30 Knowledge Management

P. Jaisridhar

1. Introduction

Knowledge and Knowledge management are concepts, which are debated extensively by managers, analyst and academicians. When we refer to knowledge, most of us mainly tend to think of codified and documented knowledge like patents, databases, manuals, white papers etc. knowledge is intuitive, contextual, linked to experience, past memories and difficult to codify, document and communicate. Unfortunately, there is no universal definition of Knowledge Management (KM), just as there’s no agreement as to what constitutes knowledge in the first place. In broadest context KM is the process through which organizations generate value from their intellectual and knowledge-based assets. It is the practice of harnessing and exploiting intellectual capital to gain competitive advantage and customer commitment through efficiency, innovation and faster and more effective decision-making. Most often, generating value from such assets involves sharing them among employees, departments and even with other companies in an effort to devise best practices.

Today, knowledge is still considered power – an enormous power in fact – but the understanding has changed considerably, particularly from the perspective of organizations. The new paradigm is that within the organization knowledge must be shared in order for it to grow. It has been shown that the organization that shares knowledge among its management and staff grows stronger and becomes more competitive. This is the core of knowledge management – the sharing of knowledge. Knowledge management (KM) is all about managing organization’s knowledge effectively by sharing and having a systematic activity for creation of knowledge and exploiting it for the market and benefit of the organization. KM techniques and processes provide such a structured approach to explicate a significant part of this tactic knowledge document in knowledge repositories and also share in teams, through intensive dialogue and discussions. KM refers to the critical issues of organizational adaptation, survival and competence against discontinuous environmental change.

Knowledge management is also a process that helps organizations identify, sort, select, organize, systematize, disseminate, and transfer important information and expertise that are part of the organization’s memory and that typically reside within the organization. The information technologies that together make knowledge management available throughout an organization are referred to as a knowledge management system (Smith and McKeen, 2003). It focuses on organizing and making important knowledge available, wherever and whenever it is needed. Knowledge management (KM) has been the subject of much discussion over the past decade. Organisations are often told that they will not survive in the modern Knowledge Era unless they have a strategy for managing and leveraging value from their intellectual assets, and many KM lifecycles and strategies have been proposed. However, it has become clear that the term “Knowledge Management” has been applied to a very broad spectrum of activities designed to manage, exchange and create or enhance intellectual assets within an organisation, and that there is no widespread agreement on what KM actually is. Knowledge management involves IT applications that are termed as “knowledge management applications”, ranging from the development of highly codified help desk systems to the provision of video conferencing to facilitate the exchange of ideas between people.

Knowledge Management can be recognized as a process where the aim is to increase, renew, share, or improve the use of knowledge represented in any form of intellectual capital including structural, human and social (Seemann et al., 1999). Although various forms of knowledge classification might exist in the literature, the popular one is to classify knowledge as either explicit or tacit, and either individual or collective. Another classification comes from the work of Boisot (1998) where he considers knowledge as assets that can be located within a three dimensional space defined by axes from “non-codified” to “codified”, from “concrete” to “abstract” and from “undiffused” to “diffused”. Similar distinction has been made as: “Tacit knowledge is that stored in the brain of a person. Explicit knowledge is that contained in documents or other forms of storage other than the human brain. Explicit knowledge may therefore be stored or embedded in facilities, products, processes, services and systems. Both types of knowledge can be produced as a result of interactions or innovations. They can be the outcome of relationships or alliances” (Uriarte, 2008: 4).

This classification involves passing through the following phases:

Scanning: insights are gained from generally available (diffused) data
Problem-Solving: problems are solved giving structure and coherence to these insights (knowledge becomes ‘codified’)
Abstraction: the newly codified insights are generalised to a wide range of situations (knowledge becomes more ‘abstract’)
Diffusion: the new insights are shared with a target population in a codified and abstract form (knowledge becomes ‘diffused’)
Absorption: the newly codified insights are applied to a variety of situations producing new learning experiences (knowledge is absorbed and produces learnt behaviour and so becomes ‘non-codified’, or ‘tacit’)
Impacting: abstract knowledge becomes embedded in concrete practices, for example in artefacts, rules or behaviour patterns (knowledge becomes ‘concrete’)

In classifying knowledge management, the most influential and helpful classifications is based on a combination of knowledge accessibility (i.e. where the knowledge is stored or located and the form in which it is stored, be it electronic, print, pictorial, video) and knowledge transformation (i.e. the flow of knowledge from one place to another and from one form to another, from a complex to simple to improve understanding). The knowledge processes that transform knowledge from one form to another are as follows:

Socialisation (from tacit to tacit, whereby an individual acquires tacit knowledge directly from others through shared experience, observation, imitation and so on);
Externalisation (from tacit to explicit, through articulation of tacit knowledge into explicit concepts);
Combination (from explicit to explicit, through a systematisation of concepts drawing on different bodies of explicit knowledge); and
Internalisation (from explicit to tacit, through a process of “learning by doing” and through a verbalisation and documentation of experiences).

1.1. Data, Information and Knowledge

Data, Information and Knowledge are the basic building blocks of Information Science. These are considered to be the different levels of abstraction. Data becomes the basic building material for information, and the blocks of information form the base of knowledge. It is commonly seen that data is very frequently substituted for information, and information is wrongly used for knowledge. Datum is the representation of concepts or other entities, fixed in or on a medium in a form suitable for communication, interpretation, or processing by human beings or by automated systems. Quantified and/or qualified facts and figures belong to this category. The verb ‘inform’ normally is used in the sense to communicate (i.e., to report, relate, or tell) and comes from the Latin verb informare, which meant to shape (form) an idea. Data is persistent while information is transient, depending on context and the interpretation of the recipient. Information is data received through a communication process that proves of value in making decisions. Information can also be known as organized data which can answer queries like what?, when?, who?, and where?. Knowledge should not be confused with data. It consists of facts, prejudices, beliefs, and most importantly, heuristic knowledge. Thus, we can say that knowledge includes and requires the use of data and information. But it is more. It combines relationships, correlations, dependencies, and the notion of gestalt with data and information. Knowledge involves both data and the relationships among data elements or their sets. This organization of data based on relationships is what enables one to draw generalizations from the data so organized, and to formulate questions about which one wishes to acquire more data. That is, knowledge begets the quest for knowledge, and it arises from verified or validated ideas.

Knowledge is said to be transformed from information by humans through methods of

• Comparison,

• Consequences,

• Connections, and

• Conversation.

For instance, when a person makes a comparison of some information with another situation previously encountered, knowledge is derived. Knowledge is having a familiarity with language, concepts, procedures, rules, ideas, abstractions, places, customs, facts, and associations, coupled with the ability to use these notions effectively in modelling different aspects of the world. Knowledge can be required for content of study and may be objective or subjective. It may be required for policy formulation, decision making, or for some administrative or management based decision. Collection of proper input, selection of quality attributes, and focus on output is very important for knowledge. Both knowledge and information are context specific and relational; however, information is moreover factual, whereas knowledge is a true justified belief.

2. Generation of Knowledge Management

The evolution of the knowledge management concept has been categorized into three generations by the knowledge analysts. The first age of knowledge management was the one in which the word knowledge itself was not at first “problematic,” and in which the focus was on distributing information to decision makers for timely use in decisions. The second age replaced the information technology focus with one on tacit/explicit knowledge conversion inspired by Nonaka’s SECI model. The third age is the one in which knowledge is viewed paradoxically as a thing and a flow; context, narrative and content management is central to our view of Knowledge Management. Further, he believes that there will be an understanding of organizations as engaged in sense making through utilization of complex adaptive systems (CAS) phenomena constrained by human acts of free will attempting to order them; and finally, the use of the insights and practices of scientific management will be restricted to appropriate context, while insight and learning from theories of chaos and complexity will supplement them in context where these new insights are relevant.

The first generation stressed on identification of knowledge and furthermore on its sharing, systematising and controlling process within the organization; the second involved itself in exploitation of knowledge with a touch of innovation, whereas the third is aimed at exploration of new knowledge. The key knowledge management tools for the first generation have been use of information technology for locating and capturing knowledge and skills. To collect and codify the existing knowledge was their main goal. The major tools for the second generation have been a combination of information technology with emphasis on social interaction and communication. The third or the current generation is looking for self-renewing organizations and the tools and technologies used as evolving day-by-day for efficient management of knowledge. The most successful organisations are shifting from strategies based on prediction to strategies based on anticipation of surprises. They are shifting from management based on compliance to management based on self-control and self-organisation. They are also shifting from utilisation of already known knowledge to the creation of new knowledge, from pure ‘technology’ KM applications to also include ‘process’ applications.

3. Knowledge Management Value Position in Global Application Management

Knowledge Management system aim to ensure consistent, efficient and effective smart service to end-customers by enabling smart work-ways within Global Applications delivery Unit. The following table explains the opportunities available to knowledge management for global application on four quadrants of the balance scorecard.

1. Process:

Smarter and efficient processes: Adapting best practices. Drive re-usage of knowledge
Standardize processes for greater consistency and flexibility
Enable Common Delivery Pool (CDP) model by offering common source of knowledge and documentation which results into higher flexibility
Avoid re-invention. Quick replication across Global Production Centers (GPCs)

2. Customer:

Improves contextual grasp of customer knowledge
Move up from customer satisfaction to customer delight
Improved SLAs and response time. Futuristic solutions
Ensures new joiners adapts faster and thereby reduces impact on delivery to customer

3. People:

Learn right things with right speed and ensure financial benefits
Higher collaboration among teams
High levels of employee engagements
Help get access to Global Subject Matter Experts across Global Applications.

4. Finance:

Need to improve operational efficiency like productivity, response time, optimum utilization of resources.
Smart work ways to ensure market growth from existing customers
Enhance chances for cross-selling and up-selling of enhancements.

4. Role of Information Technology in Knowledge Management

Firms need internal information about their financial situation, the effectiveness of their products, their production costs, and so on. And they need external information about the environment in which they operate– competitors, customers, suppliers, etc. – that helps them to get to know their customers and satisfy them immediately and effectively, and so gain sustainable competitive advantages. Getting information is no longer the problem. The difficulty lies in obtaining quality information, where quality is measured in terms of accuracy, reliability, precision, and timeliness, and the extent to which the information is relevant in the decision making. The IT revolution has facilitated the processes of searching for and recovering information, but at the same time it has led to an important growth in the database industry. Firms must be able to use IT to obtain useful information for their decision-making. While IT is a generic term fundamentally used to refer to programs, computers and telecommunications, the term IT competency is broader and refers to the use of these technologies to satisfy the firm’s information needs. This study differentiates between three dimensions of this concept: IT knowledge, IT operations, and IT infrastructure. These dimensions represent co specialized resources that indicate the organization’s capacity to understand and use the tools necessary for managing information about markets and customers. Moreover, although they are independent, all three aspects must be present for the firm to achieve IT competency. For example, many firms invest in technical tools but at the same time fail to achieve IT.

Capturing and collection of knowledge is important part of KM but when we are not able to disseminate this knowledge to employees or people than its not worth. Than IT helps an organization to spread knowledge from one person to other person. It provides several techniques for Creation, collection, capture, organize, refinement, disseminate, maintenance through which KM can easily applied in an organization. Considering the complexity of KM initiatives and the variety of IT solutions available on the market, executives must often confront the challenging task of deciding what type of IT solutions to deploy in support of their KM initiatives. There are two basic approaches to KM for which IT can provide support: codification and personalization. With the codification approach, more explicit and structured knowledge is codified and stored in knowledge bases. The main role of IT here is to help people share knowledge through common storage so as to achieve economic reuse of knowledge. An example of such IT tools is electronic knowledge repositories. With the personalization approach, more tacit and unstructured knowledge is shared largely through direct personal communication. The main role of IT is to help people locate each other and communicate so as to achieve complex knowledge transfer. Examples of such IT tools are knowledge expert directories and video-conferencing tools. Information and communication technologies have been closely associated with the development of the great majority of knowledge management initiatives. It is estimated that almost 70% of publications on knowledge management focus on the design of IT systems. The influence of IT competency on knowledge management can be considered twofold: direct and indirect. Information systems can directly influence the knowledge management processes.

5. Conclusion

One of the key concept of knowledge management is learning. Learning is a complex dynamic process of interacting with many sources of information in meaningful ways to construct new knowing and understanding. Knowledge management enables a learning community to learn more effectively. Knowledge management is very important to an organization. Mission, conception, change and performance are four dimensions of knowledge management, which define the value of an organization. The most important area of knowledge management is the concept of tacit knowledge. Unlike most other management tools, knowledge management encloses every individual in the organization cutting across departments, functions and business units. It has been observed that KM for corporate is mainly for getting competitive advantages over the rival companies. In developed countries this culture is running for quite some time where as in developing countries especially in India it is slowly picking up. A KM initiative in different sectors of the economy in India is mentioned. Corporate in India such as TCS, ONGC, Infosys etc have established their in-house knowledge management systems. Different types of KM initiatives such as external structure initiatives, internal structure initiatives and competence initiatives with examples find mention in the paper.

Knowledge management is a rapidly growing field with immense potential. Tracking all the day-to-day activities, development and research works related to knowledge is a herculean task. The field is very vast and is reshaping eventually with time due to the advent of new techniques and technologies Still it will be instrumental to work on some key technologies that seem to be more promising. The trends and technologies will provide effective solution and advancement to the existing glitches that are being faced today. These technologies are not only individually beneficial but they have also got social benefits as they incorporate social informal conversations and practices.

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