using the best product or service, seems to be more effective with the cultural shift and the creation of Communities of Practice (CoPs) within the knowledge sharing domain.
3.1
Communities (CoPs)
of
Practices
by Wenger (2004) were used in the survey. The elements are: 1.
Domain – Task, team and area of “knowledge” to be explored.
2.
Community – “group of people for whom the domain is relevant, the quality of the relationships among members and the definition of the boundary between inside and outside of the community”.
3.
Practice – “body of knowledge, methods, tools, stories, cases and documents which members share and develop”.
From the survey conducted with 50 participants, more than 80% were interested in establishing CoPs in their organisation as it was not formally done and highlighted that the concept had started but needs improvement especially for the knowledge repositories as it lacked the technological and cultural establishment which were not fully formalised and supported by management. Therefore senior management involvement is important in the creation of CoPs and the sharing of knowledge should be value as one of the business strategy and communicated to all employees. Denning (2004) supported his claim by stating that with CoPs established in organisations, it increases sharing of common interest or passion in an area of competence which results in a continuous learning effort. Opinion leaders who believe in practices and behaviour should be appointed to the CoPs to lead the sharing and management of the knowledge (Cheng, 2002) because knowledge is power for organisations in today‟s world.
3.2 Communities of Practice (CoPs) are workers or experts who share and utilise their knowledge assets. Wenger (2004) defines “CoPs as groups of people who share a passion for something that they know how to do (tacit knowledge) and who interact regularly in order to learn to do it better”. CoPs are “practitioner who use knowledge in their activities and are in the best position to manage and share the knowledge” (Wenger, 2004). A survey was conducted by the author in 2005 using Global shared service centre with IT excellence and one University College in Malaysia as sample case study to define the impact of CoPs. Three key elements suggested
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Why share knowledge?
Generally, organisations do realise the need for knowledge sharing. Gurteen (1999) believes that if an organisation does not cultivate a knowledge sharing culture then it will face the following difficulties: 1.
Intangible products such as ideas, processes, and information will take “a growing share of global trade from the traditional, tangible goods of the manufacturing economy”.
2.
There will be an increasing turnover of staff.” People don‟t take a job for
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life any more. When someone leaves an organisation their knowledge walks out of door with them”. 3.
4.
An organisation will not know what it knows. “Large global or even small geographically dispersed organisation does not know what they know. Expertise learnt and applied in one part of the organisation is not leveraged in another”. There will be accelerated change in technology, business and social needs which will get unnoticed if not being shared.
Organisations that have successfully implemented knowledge sharing are Ernst and Young, Anderson Consulting, IBM and British Petroleum. For the global shared service centre used in the survey it was suggested that they follow in the footsteps of the successful organisations, meanwhile for the university college the example of Czeh University that implemented knowledge sharing in their academic community should be seen as a good example (Cesh et.al.,2003). These successful organisations explained that with the use of technology, such as telephone, e-mail, video conferencing and the internet, knowledge can then be easily shared regardless of the place and time dimension. It will be a tremendous effort for organisations to analyse how and why people do not want to share knowledge. This lack of willingness to share has become the drawback for knowledge management success.
3.3 Why people do not want to share knowledge? Analysis by Skyrme (2002) highlighted that companies should analyse reasons why knowledge sharing is not taking place in their organisation. The following list highlights the key issues identified: 1.
Knowledge is power therefore employees are worried about losing their job security.
2.
People feel superior therefore they do not want to learn from others.
3.
Not realising the power of useful knowledge because unaware of sharing of best practices.
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4.
People feels that the effort of sharing knowledge required trust and support that might not be encouraged and recognised by the organisation.
5.
Lack of time as people feel it takes more work to create and store knowledge. It feels like an additional task besides their existing duties.
6.
Fear of “inadequate technology, internal competition and top down decision making” barriers.
One of the solutions to overcome the above problems is to apply the 3C‟s of the knowledge sharing concept.
3.4 The 3C’s of Knowledge Sharing The 3C‟s of knowledge sharing suggested by Skyrme in 2002 is an application and proven theory that organisations should be applied to initialise the effort of knowledge management: 1.
Culture change – “the way we do things here”
Organisations should carry out a culture audit through questionnaires and interviews to solve the issue pointed out by Skyrme in section 3.3. For example, Siemens incorporated an audit culture and built their CoPs with a rewards scheme to encourage the knowledge sharing capabilities.
2.
Challenging through Collaboration and Competition
By applying competition in a healthy way Skyrme‟s first four key issues can be improved. This can be achieved through the implementation of peer reviews; continuous benchmarking of internal processes and functions. Standards of measurement need to be reviewed and benchmarked for leveraging learning and sharing within the organisation.
3.
Commitment
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it‟s about improving the way things get done by sharing the little things”. (Gurteen, 1999)
One of the most important aspects of knowledge sharing is commitment and this should start right with a management motivation scheme. Rewarding systems and a development programme should be in place. Groupware functions and application details confirm that the 3C‟s would increase communication, collaboration and coordination (Chaffey, 1998).
3.5 The Knowledge Sharing Culture Knowledge sharing strategy application is important to encourage “people to work together effectively” (Skyrme, 2002). This strategy implementation will allow and direct any organisation to achieve the “ultimate goal of knowledge management” that is to increase sharing of knowledge and productivity of its employees. The knowledge sharing strategy (Gurteen, 1999) includes: Rewarding knowledge sharing
Motivating knowledge sharing
To encourage “knowledge sharing, an ideas database should be created and people should be paid for their contributions, regardless of quality whether the ideas are brought to fruition or plain crazy”. Knowledge sharing should be part of personal interest as knowledge sharing is power. To make “knowledge sharing a reality sharing individual knowledge helps them do their jobs more effectively, helps them retain their jobs, helps them in their personal development and career progression; rewards them for getting things done” and brings more personal recognition. “By sharing your knowledge, you gain more then you lose. Sharing knowledge is a synergistic process, you get more out than you put in, collaboration is important. Knowledge sharing is not only about sharing great ideas but
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Making it happen
Knowledge sharing starts at individual, department, team or organisation level with the concept of CoPs. Fundamentally, “sharing is about being more open” in the workplace and the relationship with others.
The role of technology
Technology plays a crucial transformational role as it encourages collaboration and sharing of knowledge globally with the usage of internet, intranet and groupware systems.
Together with the knowledge sharing strategy identified above, organisations can apply the following 7 steps/incentives for sharing suggested by Skyrme (2002) to enhance the knowledge sharing strategy. 1.
Hire people who will share – Texas Instruments started having interactive interviews at their recruiting process.
2.
Develop trust – a professional code of conduct was used by all employees at Buckman Laboratories.
3.
Vary motivations – “Gemini and Ernst & Young applied incentives at three levels. A solid business case for senior executives; relevant benefits for departments” and incentive should be provided to the employee with positive behaviours and results.
4.
Show public recognition – “Harris has a “wall of fame” gallery of employees who have excelled at work”, meanwhile McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken fast food restaurants display the employee of the month.
5.
Reorganise for sharing – “Northrop Grumman uses integrated product teams backed with mentoring programme”.
6.
Create communities – “The World Bank uses electronic bulletin boards”, which focus on relevant topics and increases the use globally on topics that the CoPs are sharing.
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7.
Develop leaders – “Capital One formed a group from natural knowledge champions to promote knowledge sharing and develop training”.
In total, knowledge management must connect people to information across a broad spectrum in the company. This connection includes creating a knowledge sharing capability in processes and encouraging people to share and use technology to collaborate on global knowledge repositories and hence successfully allow them to contribute to an organisation‟s strategic goals. Increased productivity, accelerated learning and faster decision making will be obtained with the scheme of incentives and motivation. To introduce knowledge management, knowledge sharing culture need to be should start at the individual level with the creation of CoPs and application of popular knowledge management models and frameworks.
4
Models and Frameworks
Knowledge management involves the creation of value from an organisation‟s intangible assets, therefore according to Alavi and Leider (1999) “many organisations are developing systems designed specifically to facilitate the sharing and integration of knowledge” (Montaano et al, 2004). Venters (2001) highlighted that knowledge management can be concluded and described as the essence of knowledge as either “tacit” or “explicit”. “Tacit knowledge is personal; context specific and therefore hard to formalise and communicate, meanwhile explicit or codified knowledge refers to knowledge that is transmittable in a formal and systematic language” (Nonaka and Tackecuhi, 1995). The model created by Nonaka and Takeuchi called the “Knowledge Conversion” model or “Knowledge Life Cycle” is an important key element to knowledge sharing. Organisational knowledge creation process is based on a basic framework that contains two dimensions. One is “epistemological that explains that only individuals can create knowledge therefore it is a process that organisationally amplifies the knowledge created by individuals and crystallises it and another is the ontological that relates to the interaction between tacit and explicit
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knowledge” Leverde (2000).This model is also called the SECI process. Knowledge includes both the tacit and explicit knowledge and is stored and accomplished through systems, structures and culture. The four steps of the SECI process are described below by KnowledgeBoard (2002). Socialisation – is the “process that transfers tacit knowledge from one person to tacit knowledge of another person”. This can be achieved through sharing experiences. Externalisation – is the process of converting tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge amongst individuals within a group with activities such as metaphors, hypotheses and models. Combination – Having completed the first three steps, “explicit knowledge may then combine through a process of systemising concepts into a knowledge system or repositories. This can be achieved by individuals exchanging and combining knowledge through media. The media are documents, meetings, telephone conversations and computerised communication networks. Formal education and training programmes also constitute this form of conversion”. Internalisation – is the “process of understanding and absorbing explicit knowledge into tacit knowledge held by the individual”. This can be done with activities such as “learning by doing” and “documentation read by individuals where the ideas are combined with the tacit knowledge, such as an individual possesses”. Nonaka and Takeuchi (1999) also developed the Five Phase model for knowledge creation. The model is similar to SECI model as describe below: 1. Sharing tacit knowledge – “tacit knowledge held by individuals” combining experience and best practice. 2. Creating concepts – this is the most intensive phase. “Once a shared model is formed in the field of interaction (tacitexplicit), the self-organising team articulates through continuous dialogue to form a collective reflection” of the knowledge. The process then verbalises the knowledge into words and phrases which is then crystallised into explicit concepts (externalisation). 3. Justifying concepts – determine if “the newly created concepts are truly worthwhile for the organisation and society”.
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4. Building an archetype – converting the justified concepts into “tangible or concrete archetype”. “An archetype can be considered as the prototype of new product development process”. 5. Cross levelling of knowledge (spiral process) –This interactive spiral process takes place intra and inter organisationally to create and grow knowledge as knowledge creation is a never ending process. (Tannembaum and Alliger, 2000) Systematic combination of the aspects stated below in the cross levelling in knowledge and the interactive spiral process are important to examine the effectiveness of knowledge management implementation in any organisation (Leverde, 2000).The aspects are: Cross levelling of knowledge - (spiral process): 1.
Knowledge Sharing – is the “extent to which people share their knowledge”.
2.
Knowledge Accessibility – is the “extent to which people have accesses to the information they need to make decisions, solve problems, and perform job tasks and service customers”.
3.
Knowledge Assimilation – is the “extent to which people learn or assimilate the knowledge they need to perform well”.
4.
Knowledge Application– is the “extent to which people apply and use knowledge to effectively make decisions, solve problems and service customers”.
Besides aspects above, Rastogi (2000) and Leverde (2000) also suggested that management should include the following set of operations in their consideration for knowledge management. Identification – of the “knowledge required for a competitively effective implementation of the enterprise strategy”. Mapping – “the existing and available knowledge including expertise and skills”. Capturing – “the existing knowledge through its formalised representation”. Acquiring – “the needed knowledge and information including know-how”. Storing – “the existing, acquired, and created knowledge in properly indexed and interlinked knowledge repositories”.
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Sharing – “knowledge through its automatic access and distribution to users on the basis of their needs and interests”. Applying – “support of decisions, actions, problem solving, providing job aids and training”. Creating (advanced stage by Knowledge Management in firms) – “generating or discovering new knowledge through Research and Development, experimentation, lessons learned, creative thinking and innovation”. In relation to models and frameworks availability within the discipline of knowledge management, (Montano et al, 2004) suggested that some of industry successful implementation are important to be examined to determine the models similarities and differences to guide the recommendation to build knowledge sharing culture framework. The similarities of the models and framework findings highlighted that Ernst & Young, Knowledge Associates, Marquardt and O‟Dell use a set of activities for knowledge management where the emphasis is on a knowledge cycle. This is inclusive of tasks such as acquiring knowledge by Anderson Consulting, Knowledge Associates and Marquardt. American Management System, Ernst and Young and O‟Dell state the first step is to find knowledge and the collect the combination of “tacit and explicit knowledge”. The generation and creation of knowledge r needs to be ongoing and continuous learning process. It was analysed that that the same models suggested by Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) with the application of five-phase model of Tannembum and Alliger (2000) is noted to be the most popular combination for knowledge management application in many organisations. The difference is that Arthur Anderson Consulting uses a hybrid collection of frameworks such as knowledge cycle and conversion of tacit and explicit knowledge but firstly the model actually evaluates and defines the role of knowledge before aligning to their business strategy as defined by the steps of Syrme (2000). As for Anderson Consulting., the strategy first is to identify processes, cultural and technological aspects. Conducive environment for knowledge sharing will require crucial application of two major elements which include the motivation and recognition as the key success factors for knowledge sharing and is suggested by American Management System.
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This can be confirmed with the establishment of the intensification scheme and Community of Practices (CoPs). Implementation of a feedback mechanism in Arthur Anderson Consulting prepared the organisations to create an environment for continuous learning which provided freedom to share and improve the existing repositories. This knowledge has now guided the framework for building the knowledge sharing culture.
5. Recommendation for building a knowledge-sharing framework
of old knowledge with the modification on new knowledge must be placed and stored using knowledge repositories in the format of identified knowledge categories or maps. Individual level within the CoPs needs to identify and select one leader who will be called as opinion leader to guide and influence the teams to share their knowledge. To motivate the CoPs to share knowledge, cultural audit and rewarding schemes needs to be communicated and integrated within the organisation. 3.
From the preceding investigation of models and frameworks, it can be seen that knowledge management includes much more than a knowledge cycle or tasks. Therefore the steps that can be taken as a holistic view to create a generic framework to build the knowledge sharing culture will require the following: 1.
Organisations should emphasise on cultural aspects as claimed by Bob Buckmans of Bukman Labs (Montano,et,.al. 2004), who stated that 90% of knowledge management effort in any organisation is cultural and this was confirmed by Larry Bobbitt of Anderson Consulting who explained that the first step is to evaluate and define the role of knowledge as this will takes up 80% of the effort to perform the cultural shift. This can be confirmed with the establishment of the 3C‟s of Knowledge Sharing and the steps suggested by Skyrme (2000) to help build a knowledge sharing culture. This will include the analysis of the business strategy, how to motivate employees with the establishment of community of practices (CoPs) as defined by Wenger (2004). Continuous learning should be extended to other groups to meet corporate business strategy. (Senge, 1990).
2.
The second step is to focus on knowledge; this refers to the Nonaka and Takeuchi Model (1995), the knowledge life cycle or conversion. The identification of tacit and explicit knowledge should be identified for the CoPs. The process of knowledge sharing should start with creation, acquiring and generating of new knowledge. As for the continuous learning process, acquisition
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Technologies, methods and tools are important in the effort to build and share of knowledge and will include the concept of Computer Supported Cooperative Work. This concept will assist in identifying the workflow of the knowledge sharing, with the assistance of technology that will allow the sharing and dissemination of knowledge globally. Accessibility to workflow, document systems, real time collaborations, online learning systems, portalisation and custom web applications are some of the technology enablers being utilised (Early & Associates, 2005).
4.
Establishing a framework should include a measurement and feedback step as suggested by Arthur Anderson Consulting. Continuous learning will involve the implementation of feedback mechanisms to enable an iterative process to focus on the key enablers that (identified below).
6 Identification of Key Enablers The key enablers in this section are recommended for any global shared service centre, academic institute or any organisation wishing to setup a knowledge sharing culture.
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Framework for building Knowledge Sharing Culture Knowledge Management
Cultural
Knowledge
Feedback
Knowledge Sharing
Technology
CoPs
1) Culture The impact of culture was defined in the recommendation of the 3C‟s and is seen to be extremely crucial. It is the first alignment in the organisation strategy. Organisations should focus on the following cultural issues: The employees understanding of knowledge management and their value asset that is their intellectual capital. A review of the current workflow to check if there is any information or knowledge sharing capabilities in existence. Interviewing personnel especially middle management, who will be identified as the opinion leaders. A review to check if knowledge sharing best practice is conducive for the case study environment with the analysis of management strategy and processes, technology in the current situation. Identification of the community of practices (CoPs‟) to be used as the prime source of users that will be piloted for this framework utilisation. Review of a questionnaire to allow the community of practice (CoPs) to provide their understanding and knowledge awareness of knowledge management. 2) Knowledge Identification The Nonaka and Takeuchi knowledge life cycle model identified a number of core steps that organisation can apply to pilot the identification of knowledge: Analysis of the report of opinion leaders with regard to the community of practice (CoPs) feedback. This can include the warning signs such as duplication and
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waste of effort in performing the same tasks that might not benefit the teams because it is not captured or not being collaborated. Identification of the workflow to capture the knowledge that is shared in the community. This will include the acquiring, finding and generation or creation of knowledge that they can share and document in knowledge repositories. Mission and Vision plan statement should include knowledge management is part of their business strategy. Management should create 3C‟s culture and incorporate rewarding scheme. 3) Knowledge sharing and accessibility – Community of Practices (CoPs) The CoPs will be formed and the knowledge sharing capabilities need to be established with the following: Granting access to the CoPs to access the generic knowledge repositories using the technology support. Creation of workflow to pilot and to identify how and who will be creating, storing and generating knowledge. Spiral process model can be utilised to ensure collaboration effort and sharing takes place using knowledge repositories. Rewards and benefits used as motivation factors using the 3C‟s plan. 4) Technology enabler Technology is not a driver for knowledge management but it is rather the cultural shift. But it needs to be in place to allow the CoPs to collaborate and share knowledge globally. Organisations should review the following: Installation of Computer Supported and Cooperative systems (CSCW) such as groupware systems that allow knowledge to be shared regardless of the time and place dimension.. All information and knowledge being stored and delivered electronically using the knowledge repositories. A focus to monitor and to minimise duplication and rework.
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A focus on simplicity and ease of use rather than complex functionality.
benchmarking the establishment of knowledge management in the organisation.
Avoiding the need to completely rebuild sites as new technologies and opportunities arise.
Organisations should start off with the review of the 3C‟s and the implementation of 7 steps or incentives to enhance and encourage knowledge sharing to be cultivated in their organisation with the concept of CoPs .
Ensuring the technology is reliable and provides accessibility to the community of practice to reuse and acquire knowledge. 5) Feedback and Measurement Feedback and measurement will be required to test and manage the acceptance of the knowledge being share. This is important also to monitor the continuous learning process. The following can be use as checklist: Data collection and storage processes and measurement plan and feedback will be placed as a benchmark. Information is classified and integrated through common data definitions, standards and naming conventions. These should be discussed by the opinion leader. Maintenance review processes to ensure the ongoing currency of the current web presence and content being uploaded on the intranet or website. Planning and identifying requirements and options for core training and skills development in information management.
Therefore why wait, the framework for building the knowledge sharing culture should be adopted to obtain and manage the most valuable intellectual asset (knowledge). By adopting a knowledge sharing culture, the key foundation for collaboration can be obtained and will increase the advantages of the organisation to gain a competitive edge. References Alavi, M and Leider,D.1999, Knowledge Management Systems: Emerging Views and Practices From the Field [online], Available from http://csdl.computer.org/ comp/proceedings/hicss/1999/0001/07/00 017009.pdf, [Accessed on 20/2/2005] Amin,et.al,. 2001, Building a Knowledge Sharing Culture,, Sugar Land Texas, USA. Argyris,C. (1997), Organisational Learning: Theory ,Method and Practice, Addison Wesley. Bontis,N. 1998, Intellectual Capital, An Exploratory Study that Develops Measures and Models, Management Decision.
Conclusion In conclusion, organisations should apply knowledge management in their business strategy to benefit from the creation of knowledge, the powerful asset that should be stored in repositories. In relation to this, organisations would be able to develop employees into knowledge workers who can share their experiences to generate a bigger pool of knowledge. Models and frameworks discussion in this paper provided a new direction for any organisation to adopt the recommended framework to start becoming knowledge intensive organisation. The framework as it is known is a recommendation for building knowledge sharing culture because it concentrates on shared knowledge which is essential. The key enablers that are identified are the most important aspects for
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Brown,R.B. and Woodlanf,M.J. 1999, Managing Knowledge [online], Available from http://www.tlainc.com/articl79.htm, [Accessed on 28/2/2005] Cech, et al, 2003, Knowledge Management and Czech Universities, Department of Information Technologies, University of Hradec Kralove, 3rd European Knowledge Management Summer School. Chaffey.D. 1998, Groupware, Workflow and Intranets, Reengineering the Enterprise with Collbaorative Software, Digital Press. ChengM,Y. 2002, Socialising Knowledge Management: The Influence of the Opinion Leader [online], Available from http://www.tlainc.com/articl42.htm, [Accessed on 10/3/2005]
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Churman ,C.W.1971, The Design of Inquiring Systems, New York, Basic Books.
Hinkins,M.(1999), Xerox Shares Knowledge, Management Review.
Cole.E.R. 2002, Knowledge Management [online], Available from http://ieas.berkeley.edu/faculty/cole.html, [Accessed on 1/3/2005]
Hjelmsoe, P.2003, Master of Knowledge Management [online], Available from http://km.ittoolbox.com/common/print.as p?I=90719, [Accessed on 3/2/2005]
Conway.S and Silgar.C, 2002. The Knowledge Management, Unlocking Knowledge Assets, Solutions from Microsoft.
Hurley, et.al,. 2005, Knowledge Management and the Nonprofit Industry: a within and between Approach, Journal of Knowledge Management Practice [online], Available from http://www.tlainc.com.articl79.htm, [Accessed on 17/2/2005]
Cornell,et,al,.2003, Knowledge Community, Available from http://www.knowledgeboard.com/ community/zones, [Accessed on 16/3/2005] Denham, 1999, Community of Practice Forum [online] , Available from http://www.brint.com/wwwboard/messages/ 6190.html, [Accessed on 28/2/2005] Denning,S. 2004, Communities for Knowledge Management [online], CR Web Consulting, Available from http://www.stevedenning.com/communities _knowledge _management.html, [Accessed on 16/3/2005] Davenport,T. and Prusak,L. (2000) Working Knowledge : How Organisations Manage What they Know, United States of America, Harvard Business Press. Devenport.T.H. 1999, KM Some Principles of Knowledge Management [online], Graduate School of Business, University of Texas, Available from http://www.mccombs.utexas.edu/kman/k mprin.htm, [Accessed on 26/2/2005] Early & Associates. 2005, A “Holistic “ Approach to KM [online], Available from http://www.early.com/Early_Report/ER_ Holistic_Approach_to_KM, [Accessed on 16/3/2005] Furlong,G. 2001, Knowledge Management and the Competitive Edge [online], University of Greenwich Business School. Gurteen,D. 1999, Creating a Knowledge Sharing Culture, Knowledge Management Magazine Volume 5 [Online], Available at http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen. nsf/, [Accessed on 3/2/2005]
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Its
Koulopoulos,T & Frappaolo,c 1999, Smart things to know about Knowledge Management, United Kingdom,Capstone Publishing Limited. Laverde, et.al,. 2003, Knowledge Processes: An overview of the Principal Models, 3rd European Knowledge Management Summer School. Malhotra,Y.1998, Knowledge Management and Learning Organisation [online], Available at http://www.brint.net/forums , [Accessed on 5/3/2005] Malhotra, Y. 2004, Why Knowledge Management Systems Fail? Enablers and Constraints of Knowledge Management in Human Enterprises, Syracuse University, School of Management. Mantano,et,al,. 2004, A Systems Thinking Framework for Knowledge Management, KnowledgeBoard,2002, Knowledge Management Models: a state of the art [Online], Available from http://www.providersedge.com/docs/km_ articles/KM_Models__A_State_of_Art.pdf, [Accessed on 5/3/2005] Murty.K.S. 2004, Role of HR in Institutionalizing Knowledge Management in a company [online],Hindustan Level Limited, Available from http://www.kwork.org/White_Papers/hrkm.html, [Accessed on 5/3/2005] Nonaka, I and Takeuchi,h. 1995, The Knowledge Creating Company, Oxford University Press,Inc.
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Polanyi, M.1964, The Study of Man, Chicago University. Rao.M,.2003, Eight C‟s of KM success [online], Available from http://www.destinationkm.com/print/defa ult.asp?ArticleID=1085, [Accessed on 10/3/2005] Santosus,M. and Surmacs,J. 2001, The ABCs of Knowledge Management [online], Knowledge Management Research Center, Available from http://www.cio.com/research/knowledge/ edit/kmabcs.html, [Accessed on 7/3/2005] Sveiby,K. (1997) „The Knowledge Organisation [online], Available from http://www.sveiby.com.au/KIS1.html, [Accessed on 15/2/2005] Skyrme,D.J,.2002, The 3Cs of Knowledge Sharing: Culture, Competition and Commitment.[online], Available at http://eee.skyrme.com/updates/u64_f1.ht m, [ Accessed on 4/2/2005] Stewart, T, A, 1999, Knowledge Management and Chief Knowledge Officers, Available from http://informationr.net/ir/81/paper143.html, [Accessed on 16/3/2005] Swart,J., Kinnie,N. 2003, Sharing Knowledge on Knowledge Intensive Firms, Human Resource Management Journal. Tissen, et,.al,. 2000, The Knowledge Dividend, Creating High Performance Companies through Value based Knowledge Management, Prentice Hall. Venters.W. 2001, Literature Review for CSand: Knowledge Management [online], Available from http://www.csand.org.uk/Documents/COP1001-02kmLitRev.pdf, [Accessed on 2/3/2005] Wenger.E. 2004, Knowledge Management as a doughnut: Shaping your knowledge strategy through communities of practices, Ivey Business Journal Improving the Practice of Management.
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by Palvinderjit Kaur
April 2007
UCTI Working Paper WP-07-04
Knowledge Management: A Framework for building a Knowledge Sharing Culture Palvinderjit Kaur Asia Pacific University College of Technology & Innovation Technology Park Malaysia Bukit Jalil, 5700 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia April 2007 [email protected] Abstract Knowledge management has now become the ultimate goal and business strategy in many organisations to gain the competitive edge. Knowledge is known to be the most powerful and intellectual asset in organisation which require managing and sharing capabilities. Organisations will be able to upgrade their position by becoming knowledge intensive organisations if they start valuing knowledge and use it as a powerful tool to meet business challenges. Knowledge repository implementation will add value to the success of knowledge management by providing a new platform for continuous learning process. The process of creating, managing and storing knowledge requires a new shift that now focuses on knowledge sharing to leverage the organisational capital asset which is the knowledge. The entire concept of knowledge management will not work if a knowledge sharing culture is not established. This paper describes concepts such as the 3C‟s and CoPs which need to be incorporated to guarantee the success of knowledge management. By examining the application of models and frameworks for knowledge management a framework for a building knowledge sharing culture is recommended. No knowledge can be managed if sharing capabilities are not supported with the cultural and technological shifts. With this understanding, the framework includes 5 key enablers which are simplified and presented as a checklist to guide organisational interest in implementing knowledge management. Methods which can be adopted to encourage the success of the recommended framework are then discussed. Knowledge management with the strong support of a knowledge sharing culture will raise any organisation to a new level for meeting business challenges This can be achieved with the creation of knowledge repositories and generating knowledge workers as part of their business strategy. Keywords: Knowledge management, knowledge sharing, models, framework and key enablers.
1.
Introduction
Organisations in today‟s world are viewing a new business strategy which includes knowledge management as their ultimate goal for competition advantage and success factors. According to the Head of Knowledge Management in Hindustan Lever Limited, “knowledge management refers to all systematic activities for the creation and sharing of knowledge that connect people to people and people to information” (Murty, 2004). Knowledge management is not just about capturing and disseminating knowledge but it Palvinderjit Kaur
is also about the sharing element that is the most important aspect that is still difficult to be established and achieved by organisations. The reason for this is that knowledge is known to be the most powerful asset to an individual. Authors such as Koulopoulas and Frappaolo (1999) and Polanyi (1964) highlight that the only irreplaceable capital organisations possess is their knowledge. Regardless of the fact that knowledge is either explicit or tacit, it is important to be shared and improved continuously. Churman (1971) mentions that knowledge is a collection of information that resides in the person‟s mind.
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2.
Knowledge
It is true, explicit knowledge can be easily stored compared to tacit knowledge. Explicit knowledge concentrates on formal and systematic documentation that is made public to all domain users (Conway and Silgar, 2003) but it is the tacit knowledge which evolves from experience and intuition which is not being shared and explored (Cornell et al, 2003). It is now incredibly important for organisations to value and manage both the explicit and the tacit knowledge and should seek ways creating, storing, finding and acquiring this knowledge with the model suggested by Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995). This model allows conceptualisation of knowledge which is crucial as it is known as “justified belief and commitment based on the individual capacity to take the effective action” stated by Alavi and Leider (2001). In addition Davenport and Prusak (1998) noted that organisations should view knowledge as a “fluid mix of frame experiences, values, contextual information and expert insight that provides a framework for evaluating and incorporating new experiences and information”. Therefore organisations should focus on sharing their knowledge especially using documentation and repositories. The knowledge should include tacit knowledge from business processes, routines and norms which encapsulate the application of best practices to become knowledge intensive organisation as suggested by Malhotra (2004).
2.1 Knowledge Organisation
Intensive
“A knowledge intensive organisation relies on human capital and knowledge as being a source of competitive advantage, where knowledge has more importance than other inputs such as physical or financial capital” (Starbuck, 1992). Knowledge is an intangible resource for an organisation (Svieby, 1977), utilising this resource becomes the source of innovation and strategic renewal for the success criteria of knowledge sharing. Nonaka and Takeuchi‟s model can be used to focus on the creation of knowledge, known as the Knowledge Value (KnoVa) (Tissen, et al, 2000) to start the knowledge sharing culture. David Owens, Vice President of Knowledge Management at Unisys Corp quoted “Only 2% Palvinderjit Kaur
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of information gets written down and the rest is in people‟s heads” (Hickins, 1999). He is concerned as he believes that the need to create a knowledge intensive organisation becomes crucial because the organisation‟s risk will include the loss of knowledge when an employee leaves the organisation. Therefore the individual should be allowed and encouraged to share knowledge. Knowledge storing and sharing should be supported with repositories that can be accessed by all employees suggested by Brown and Woodland (1999). Swart (2003) defines “knowledge intensive organisations in terms of their emphasis on the nature and quality of their highly skilled human capital. In addition, work processes that create market value through knowledge and the deployment of the knowledge involving innovation, initiative and competence should be built into the organisation”. Therefore it becomes extremely important for the survival of any organisation to be knowledge intensive with the establishment of knowledge repositories that can be shared by the employees in the organisation.
2.2
Knowledge Repositories
The relationship between data, information and knowledge is important to be understood (Furlong, 2001). Data are raw facts such as figures that can be stored easily. The data becomes information when the human mind interprets the combination of data in a more meaningful format, such as a report. As information resides in human minds it will become knowledge only when more and more valuable ideas, insights and interpretations are created, stored and shared. This is only possible if knowledge repositories are created as discussed by Marchand (2000) and Stewart (1999). Authors such as Davenport and Marchand (2000), Bukowitz and Williamns (1999), Davenport and Prusak (2000), Stewart (1999), Nonaka and Takeuchi (1999) and Koulopoulos and Frappaolo (1999) all state that knowledge repositories are “a set of knowledge categories, the location of the knowledge and in some cases its condition and value”. (Davenport T.H, 1999) Therefore organisations should make these knowledge repositories accessible using knowledge maps or expertise directories to Page 2
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enhance knowledge sharing capabilities. The Knowledge Life Cycle model can be used for knowledge creation and is good for identification of tacit and explicit knowledge (Polanyi, 1997). Based on a review of the ABCs of Knowledge Management compiled by Santosus and Surmacs in 2001 “explicit knowledge consists of anything that can be documented, achieved and codified often with the help of Information Technology (IT) but it is harder to grasp the concept of tacit knowledge the know-how contained in people‟s heads”. The challenges are to create knowledge repositories that will recognise, generate, manage and share tacit knowledge. This will provide an excellent solution for competitive edge within the organisation ensuring that best practices and knowledge are safe and will be just one click away.
2.3
Importance of Knowledge Management
In a nutshell, organisations needs to recognise the power of knowledge management as it is a way to obtain the most valuable intellectual assets as confirmed by Santosus and Surmacs (2001). The advantages of knowledge management that they identify are: 1.
The fostering of “innovation by encouraging the free flow of ideas”.
2.
Improvement in “customer service by streamlining response times”.
3.
Boosting revenue by getting products or services to market faster.
4.
Enhancing “employee retention” rates by recognising “the value of employees‟ knowledge and rewarding them for it”.
5.
“Streamlining operations and reducing costs by eliminating redundant or unnecessary processes”.
The same review was supported by Robert.E.Cole (2002) by the claims that organisations will benefit in areas such as globalisation, global integration, increased growth and scope and networking, as employees will be able to manage, share and retain their knowledge. This becomes possible with knowledge repositories and Information Technology which allows collaboration and
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sharing to work with the power of the internet and networking. One clear discovery is that if organisations are not moving forward to knowledge management then they will face some of the following warning signs that are not healthy for their business‟ success. The warning signs are: 1.
Repetition of mistakes.
2.
Duplication of work.
3.
Failure to share good ideas.
4.
Loss of competitive position in the market place.
5.
Inefficiencies technology.
in
launching
new
It becomes equally reflective that with the incorporation of knowledge management, warning signs can be reduced and organisations should obtain benefits such as having a dynamic and ever growing number of activities and knowledge that can be freely shared if knowledge sharing culture is cultivated in their organisation.
3.
Knowledge Sharing
Hjelmsoe (2003) stated that “knowledge management is 5% technology and 95% management”. The prime aim of “knowledge sharing is to share and enrich organisational knowledge by cultivating the culture of sharing at the individual level right up to management level” (Gurteen, 1999). Knowledge management includes sets of principles, processes, organisation structures and technology applications which are required to be shared and leveraged if the sharing culture is cultivated. Webster‟s New Collegiate Dictionary (Gurteen, 1999) defined culture as “the integrated pattern of human behaviour that includes thought, speech, action, and artefacts and depends upon man's capacity for learning and transmitting knowledge”. This culture (Gurteen, 1999) should be transparent in organisation and the establishment of community of practices should be formed (Amin, et.al,.20001). Research was conducted in Sugar Land Texas, USA, where a team was set up with common or community goals to a problem solving situation. The team was reported to be highly
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motivated and was experiencing a new situation where multiple ideas, expertise and skills was seen being discussed and shared among the team members to decide on the suggested solution to the problem domain. The team was also reported to be collaborating, pooling and disseminating their collective experiences using the knowledge repositories made available. It is noted that the knowledge sharing process will not only encouraged the team member but will lead the organisation to become knowledge learning organisation. Senge (1999) suggests that “the rate at which organisations learn may become the only sustainable source of competitive advantage”. Generative learning or double loop learning (Argyris, 1997) can be applied by organisations where any experiences or feedback that had improved from the existing knowledge is made compulsory to be stored in knowledge repositories. This application will encourage continuous learning and will be the base for ongoing examination which can be part of evaluation and measurement process. This is required for the benchmarking and checking the optimisation of the knowledge and the way the organisation goes about using the knowledge for defining and solving problems. As many organisations are rigorously adopting knowledge management with the best people producing and applying the best technology, using the best product or service, seems to be more effective with the cultural shift and the creation of Communities of Practice (CoPs) within the knowledge sharing domain.
3.1
Communities (CoPs)
of
Practices
by Wenger (2004) were used in the survey. The elements are: 1.
Domain – Task, team and area of “knowledge” to be explored.
2.
Community – “group of people for whom the domain is relevant, the quality of the relationships among members and the definition of the boundary between inside and outside of the community”.
3.
Practice – “body of knowledge, methods, tools, stories, cases and documents which members share and develop”.
From the survey conducted with 50 participants, more than 80% were interested in establishing CoPs in their organisation as it was not formally done and highlighted that the concept had started but needs improvement especially for the knowledge repositories as it lacked the technological and cultural establishment which were not fully formalised and supported by management. Therefore senior management involvement is important in the creation of CoPs and the sharing of knowledge should be value as one of the business strategy and communicated to all employees. Denning (2004) supported his claim by stating that with CoPs established in organisations, it increases sharing of common interest or passion in an area of competence which results in a continuous learning effort. Opinion leaders who believe in practices and behaviour should be appointed to the CoPs to lead the sharing and management of the knowledge (Cheng, 2002) because knowledge is power for organisations in today‟s world.
3.2 Communities of Practice (CoPs) are workers or experts who share and utilise their knowledge assets. Wenger (2004) defines “CoPs as groups of people who share a passion for something that they know how to do (tacit knowledge) and who interact regularly in order to learn to do it better”. CoPs are “practitioner who use knowledge in their activities and are in the best position to manage and share the knowledge” (Wenger, 2004). A survey was conducted by the author in 2005 using Global shared service centre with IT excellence and one University College in Malaysia as sample case study to define the impact of CoPs. Three key elements suggested
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Why share knowledge?
Generally, organisations do realise the need for knowledge sharing. Gurteen (1999) believes that if an organisation does not cultivate a knowledge sharing culture then it will face the following difficulties: 1.
Intangible products such as ideas, processes, and information will take “a growing share of global trade from the traditional, tangible goods of the manufacturing economy”.
2.
There will be an increasing turnover of staff.” People don‟t take a job for
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life any more. When someone leaves an organisation their knowledge walks out of door with them”. 3.
4.
An organisation will not know what it knows. “Large global or even small geographically dispersed organisation does not know what they know. Expertise learnt and applied in one part of the organisation is not leveraged in another”. There will be accelerated change in technology, business and social needs which will get unnoticed if not being shared.
Organisations that have successfully implemented knowledge sharing are Ernst and Young, Anderson Consulting, IBM and British Petroleum. For the global shared service centre used in the survey it was suggested that they follow in the footsteps of the successful organisations, meanwhile for the university college the example of Czeh University that implemented knowledge sharing in their academic community should be seen as a good example (Cesh et.al.,2003). These successful organisations explained that with the use of technology, such as telephone, e-mail, video conferencing and the internet, knowledge can then be easily shared regardless of the place and time dimension. It will be a tremendous effort for organisations to analyse how and why people do not want to share knowledge. This lack of willingness to share has become the drawback for knowledge management success.
3.3 Why people do not want to share knowledge? Analysis by Skyrme (2002) highlighted that companies should analyse reasons why knowledge sharing is not taking place in their organisation. The following list highlights the key issues identified: 1.
Knowledge is power therefore employees are worried about losing their job security.
2.
People feel superior therefore they do not want to learn from others.
3.
Not realising the power of useful knowledge because unaware of sharing of best practices.
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4.
People feels that the effort of sharing knowledge required trust and support that might not be encouraged and recognised by the organisation.
5.
Lack of time as people feel it takes more work to create and store knowledge. It feels like an additional task besides their existing duties.
6.
Fear of “inadequate technology, internal competition and top down decision making” barriers.
One of the solutions to overcome the above problems is to apply the 3C‟s of the knowledge sharing concept.
3.4 The 3C’s of Knowledge Sharing The 3C‟s of knowledge sharing suggested by Skyrme in 2002 is an application and proven theory that organisations should be applied to initialise the effort of knowledge management: 1.
Culture change – “the way we do things here”
Organisations should carry out a culture audit through questionnaires and interviews to solve the issue pointed out by Skyrme in section 3.3. For example, Siemens incorporated an audit culture and built their CoPs with a rewards scheme to encourage the knowledge sharing capabilities.
2.
Challenging through Collaboration and Competition
By applying competition in a healthy way Skyrme‟s first four key issues can be improved. This can be achieved through the implementation of peer reviews; continuous benchmarking of internal processes and functions. Standards of measurement need to be reviewed and benchmarked for leveraging learning and sharing within the organisation.
3.
Commitment
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it‟s about improving the way things get done by sharing the little things”. (Gurteen, 1999)
One of the most important aspects of knowledge sharing is commitment and this should start right with a management motivation scheme. Rewarding systems and a development programme should be in place. Groupware functions and application details confirm that the 3C‟s would increase communication, collaboration and coordination (Chaffey, 1998).
3.5 The Knowledge Sharing Culture Knowledge sharing strategy application is important to encourage “people to work together effectively” (Skyrme, 2002). This strategy implementation will allow and direct any organisation to achieve the “ultimate goal of knowledge management” that is to increase sharing of knowledge and productivity of its employees. The knowledge sharing strategy (Gurteen, 1999) includes: Rewarding knowledge sharing
Motivating knowledge sharing
To encourage “knowledge sharing, an ideas database should be created and people should be paid for their contributions, regardless of quality whether the ideas are brought to fruition or plain crazy”. Knowledge sharing should be part of personal interest as knowledge sharing is power. To make “knowledge sharing a reality sharing individual knowledge helps them do their jobs more effectively, helps them retain their jobs, helps them in their personal development and career progression; rewards them for getting things done” and brings more personal recognition. “By sharing your knowledge, you gain more then you lose. Sharing knowledge is a synergistic process, you get more out than you put in, collaboration is important. Knowledge sharing is not only about sharing great ideas but
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Making it happen
Knowledge sharing starts at individual, department, team or organisation level with the concept of CoPs. Fundamentally, “sharing is about being more open” in the workplace and the relationship with others.
The role of technology
Technology plays a crucial transformational role as it encourages collaboration and sharing of knowledge globally with the usage of internet, intranet and groupware systems.
Together with the knowledge sharing strategy identified above, organisations can apply the following 7 steps/incentives for sharing suggested by Skyrme (2002) to enhance the knowledge sharing strategy. 1.
Hire people who will share – Texas Instruments started having interactive interviews at their recruiting process.
2.
Develop trust – a professional code of conduct was used by all employees at Buckman Laboratories.
3.
Vary motivations – “Gemini and Ernst & Young applied incentives at three levels. A solid business case for senior executives; relevant benefits for departments” and incentive should be provided to the employee with positive behaviours and results.
4.
Show public recognition – “Harris has a “wall of fame” gallery of employees who have excelled at work”, meanwhile McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken fast food restaurants display the employee of the month.
5.
Reorganise for sharing – “Northrop Grumman uses integrated product teams backed with mentoring programme”.
6.
Create communities – “The World Bank uses electronic bulletin boards”, which focus on relevant topics and increases the use globally on topics that the CoPs are sharing.
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Knowledge Management: A Framework for Building a Knowledge Sharing Culture
7.
Develop leaders – “Capital One formed a group from natural knowledge champions to promote knowledge sharing and develop training”.
In total, knowledge management must connect people to information across a broad spectrum in the company. This connection includes creating a knowledge sharing capability in processes and encouraging people to share and use technology to collaborate on global knowledge repositories and hence successfully allow them to contribute to an organisation‟s strategic goals. Increased productivity, accelerated learning and faster decision making will be obtained with the scheme of incentives and motivation. To introduce knowledge management, knowledge sharing culture need to be should start at the individual level with the creation of CoPs and application of popular knowledge management models and frameworks.
4
Models and Frameworks
Knowledge management involves the creation of value from an organisation‟s intangible assets, therefore according to Alavi and Leider (1999) “many organisations are developing systems designed specifically to facilitate the sharing and integration of knowledge” (Montaano et al, 2004). Venters (2001) highlighted that knowledge management can be concluded and described as the essence of knowledge as either “tacit” or “explicit”. “Tacit knowledge is personal; context specific and therefore hard to formalise and communicate, meanwhile explicit or codified knowledge refers to knowledge that is transmittable in a formal and systematic language” (Nonaka and Tackecuhi, 1995). The model created by Nonaka and Takeuchi called the “Knowledge Conversion” model or “Knowledge Life Cycle” is an important key element to knowledge sharing. Organisational knowledge creation process is based on a basic framework that contains two dimensions. One is “epistemological that explains that only individuals can create knowledge therefore it is a process that organisationally amplifies the knowledge created by individuals and crystallises it and another is the ontological that relates to the interaction between tacit and explicit
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knowledge” Leverde (2000).This model is also called the SECI process. Knowledge includes both the tacit and explicit knowledge and is stored and accomplished through systems, structures and culture. The four steps of the SECI process are described below by KnowledgeBoard (2002). Socialisation – is the “process that transfers tacit knowledge from one person to tacit knowledge of another person”. This can be achieved through sharing experiences. Externalisation – is the process of converting tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge amongst individuals within a group with activities such as metaphors, hypotheses and models. Combination – Having completed the first three steps, “explicit knowledge may then combine through a process of systemising concepts into a knowledge system or repositories. This can be achieved by individuals exchanging and combining knowledge through media. The media are documents, meetings, telephone conversations and computerised communication networks. Formal education and training programmes also constitute this form of conversion”. Internalisation – is the “process of understanding and absorbing explicit knowledge into tacit knowledge held by the individual”. This can be done with activities such as “learning by doing” and “documentation read by individuals where the ideas are combined with the tacit knowledge, such as an individual possesses”. Nonaka and Takeuchi (1999) also developed the Five Phase model for knowledge creation. The model is similar to SECI model as describe below: 1. Sharing tacit knowledge – “tacit knowledge held by individuals” combining experience and best practice. 2. Creating concepts – this is the most intensive phase. “Once a shared model is formed in the field of interaction (tacitexplicit), the self-organising team articulates through continuous dialogue to form a collective reflection” of the knowledge. The process then verbalises the knowledge into words and phrases which is then crystallised into explicit concepts (externalisation). 3. Justifying concepts – determine if “the newly created concepts are truly worthwhile for the organisation and society”.
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4. Building an archetype – converting the justified concepts into “tangible or concrete archetype”. “An archetype can be considered as the prototype of new product development process”. 5. Cross levelling of knowledge (spiral process) –This interactive spiral process takes place intra and inter organisationally to create and grow knowledge as knowledge creation is a never ending process. (Tannembaum and Alliger, 2000) Systematic combination of the aspects stated below in the cross levelling in knowledge and the interactive spiral process are important to examine the effectiveness of knowledge management implementation in any organisation (Leverde, 2000).The aspects are: Cross levelling of knowledge - (spiral process): 1.
Knowledge Sharing – is the “extent to which people share their knowledge”.
2.
Knowledge Accessibility – is the “extent to which people have accesses to the information they need to make decisions, solve problems, and perform job tasks and service customers”.
3.
Knowledge Assimilation – is the “extent to which people learn or assimilate the knowledge they need to perform well”.
4.
Knowledge Application– is the “extent to which people apply and use knowledge to effectively make decisions, solve problems and service customers”.
Besides aspects above, Rastogi (2000) and Leverde (2000) also suggested that management should include the following set of operations in their consideration for knowledge management. Identification – of the “knowledge required for a competitively effective implementation of the enterprise strategy”. Mapping – “the existing and available knowledge including expertise and skills”. Capturing – “the existing knowledge through its formalised representation”. Acquiring – “the needed knowledge and information including know-how”. Storing – “the existing, acquired, and created knowledge in properly indexed and interlinked knowledge repositories”.
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Sharing – “knowledge through its automatic access and distribution to users on the basis of their needs and interests”. Applying – “support of decisions, actions, problem solving, providing job aids and training”. Creating (advanced stage by Knowledge Management in firms) – “generating or discovering new knowledge through Research and Development, experimentation, lessons learned, creative thinking and innovation”. In relation to models and frameworks availability within the discipline of knowledge management, (Montano et al, 2004) suggested that some of industry successful implementation are important to be examined to determine the models similarities and differences to guide the recommendation to build knowledge sharing culture framework. The similarities of the models and framework findings highlighted that Ernst & Young, Knowledge Associates, Marquardt and O‟Dell use a set of activities for knowledge management where the emphasis is on a knowledge cycle. This is inclusive of tasks such as acquiring knowledge by Anderson Consulting, Knowledge Associates and Marquardt. American Management System, Ernst and Young and O‟Dell state the first step is to find knowledge and the collect the combination of “tacit and explicit knowledge”. The generation and creation of knowledge r needs to be ongoing and continuous learning process. It was analysed that that the same models suggested by Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) with the application of five-phase model of Tannembum and Alliger (2000) is noted to be the most popular combination for knowledge management application in many organisations. The difference is that Arthur Anderson Consulting uses a hybrid collection of frameworks such as knowledge cycle and conversion of tacit and explicit knowledge but firstly the model actually evaluates and defines the role of knowledge before aligning to their business strategy as defined by the steps of Syrme (2000). As for Anderson Consulting., the strategy first is to identify processes, cultural and technological aspects. Conducive environment for knowledge sharing will require crucial application of two major elements which include the motivation and recognition as the key success factors for knowledge sharing and is suggested by American Management System.
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Knowledge Management: A Framework for Building a Knowledge Sharing Culture
This can be confirmed with the establishment of the intensification scheme and Community of Practices (CoPs). Implementation of a feedback mechanism in Arthur Anderson Consulting prepared the organisations to create an environment for continuous learning which provided freedom to share and improve the existing repositories. This knowledge has now guided the framework for building the knowledge sharing culture.
5. Recommendation for building a knowledge-sharing framework
of old knowledge with the modification on new knowledge must be placed and stored using knowledge repositories in the format of identified knowledge categories or maps. Individual level within the CoPs needs to identify and select one leader who will be called as opinion leader to guide and influence the teams to share their knowledge. To motivate the CoPs to share knowledge, cultural audit and rewarding schemes needs to be communicated and integrated within the organisation. 3.
From the preceding investigation of models and frameworks, it can be seen that knowledge management includes much more than a knowledge cycle or tasks. Therefore the steps that can be taken as a holistic view to create a generic framework to build the knowledge sharing culture will require the following: 1.
Organisations should emphasise on cultural aspects as claimed by Bob Buckmans of Bukman Labs (Montano,et,.al. 2004), who stated that 90% of knowledge management effort in any organisation is cultural and this was confirmed by Larry Bobbitt of Anderson Consulting who explained that the first step is to evaluate and define the role of knowledge as this will takes up 80% of the effort to perform the cultural shift. This can be confirmed with the establishment of the 3C‟s of Knowledge Sharing and the steps suggested by Skyrme (2000) to help build a knowledge sharing culture. This will include the analysis of the business strategy, how to motivate employees with the establishment of community of practices (CoPs) as defined by Wenger (2004). Continuous learning should be extended to other groups to meet corporate business strategy. (Senge, 1990).
2.
The second step is to focus on knowledge; this refers to the Nonaka and Takeuchi Model (1995), the knowledge life cycle or conversion. The identification of tacit and explicit knowledge should be identified for the CoPs. The process of knowledge sharing should start with creation, acquiring and generating of new knowledge. As for the continuous learning process, acquisition
Palvinderjit Kaur
WP-07-04
Technologies, methods and tools are important in the effort to build and share of knowledge and will include the concept of Computer Supported Cooperative Work. This concept will assist in identifying the workflow of the knowledge sharing, with the assistance of technology that will allow the sharing and dissemination of knowledge globally. Accessibility to workflow, document systems, real time collaborations, online learning systems, portalisation and custom web applications are some of the technology enablers being utilised (Early & Associates, 2005).
4.
Establishing a framework should include a measurement and feedback step as suggested by Arthur Anderson Consulting. Continuous learning will involve the implementation of feedback mechanisms to enable an iterative process to focus on the key enablers that (identified below).
6 Identification of Key Enablers The key enablers in this section are recommended for any global shared service centre, academic institute or any organisation wishing to setup a knowledge sharing culture.
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Knowledge Management: A Framework for Building a Knowledge Sharing Culture
Framework for building Knowledge Sharing Culture Knowledge Management
Cultural
Knowledge
Feedback
Knowledge Sharing
Technology
CoPs
1) Culture The impact of culture was defined in the recommendation of the 3C‟s and is seen to be extremely crucial. It is the first alignment in the organisation strategy. Organisations should focus on the following cultural issues: The employees understanding of knowledge management and their value asset that is their intellectual capital. A review of the current workflow to check if there is any information or knowledge sharing capabilities in existence. Interviewing personnel especially middle management, who will be identified as the opinion leaders. A review to check if knowledge sharing best practice is conducive for the case study environment with the analysis of management strategy and processes, technology in the current situation. Identification of the community of practices (CoPs‟) to be used as the prime source of users that will be piloted for this framework utilisation. Review of a questionnaire to allow the community of practice (CoPs) to provide their understanding and knowledge awareness of knowledge management. 2) Knowledge Identification The Nonaka and Takeuchi knowledge life cycle model identified a number of core steps that organisation can apply to pilot the identification of knowledge: Analysis of the report of opinion leaders with regard to the community of practice (CoPs) feedback. This can include the warning signs such as duplication and
Palvinderjit Kaur
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waste of effort in performing the same tasks that might not benefit the teams because it is not captured or not being collaborated. Identification of the workflow to capture the knowledge that is shared in the community. This will include the acquiring, finding and generation or creation of knowledge that they can share and document in knowledge repositories. Mission and Vision plan statement should include knowledge management is part of their business strategy. Management should create 3C‟s culture and incorporate rewarding scheme. 3) Knowledge sharing and accessibility – Community of Practices (CoPs) The CoPs will be formed and the knowledge sharing capabilities need to be established with the following: Granting access to the CoPs to access the generic knowledge repositories using the technology support. Creation of workflow to pilot and to identify how and who will be creating, storing and generating knowledge. Spiral process model can be utilised to ensure collaboration effort and sharing takes place using knowledge repositories. Rewards and benefits used as motivation factors using the 3C‟s plan. 4) Technology enabler Technology is not a driver for knowledge management but it is rather the cultural shift. But it needs to be in place to allow the CoPs to collaborate and share knowledge globally. Organisations should review the following: Installation of Computer Supported and Cooperative systems (CSCW) such as groupware systems that allow knowledge to be shared regardless of the time and place dimension.. All information and knowledge being stored and delivered electronically using the knowledge repositories. A focus to monitor and to minimise duplication and rework.
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A focus on simplicity and ease of use rather than complex functionality.
benchmarking the establishment of knowledge management in the organisation.
Avoiding the need to completely rebuild sites as new technologies and opportunities arise.
Organisations should start off with the review of the 3C‟s and the implementation of 7 steps or incentives to enhance and encourage knowledge sharing to be cultivated in their organisation with the concept of CoPs .
Ensuring the technology is reliable and provides accessibility to the community of practice to reuse and acquire knowledge. 5) Feedback and Measurement Feedback and measurement will be required to test and manage the acceptance of the knowledge being share. This is important also to monitor the continuous learning process. The following can be use as checklist: Data collection and storage processes and measurement plan and feedback will be placed as a benchmark. Information is classified and integrated through common data definitions, standards and naming conventions. These should be discussed by the opinion leader. Maintenance review processes to ensure the ongoing currency of the current web presence and content being uploaded on the intranet or website. Planning and identifying requirements and options for core training and skills development in information management.
Therefore why wait, the framework for building the knowledge sharing culture should be adopted to obtain and manage the most valuable intellectual asset (knowledge). By adopting a knowledge sharing culture, the key foundation for collaboration can be obtained and will increase the advantages of the organisation to gain a competitive edge. References Alavi, M and Leider,D.1999, Knowledge Management Systems: Emerging Views and Practices From the Field [online], Available from http://csdl.computer.org/ comp/proceedings/hicss/1999/0001/07/00 017009.pdf, [Accessed on 20/2/2005] Amin,et.al,. 2001, Building a Knowledge Sharing Culture,, Sugar Land Texas, USA. Argyris,C. (1997), Organisational Learning: Theory ,Method and Practice, Addison Wesley. Bontis,N. 1998, Intellectual Capital, An Exploratory Study that Develops Measures and Models, Management Decision.
Conclusion In conclusion, organisations should apply knowledge management in their business strategy to benefit from the creation of knowledge, the powerful asset that should be stored in repositories. In relation to this, organisations would be able to develop employees into knowledge workers who can share their experiences to generate a bigger pool of knowledge. Models and frameworks discussion in this paper provided a new direction for any organisation to adopt the recommended framework to start becoming knowledge intensive organisation. The framework as it is known is a recommendation for building knowledge sharing culture because it concentrates on shared knowledge which is essential. The key enablers that are identified are the most important aspects for
Palvinderjit Kaur
Brown,R.B. and Woodlanf,M.J. 1999, Managing Knowledge [online], Available from http://www.tlainc.com/articl79.htm, [Accessed on 28/2/2005] Cech, et al, 2003, Knowledge Management and Czech Universities, Department of Information Technologies, University of Hradec Kralove, 3rd European Knowledge Management Summer School. Chaffey.D. 1998, Groupware, Workflow and Intranets, Reengineering the Enterprise with Collbaorative Software, Digital Press. ChengM,Y. 2002, Socialising Knowledge Management: The Influence of the Opinion Leader [online], Available from http://www.tlainc.com/articl42.htm, [Accessed on 10/3/2005]
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Koulopoulos,T & Frappaolo,c 1999, Smart things to know about Knowledge Management, United Kingdom,Capstone Publishing Limited. Laverde, et.al,. 2003, Knowledge Processes: An overview of the Principal Models, 3rd European Knowledge Management Summer School. Malhotra,Y.1998, Knowledge Management and Learning Organisation [online], Available at http://www.brint.net/forums , [Accessed on 5/3/2005] Malhotra, Y. 2004, Why Knowledge Management Systems Fail? Enablers and Constraints of Knowledge Management in Human Enterprises, Syracuse University, School of Management. Mantano,et,al,. 2004, A Systems Thinking Framework for Knowledge Management, KnowledgeBoard,2002, Knowledge Management Models: a state of the art [Online], Available from http://www.providersedge.com/docs/km_ articles/KM_Models__A_State_of_Art.pdf, [Accessed on 5/3/2005] Murty.K.S. 2004, Role of HR in Institutionalizing Knowledge Management in a company [online],Hindustan Level Limited, Available from http://www.kwork.org/White_Papers/hrkm.html, [Accessed on 5/3/2005] Nonaka, I and Takeuchi,h. 1995, The Knowledge Creating Company, Oxford University Press,Inc.
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