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OTTO-VON-GUERICKE UNIVERSITÄT Magdeburg
FACULTY OF ECONOMICS AND MANAGEMENT
UNICERT IV Winter semester 2001/2002
Knowledge
Its significance for organizations
and
the reason for a new management task
Anja Berthold 5th semester BWL/Int. Management Bunter Weg 6/6 39118 Magdeburg
1
Abstract
In times of globalization, knowledge has a great significance for the future of an organization.
Concerning the effect knowledge has on society and work, this paper will try to show that
knowledge management will be essential for organizations to compete against others and to
sustain this competition.
Key words
Knowledge, knowledge society, knowledge worker, knowledge management
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Table of contents
0. Introduction ……………………………………………………………………………. 3
1. Knowledge ……………………………………………………………………………...3
1.1. Why is knowledge important? ………………………. ………………………3
1.2. Definition of knowledge …………………………………………………….. 5
1.3. Explicit and tacit knowledge ………………………………………………… 5
1.4. Peter Drucker’s view on knowledge ………………………………………… 6
1.5. Knowledge Creation ………………………………………………………… 7
2. The knowledge society and the knowledge worker …………………………………...10
3. Knowledge Management ……………………………………………………………...14
4. Conclusion …………………………………………………………………………….19
Appendix ……………………………………………………………………………….…21
Bibliography ……………………………………………………………………………...22
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0. Introduction
Due to globalization and the struggle to survive, business environments are changing rapidly.
Today, dealing with knowledge will increasingly be of great importance to organizations.
Knowledge will become the future factor of production provided that integrated knowledge
management approaches are developed.
This paper will show that there is a need for knowledge management in the knowledge
society. Because of various approaches found in literature attention will be directed at the
strategic view of knowledge management. However, in order to see the necessary aspect of
knowledge management this paper follows a certain structure.
Part one will give an explanation of why knowledge is important. After some general
definitions of knowledge, emphasis will be laid on three points: first the definition of explicit
and tacit knowledge, second Peter Drucker’s approach to defining knowledge, and third the
creation of knowledge. Part two will describe the impact of knowledge on society creating
the knowledge society and the knowledge worker. The information of the first and the second
part then will be of help and partly taken as a basis when coming to the last part showing that
knowledge management is important to an organization.
1. Knowledge
1.1. Why is knowledge important?
Knowledge has become increasingly relevant for organizations since the shift from an
industrial economy based on assembly lines and hierarchical control to a global,
decentralized, information-driven economy. Nowadays, organizations work, compete, and
co-operate on a worldwide scale because of the global economy. Consequently, they have to
be capable of maintaining and reproducing their core competencies and corporate identity
regardless of geographical distance, linguistic and cultural differences of the markets they
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operate in. Simultaneously, they must have the ability to creatively enrich such competencies
with knowledge coming from the local communities participating in their global workforce.
In addition, they have to show that they can keep up with the quick pace of worldwide
competition by being highly innovative in their products and services. Finally, organizations
have to use their maximum strength to preserve, reuse, and generate intangible assets, i.e., in
the form of competencies, image, and reputation. Tangible assets, such as land and labor,
have prices and are traded in the global marketplace, whereas intangibles do not offer this
opportunity since their value is tightly bound to the specific and unique organizational
context in which they originate.1
The global economy went through an epoch making evolution. The industrial age that has
affected human life since the late 18th century is quickly disappearing. The evolution of
technology, due to such developments as inexpensive networks for data transmission like the
Internet, is shifting the focus of economic activities from the production and consumption of
material things to the production and consumption of information. As a matter-of-fact,
without the existence of a global information infrastructure, the global economy would be
unable to survive.2
Therefore, information now serves as a commodity which is able to connect people directly
with one another without being affected by geographic and physical barriers. However, this is
not like the way information was spread during the industrial age. At that time, there was a
need for applying hierarchical, centralized distribution processes that resulted directly from
geographical barriers and physical constraints. The typical media for this means of spreading
information were local central authorities such as national governments and management
pyramids. The information age is using a transnational global village based on shared
decision making from bottom-up instead of this institutional apparatus. In addition, it
1Borghoff and Pareschi , 1998, p.3 2Ibid.
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changed the pattern of ‘intellectual work.’ During the industrial age, this type of work was
“essentially viewed as the continuation in the office of the assembly line on the shop floor.”3
Consequently, white collar workers did not differ from blue collar workers in their
application of fixed procedures and compliance with standardized information schemes. In
contrast, a new type of intellectual work is appearing known as knowledge work. This new
work can be described as “turning information into knowledge through the interpretation of
incoming highly non-standardized information for the purposes of problem solving and
decision making.”4 Furthermore, once new knowledge is generated, a basis will be laid for
the innovative process of organizations.
1.2. Definition of knowledge
In a dictionary, knowledge is generally explained as the information, understanding and skills
gained through education, experience or discovery.
Schlöhmer describes knowledge as a combination of numerous components. Mentioning only
some of them, there are creativity, qualification, level of education, craftsmanship and
individual experiences.5 According to Bodendorf et al., knowledge is always the result of
digested and interpreted information with due regard to the environment from which it was
taken.6
1.3. Explicit and tacit knowledge
In addition, explicit and tacit knowledge will be defined in the following in order to prevent
‘confusion’ when mentioned in further parts of the paper. Explicit knowledge is formal
knowledge that can be packaged as information. It can be found in the documents of an
3Ibid., p.4 4Ibid. 5Schlöhmer, 2001, p. 15 6Bodendorf, 2001, p. 56
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organization, such as reports, articles, manuals, patents, pictures, images, video, sound
software, etc., and in the representations that an organization has of itself, such as
organizational charts, process maps, mission statements, etc. Tacit knowledge is personal
knowledge embedded in individual experience. It is shared and exchanged through direct,
face-to-face contact. It can be communicated in a direct and effective way whereas explicit
knowledge can be acquired only indirectly. It must be decoded and recoded “into one’s
mental models where it is then internalized as tacit knowledge.”7
Both types of knowledges play an important role in the overall knowledge of an organization.
Explicit knowledge is organizational knowledge defining “identity, competencies, and
intellectual assets of an organization independently of its employees.”8 Tacit knowledge,
however, is practical knowledge which is needed in order to get things done. Therefore,
having a rich background of tacit knowledge is everything an organization needs to have its
explicit knowledge grow and be sustained.
1.4. Peter Drucker’s view on knowledge
At this point, special emphasis should be laid on Peter Drucker’s9 approach of defining
knowledge. Drucker assigns knowledge to the three classic resources of production, i.e.,
capital, labor and land. However, one difference to the other resources is “that knowledge
cannot be inherited or bequeathed”10, and therefore has to be developed in a new and
different way by every individual beginning with the same lack of knowledge or information,
i.e., ignorance. According to him, this knowledge can be acquired only through schooling,
once it is put in a form in which it can be taught and once it becomes public.11
7Borghoff, 1998, p. 6 8Ibid. 9According to Daly, Drucker is “...the preeminent business philosopher of the 20th century...” and “...the guru of management.” 10Drucker, 2001, p. 12 11Ibid.
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Knowledge is not tied to any country since it is portable and therefore it can be created
everywhere fast and cheaply. Furthermore, no boundaries are set to knowledge since there is
neither domestic knowledge nor international knowledge. “There is only knowledge.”12 In
addition, Drucker sees knowledge as non-hierarchical saying that there is no higher or lower
knowledge. “What is knowledge in one situation, ..., is only information, and not very
relevant information”13 in a different situation. For example, when a German executive, who
is fluent in Chinese, is posted to Peking, his fluency in Chinese is knowledge. However, after
a few years once he has to think through his company’s business strategy for doing work in
China, his fluency in Chinese is only information that is not very relevant.
1.5. Knowledge Creation
Referring to Sena et al., this section is going to show how knowledge is created and can lead
to wisdom which is the intellectual capital of organizations. Intellectual capital or
organizational wisdom is the application of collective knowledge within the organization.
This is illustrated in Figure 1 in the appendix.
Data is the first point of the progression. Objective facts about some event are entered into a
record keeping or transaction processing system, e.g., a payment for a purchase. The data is
evaluated based on typical validation criteria. Quantitatively, these transactions or data events
are viewed in terms of data management. How fast is the entry and processing of
transactions? How much does the system cost and how efficient is it? Qualitatively, the
organization is concerned about the timeliness of the transaction events. Can the records be
accessed when they are needed and are they understandable? Transaction processing systems
(TPS) are the foundation for organizational operations. However, this storage of operational
12Drucker, 1994 13Ibid.
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data can become overwhelming, keeping in mind that more data is not always better than
less. Data is essentially raw material for information.14
Information is meant to change the way the receiver perceives something and affects the
decision maker’s judgment and behavior. Seen from a business perspective, “the organization
interprets, analyzes, and massages the data to produce reports or screen displays - anticipating
what the business user or knowledge worker may want to see to perform their duties.”15 The
data is arranged and placed into data banks. Current data is frequently called operational data
stores (ODS), whereas historical data is often summarized and aggregated based on time
intervals and placed into a data bank called a data warehouse (a constant, time-based
repository in which knowledge workers can access, question, and analyze information in a
variety of forms and arrangements to see trends over extended periods of time). Possible
questions at this point could be: What was the company’s financial position in the same
quarter for the past five years? What products in a specific segment were sold over those
quarters?16
However, neither the ODS nor the data warehouse would be particularly useful without some
form of collective connectivity. Organizations nowadays depend on their communication and
network structure. Using this formal network in addition to phone calls, written memos and e-
mail, information is spread throughout the organization. Companies use groupware products
(such as Lotus Notes or Microsoft Exchange) to improve the efficiency of those networks.
When properly used they increase the value of data and information, and thus they are
creating knowledge.17
Although having already defined knowledge, it is of great importance here to propose another
definition. According to Davenport and Prusak in Sena et al., knowledge is
14Sena and Shani, 1999, p. 8-3 15Ibid. 16Ibid., p. 8-4 17Ibid.
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“a fluid mix of framed experience, values, contextual information, and expert
knowledge providing a framework for evaluating and incorporating new
experiences and information. It originates and is applied in the minds of knowers.
In organizations, it is often embedded not only in documents or repositories but
also in organization routines, processes and norms.” 18
From this it follows that the company’s management information systems, the operational
data stores, the data warehouses, and other institutional resources must be available for
‘knowers.’ Their knowledge is applied within the organization based on experience, intuition,
and judgment.
An individual’s applied knowledge is useful and important in an organization, but
collectively deployed it is of greater value. To illustrate, managers would rather consult
people they believe to possess knowledge and expertise than look for information in
databases. Considering this case, knowledge should be recognized as a corporate asset and
therefore, it needs to be managed and invested with the same care as tangible assets.19
Finally, wisdom, also “managerial knowledge”20, can be conceived of as objective and
universal techniques and common sense. Going beyond the idea of standardized methods
which are needed to create knowledge, it involves a process of transforming observations and
interpretations of work-related events into some form of representation. Managerial
knowledge is then created once various representations are combined.
18Ibid. 19Ibid. 20Ibid., p. 8-5
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2. The knowledge society and the knowledge worker
As already mentioned, the industrial economy has shifted to an information-driven economy.
In literature, the epoch following the industrial society is often called the information society
or knowledgeable society (also knowledge society). In 1972 the term information society
appeared for the first time in a report written by the Japanese government, and was later
established in Marc Porat’s publication “The Information Society” (1977). The term
knowledgeable society was used for the first time by Robert E. Lane in the middle of the
1960s. This term describes the society whose largest amount of the gross domestic product
(GDP) is produced in the field of information and knowledge of the service sector, and whose
vast majority of the employees works there. Knowledge is the most important factor for the
development of the economy and society.21
With regard to quantity and quality, rapid growth of different information media is taking
place in the knowledge society. Intervals between the invention of new media are becoming
shorter. For example, in 1861 the telephone was invented by Phillip Reis, and 37 years later
the film22. After a short time, radio, television, tape, satellite-TV, fax, PC, CD, and many
other inventions followed.
It is interesting to note that the reason for the development from an industrial to a knowledge
society is the ‘new’ need for information. While past epochs had to handle problems, such as
the daily search for food, transportation of goods or generation of energy, our society has to
supply and transport information. Referring to Schlöhmer, characteristics of the knowledge
society are as follows:
��People acquire knowledge in order to explain and realize their goals and moral concepts.
21Schlöhmer, 2001, p. 31 22Ibid. p. 47
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��Knowledge is accumulated, organized and interpreted, in order to be able to apply it on
expedient occasion.
��In contrast to earlier epochs, a great part of resources are used for research.
��Research follows the rules of scientific argumentation.
��Science penetrates every area of life.
��People want to seek extensively for ideas about themselves, nature and society.
��Cognitive factors, knowledge, creativity, and information increasingly determine the
success of an organization.23
The last mentioned characteristic, which is that knowledge increasingly determines the
success of an organization, will be of chief concern when talking of knowledge management.
According to other sources, it was Peter Drucker who launched the revolution that has led us
into the knowledge age.24 He originally coined the terms ‘knowledge work’ and ‘knowledge
worker’25 around 1960.26 Referring to his article “The Age of Social Transformation” from
1994, the knowledge society is characterized and led by knowledge workers, who “...may not
be the ruling class of the knowledge society, but ... are already its leading class.”27 With
regard to their characteristics, social position, values, and expectations, they distinguish
themselves “from any other group in history that has ever occupied the leading position.”28
To start with, knowledge workers gain access to jobs and social positions through formal
education and advanced schooling. Their work requires highly developed manual skill
including substantial work with one’s hands, e.g., formal education and theoretical
23Ibid., p. 50 24www.kmworld.com/publications/magazine/index.cfm?action=readarticle&article_id=464&publication_id=1 25The term ‘knowledge worker’ was coined by Peter Drucker in a 1959 book, Landmark of Tomorrow. 26Drucker, 2001, p. 8 27Drucker, 1994 28Ibid.
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knowledge will never enable anyone to be a neurosurgeon unless he also shows the manual
skill and vice versa. It may be noted here that education needed for knowledge work, makes
no difference between low and high requirements of knowledge, and can only be acquired
through formal schooling and not through apprenticeship. Therefore, education becomes the
center of the knowledge society, and school its key institution.29 Acquiring knowledge does
not stop after the age of formal schooling when work begins, due to the fact that knowledge
“becomes obsolete incredibly fast.”30 This is possible through educational processes beyond
traditional school such as weekend seminars or online training programs.
As a result, the performance of an individual, an organization, an industry or a country is
measured on how well knowledge is acquired and applied. Thus, the key competitive factor
of the knowledge society is created and determines success or failure. Moreover, knowledge
for the most part exists only in application in this society. Nothing of what an information
technologist has to know can be applied to teach Chemistry. For that reason the central work
force in the knowledge society will consist of highly specialized people, i.e., people who have
learned how to acquire additional specialties quickly in order to move from one kind of job to
another, for example, from market research into management. In this context, Drucker
believes that applied knowledge is effective only when it is specialized. In fact, the more
highly specialized the more effective it is. Consequently, this implies two new requirements,
which are that knowledge workers have to work in teams and as members of an organization.
In other words, an organization is needed in order to convert the specialized knowledge of the
knowledge worker into performance. To illustrate, a surgeon needs a diagnosis in order to
yield performance.31
Contrary to society previous to the knowledge society, knowledge workers own the means of
production through their pension funds and other savings. In the industrial society, the
29Ibid. 30Daly, 2000, p. 139
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relationship between the wage fund and the capital fund was of great importance, e.g., if the
two conflicted or benefited each other. The wage fund consists of everything that goes into
consumption, while the capital fund is “that part of the total income stream that is available
for investment.”32 However, in the knowledge society, wage fund and capital fund both
merge. According to Drucker, “the pension fund is ‘deferred wages,’ and as such is a wage
fund.”33 Additionally, its significance as the main source of capital for the knowledge society
increases. Legally each knowledge worker is an employee, whereas in a team they are
capitalists. Instead of investing in machines and tools, the knowledge society has to invest in
the knowledge of the knowledge worker because without that knowledge the machines are
unproductive.34
Furthermore, the knowledge society is characterized as a “society of mobility,”35 in which
people no longer have roots. They no longer stay where they were born considering
geography, social position and status. This society provides opportunities to more people than
ever before to be successful. However, this also means that more people than ever before can
fail or come in second. 36
Regarding the above mentioned, knowledge work can be described as work which requires a
certain formal education and the ability to acquire and to apply theoretical and analytical
knowledge. Recent studies in knowledge work show that knowledge workers are commonly
employed in sectors being in direct relation to content creation which are research, design,
consulting, computer software, advertising, and media, to name just a few. In addition, they
show an evolution towards knowledge work in traditional white collar organizations, often
31Drucker, 1994 32Ibid. 33Ibid. 34Ibid. 35Ibid. 36Ibid.
14
found in sales, insurance and financial services. This forces them to achieve higher
productivity in the context of global competition.37
Taking into account that business processes involve the creation, diffusion, renewal, and
application of knowledge in order to sustain and survive, an organization needs a framework
in which it sees all its processes as knowledge processes. This framework is knowledge
management.
3. Knowledge Management
According to Drucker, “the essence of management is to make knowledges productive”38 but
he puts more stress on “productive” than on “management” meaning that knowledge workers
have to be deployed where they can foster the development of the company with their
specialized knowledge.39 Finding the solution in knowledge management (KM), he
complains that “no one yet really knows how to do it”40 even though everybody talks about it.
Indeed, there are many different approaches to KM, as found in literature, making it more
difficult to give one single definition. For this reason, it is first of all best to think of KM in
the broadest context. Quoting Liebowitz, “knowledge management deals with the process of
creating value from an organization’s intangible assets.”41 Once again, this paper
concentrates on the strategic view of KM showing also some examples of companies which
have so far successfully applied KM.
When talking of strategy, two terms play an important role, i.e., core competencies (things an
organization knows how to do well) and capabilities (things an individual knows how to do
well). In both terms, knowledge is an important component but other factors are also
necessary. In this case, it can be stated: if sufficient amounts of resources and management
37Borghoff and Pareschi, 1998, p. 4 38Drucker, 1994 39Drucker, 2001, p. 18 40Ibid.
15
attention is given, individual capabilities can aggregate to organizational competencies.
Knowing this, it is obvious that these concepts are decisive to the relationship between
knowledge and strategy. As mentioned before, knowledge originates and is applied in the
mind of knowledge workers. Therefore, when talking of KM and strategy, one should not
neglect what those knowledge workers actually know.42
From a strategy perspective, the key issue around competencies and capabilities is the
decision of which ones are important to have. According to Davenport, looking back at
companies that had performed successfully and explaining their performance by regarding
what the organization or its employees knew how to do, is by far not enough. Additionally,
organizations need to decide which competencies and capabilities are necessary to
accumulate or build. Honda, to take an interesting example, has been successful because of
its competency in small engine design. However, as a manager at Honda, one should also
take into consideration if more experts in small engine design should be hired or if the
production of engines is already successful enough which would rather increase the need for
knowledge of body design, market research, or car recycling.43
In order to determine what competencies and capabilities will be necessary to succeed in the
future, an organization should make use of “strategic vision, industry knowledge, and market
intuition in addition to extrapolation of existing customer and market trends.”44
First and foremost, “knowing what knowledge is necessary is only the beginning.”45
Secondly, an organization must be aware of what capabilities each person within the
organization has, and the ability to connect human resource investments to desired skills and
knowledge. Along with the above statement that education becomes the center of the
41Liebowitz, 1999, p. 3 42Davenport, 1999, p. 2-6 43Ibid. 44Ibid. 45Ibid.
16
knowledge society, it should be noted here, that it is important for an organization to teach its
employees and also to know when this teaching is necessary. For example,
“Microsoft has a system to keep track of what system development capabilities
lay within the organization. When Bill Gates decided that more of Microsoft’s
employees needed Internet development capabilities, the system allowed the
company to know the extent of the problem and to monitor progress.”46
This system also enabled Microsoft to combine internal and external educational programs to
the specific capabilities which were needed by the company.
Next, an organization needs to define a knowledge management strategy in order to force its
managers to make choices about main the aspects of their knowledge environment. Based on
Davenport, some of such choices are in the following:
��What is more important to manage - tacit or explicit knowledge?
��What knowledge domain is most important to the company? Is it customer knowledge,
competitor knowledge, product knowledge, supplier knowledge, etc.?
��In which field does the knowledge environment most need improvement? Is the company
good, e.g., at creating knowledge, but weak at applying and using it?
��Should the company make or buy its knowledge in specific areas of business?47
One should also take into consideration that knowledge environments change rapidly
meaning there is no end to KM. Factors influencing the knowledge environment are for
example new technologies, management approaches, and customer concerns. Additionally,
46Ibid. 47Ibid. p. 2-7
17
strategies and organizational structures of companies change. Therefore, descriptions of
knowledge environments should not take a considerable time, or otherwise the environment
would no longer exist by the time one is finished.48
Furthermore, it is of great importance that companies “ensure that they focus on the synergy
of data and information processing capacity of information technologies, and the creative and
innovative capacity”49 of their knowledge workers. On the one hand, advanced information
technologies can then be used to accomplish ‘programmable’ tasks traditionally done by
knowledge workers. Being programmable, a procedure can then be delegated to information
technology, thus achieving efficiency and optimization. On the other hand, to achieve this
synergy, knowledge workers need to apply new technologies to their business contexts
without any efforts. Consequently, they are able to delegate programmable tasks to
technologies in order to concentrate their time and efforts on value-adding activities
demanding creativity and innovation.50 It may be noted here that this leads again to the fact
that education is of great importance since technologies change rapidly and the knowledge
worker needs to be up-to-date.
Similarly important is the use of specific software, as for example is used by Proctor &
Gamble. This kind of knowledge sharing software will enable users to locate, catalog,
transfer and maintain employee knowledge. Additionally, they will have the ability to
identify qualified individuals with relevant expertise, to submit questions or business
problems to individuals, to receive solutions from colleagues, and to respond immediately
and effectively. Answers and solutions that are transferred via the software are stored in a
knowledge base enabling employees to reuse them in the future.51 Thus, knowledge can be
applied in situations where it is relevant. If this method of sharing information, resources and
48Davenport, “Some Principles of Knowledge Management” 49Yogesh, 1998 50Ibid. 51http://www.kmworld.com/resources/featurearticles/index.cfm?action=readfeature&feature_id=263
18
employees across business units cannot be employed, another form of knowledge transfer can
be processed when employees move from one business unit to another, e.g., successfully
applied within Hewlett-Packard.52 In this way, an organization can gain a competitive
advantage by making use of the mobility of the knowledge workers.
In view of the knowledge worker, workspace has to be designed in order to follow a certain
strategy in KM. As already mentioned knowledge workers need to work in teams. Therefore,
it is optimal to use “non-hierarchical, high-touch, open workspaces”53 thereby reducing
barriers and improving knowledge worker collaboration. The company should create a
culture where knowledge workers feel comfortable asking for and offering help, as seen at
British Petroleum (BP). There, employees are encouraged to become members of lateral
networks across the organization where they belong to communities with similar interests.54
According to Deakins (the BP technology vice president) the sharing of learning and ideas
will be the basis for creation and innovation thus reaching the growth goals of the
corporation.55 Another proposal to share and exchange knowledge, especially tacit
knowledge, is to prohibit eating at the desk or workspace. Some G-8 countries, unlike the
USA, have already such requirements providing a learning experience since the knowledge
workers get the opportunity to dine with colleagues “in a shared, trustful environment.”56
Finally, KM will be efficient if knowledge workers believe their labor is honored and their
need to earn a livelihood respected. The best method to encourage knowledge transfer and
team work is by rewarding teams of workers instead of specific individuals, for example with
bonus awards, time off awards and other benefits.57
52 Davenport, “If only HP Knew What HP Knows...” 53www.kmworld.com/resources/featurearticles/index.cfm?action=readfeature&feature_id=32 54Browne, 2000 55Deakins 56www.kmworld.com/resources/featurearticles/index.cfm?action=readfeature&feature_id=32 57Adams
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When introducing a new management strategy concept, it is also of great importance to
regard benefits that the concept will have. In order to use KM efficiently, it should help a
company do one or more of the following:
��Promote the development of innovation by encouraging the free flow of ideas
��Improve customer service by streamlining response time
��Increase revenues by getting products and services to the market faster
��Improve the efficiency of operations and reduce costs by eliminating redundant or
unnecessary processes
Those are the most common examples. A creative approach to KM can result in increased
productivity, efficiency and revenues in practically any business function. 58
4. Conclusion
To sum up, organizations have gone through a change in the past half century. The shift from
an industrial economy to an information-driven economy led to the knowledge society, the
knowledge work, and the knowledge worker. It affected organizations in that way to seeing
knowledge as the key factor of production. Noticing that great potential lies within the
knowledge of the knowledge workers, organizations have to make this knowledge
productive. However, to do so organizations need to change their values and establish a new
focus on creating, renewing, sharing, and applying knowledge.
58 Santosus and Surmacz
20
As discussed in the paper, this requires a new form of management that is knowledge
management. Helping the flow of information, which creates knowledge, more egalitarian
and more dynamic organizational structures must be developed instead of keeping the old
standard, militaristic hierarchical structure. Knowledge workers need to be taught within their
organization in order to be aware of the newest changes in doing business, the newest
changes in the market, and to be able to use the newest tools supporting their work. By being
entirely up-to-date, an organization is then able to compete with others. Additionally, there is
an interdependence between an organization and a knowledge worker. The organization has
to show its knowledge worker that he or she is needed while the knowledge worker needs the
infrastructure of the organization and conversations with other knowledge workers to use,
share and create knowledge.
As learned from different examples, knowledge management is already applied in some
organizations. To give a prognosis, the assumption can be made that to a few knowledge
management is already there and to others it will be the new challenging task in organizations
in order to make knowledge work productive and to avoid reinventing the wheel.
22
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