Sunday 29 March 2009

Knowledge Management in Organisation


Knowledge Management in an Organisation


Knowledge management enables the members of organisation in dealing the situations effectively and creating the vision to their future. There are certain needs for Knowledge Management practices in Organisation workplace in order to promote knowledge sharing among the managers and the employees of the organisation. Knowledge is shared and disseminated throughout the organisation [Zack, 1999]. In addition to the organisational Knowledge Management, the KM of the people and KM of infrastructure and process [Sveiby, 1994] are the subsystems that are to be balanced in order to attain a successful KM effort. It is very important to assign a KM strategy to the overall business of the organisation [Carlson, 1996].




Fig. Extracted from Theoritical Framework of KM by Nakkiran, 1996.


Designing Framework


It is more important to focus on the employees and their contribution towards the organisation. Each should be motivated thoroughly in order to make them feel that they are also a part of it. This can be done by encouraging them in individual learning [Holland, 1998], creating vision [Tiwana, 2000] and announcing rewards to those employees who come front with innovative ideas.


Performing a knowledge based SWOT analysis [Humphrey, 1998] is also recommended which helps in identifying the organisation in filling the knowledge gap by designing the organisation strategy. This is one of the best ways to achieve better initiative growth in the organisation.


For example, TVS is a motor company in India. In this company, the KM of the people and KM of the organisation is managed by allocating incentives to the employees who are with good customer service record and feedback. It is also important to motivate members so that they can see themselves as part of organisation, so that it would be easier for them to take up the values and standards of their organisation. They are set to some goals and objectives. In addition to these, they are also awarded with best titles for their service. There was a gradual growth in sales after this attempt and it is in better position by implementing this innovative idea.


As discussed above, creating vision [Tiwana, 2000] helps in designing the organisation. It helps the employees in creating better understanding in what they are being asked to contribute to the knowledge management effort. Vision also creates a sense of belonging for the employees and make them to participate in change process. The CEO should act as a barrier between employees of organisaiton and the Knowledge Management hierarchy that exists in the organisation.


REFERENCES


1. Desouza, K. C., ‘’ Facilitating tacit knowledge exchange: Communications of the ACM ‘’ , 2003, pg: 85-88.

2. Grover, V., and Davenport, T. H., ‘’ General perspectives on knowledge management: Fostering a research agenda, Journalof Management Information Systems ’’, 2001, pg : 5 -21.

3. Maier, R. and Remus, U. ‘’ Towards a framework for knowledge management strategies: Process orientation as strategic starting point, in Proceedings of the International Conference on System Sciences’’, 2001.

4. Lee, H., and Choi, B.,’’ Knowledge management enablers, processes, and organizational performance: An integrative view and empirical examination, Journal of Management Information Systems’’, 2003, pg: 179-228.

5. Jennex, M. E., and Olfman L., ‘’ Development recommendations for knowledge management /organizational memory systems, in Contemporary Trends in IS Development ’’, Kluwer, 2001.

6. Misra, D., Hariharan, R., and Khaneja, ‘’knowledge management framework for government organizations, Information Systems Management’’, 2003, pg: 38-48.

6 comments:

  1. Hello Deepak,

    Quick glance, good work, however upon reading.. I cannot seem to understand the first sentence as to whether this is your perspective of clarity or from combination of literature material. I am impressed how you have started to incorporate references embedded into your writing.

    This is very true of Carlson (1996) statement about alignment - are you able to provide an example of what is the consequence if not aligned?

    Where you state "goals and objectives" - how will these be measured?..I quite like the idea of vision as this helps to drive where one would want to aim for.

    For improvement, I think I would like to see more analysis rather than statement. Your last point in the paragraph about "CEO should act as a barrier between employees", is this a bad idea? Too much of hiercharchial can cause disruptions and over empowerment which can demotivate employees to work towards sharing knowledge.

    One last thing, the image displayed - was that created or obtained from some where?..

    Please do not take my comment too personally, this is just to help you..? I will recheck this again tomorrow evening.

    :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. since CEO is a top level, he has to feel responsible towards the employees. An appreciation would develop more interest in himself towards work and thus he can improve the working skills..

    That figure is an extracted one.. and i mentioned the source below the figure.. it has not been displayed.

    ReplyDelete
  3. hello deepak,
    the example what you have given here which suits for the commitment and motivation in organisational workers is very good.

    But you haven't discussed cleary about the process of knowledge management ......can you make it clear..!!!

    ReplyDelete
  4. I here come with my supporting example that I've given..

    Insentives are alloted to the workers of the organisation who has a good customer feedback.. on doing this, they get motivatd and feel themselves their own responsibility..

    I think this is one of the ways to create interest among them..

    ReplyDelete
  5. I agree with Man-Chie's comment but also I want to say good improvement - except for I disagree with your replying comment about "CEO is a top level" - are you trying to say that just because people are on top level - they are all that?!

    This goes back to the organiastional culture - if the top level are too over empowering and forceful on operational and senior member - there is causation of conflict and bad culture - therefore how can they produce creativity and innovation?

    Montano (2005) explains a good situation about 'knowledge gap' which we can see if this does happen. Also another area is the works of Hofstede where he discusses about the "collective masculine cultures" that have a high "distribution of empowerment" - creating disturbance and ambiguity (cited in Montano, 2005, p.28).

    I want you improve this work even more!

    good luck

    \(-___-)/


    Montano, B. (2005). Innovations Of Knowledge Management, IRM Press, Hershey.

    ReplyDelete
  6. hello Deepak,
    nice work.....good example by you..good explanation for role commitment and motivation in knowledge workers in an organization...
    if you would have provided some more information about this may give good value to this article..

    ReplyDelete