CSS3133/N Knowledge Management

Unit 01: Introduction to Knowledge Management (KM)

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Learning outcomes
• Define the concepts of KM using a clear
framework and language
• Give an overview of the history of KM and its key
milestones
• Describe the key roles and responsibilities
required for KM application

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What is KM?
• Defining KM can be like the story of “Three Blind Men and an Elephant”.
– Basic definition – “the process of applying a systematic approach to the capture,
structuring, management, and dissemination of knowledge through an
organization to work faster, reuse best practices, and reduce costly rework from
project to project”.
– Wide definition – “KM encompasses everything to do with knowledge”.
– Narrow definition – “IT systems that dispenses organizational know-how”.

• KM can also be defined from

– The business perspective
– The cognitive science or knowledge science perspective
– The process/technology perspective

• KM is all these and more…

Consensus: KM is highly multidisciplinary.

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 The race to remain
competitive has sparked

Multidisciplinary nature of KM many organizations to

create knowledge
management (KM)
initiatives.

• KM draws upon a vast number of diverse fields:

– Organizational science
– Cognitive science
– Computer science
– Linguistics and computational linguistics
– Information technologies
– Information and library science
– Technical writing and journalism
– Anthropology and communication studies
– Collaborative technologies
– Web technologies
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What is knowledge?
• Knowledge is a more subjective way of knowing
something…

• Data vs information vs knowledge

– Data: Content that is directly observable or verifiable
– Information: Content that represents analyzed data
– Knowledge: Dealing with information using
experiential or individual values, perceptions, and
experience

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Some popular examples to distinguish data from information from
knowledge :
• Data
– Content that is directly observable or verifiable: a fact
– For example – Movie Listings giving the times and locations of all
movies being shown today – You download the listings.
• Information
– Content that represents analysed data
– For example – You can`t leave before 5 so you will go to the 7pm
show at the cinema near my office.
• Knowledge
– At that time of day, it will be impossible to find parking. I
remember the last time I took the car, I was frustrated and
stressed because I thought I would miss the opening credits. I’ll
therefore take the commuter train.
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 It is essential to
understand the difference

Types of knowledge
between tacit and explicit
knowledge because
different management
initiatives are required to
manage both types of
• 2 major types of knowledge: knowledge
1. Tacit knowledge:
o Knowledge that is difficult to articulate and also difficult to put into words, text, or
drawings.
o Ability to adapt, to deal with new and exceptional situations
o Expertise, know-how, know-why, and care-why
o Ability to collaborate, to share a vision, to transmit a culture
o Coaching and mentoring to transfer experiential knowledge on a one-to-one, face-to-face
basis

2. Explicit knowledge:
o Knowledge represented by content that has been captured in some tangible form such as
words, audio recordings, or images.
o Ability to disseminate, to reproduce, to access, and to reapply throughout the
organization
o Ability to teach, to train
o Ability to organize, to systematize; to translate a vision into a mission statement, into
operational guidelines
o Transfer of knowledge via products, services, and documented processes
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KM focus
• Common misconception: KM focuses on rendering tacit into
explicit or tangible forms.

• In fact, KM’s focus is broader  includes leveraging the value

of organizational knowledge and know-how that accumulates
over time.
– e.g. gathering and documenting successful knowledge sharing
examples as best practices.

• A number of attributes combine to make up what KM should

be.
– Using the concept analysis technique is a good way to identify
these attributes.
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The Concept Analysis Technique
• Concept analysis uses a “formula” to generate
definitions and descriptive phrases for highly
complex terms.
• This approach obtains consensus on three major
dimensions of a given concept:
1. A list of key attributes that must be present in the
definition, vision, or mission statement.
2. A list of illustrative examples.
3. A list of illustrative non-examples.

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Concept Analysis Template

Key Attributes ABC is…examples ABC is not…ex

1. …………. 1. …………. 1. ………….

2. …………. 2. …………. 2. ………….
3. …………. 3. …………. 3. ………….
4. …………. 4. …………. 4. ………….
5. …………. 5. …………. 5. ………….
6. …………. 6. …………. 6. ………….
7. …………. 7. …………. 7. ………….

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Concept Analysis: Digital library

Key Attributes Examples Non-examples

1. collection 1. MUSE 1. website
2. resources (people) 2. EEBO - Early 2. database
3. organized English Books 3. Amazon
4. digital content. Online 4. e-books
5. technological 3. EUDML – 5. physical or
container European Digital traditional library
6. location- Math Library 6. limited copies
independent 4. Digital library of 7. need to go to a
7. unlimited copies open access specific location
journals

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 Key attributes of knowledge management (1)
• Using concept analysis, Ruggles and Holtshouse (1999)
identified the following key attributes of knowledge
management:
– Generating new knowledge.
– Accessing valuable knowledge from outside sources.
– Using accessible knowledge in decision making.
– Embedding knowledge in processes, products, and/or services.
– Representing knowledge in documents, databases, and software.
– Facilitating knowledge growth through culture and incentives.
– Transferring existing knowledge into other parts of the
organization.
– Measuring the value of knowledge assets and/or impact of
knowledge management.
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 Key attributes of knowledge management (2)
• Other recurring attributes of knowledge
management:
– The notion of added value (the “so what?” of KM).
– The notion of application or use of the knowledge that
has been captured, codified, and disseminated (the
impact of KM).

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History of KM

Knowledge management came

about in the 1970s because of
papers published by
management theorists and
practitioners like Peter Drucker
and Paul Strassman. These
papers focus around how
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information and knowledge
could be used as valuable
Developmental phases in KM history

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KM in the information age
• Technology enables valuable knowledge to be
“remembered” via organizational learning and
corporate memory.
– KM is offered as a course in universities around the world,
and as a degree program in many business and library
schools.
– As a result, KM is considered a core competency in
performance and promotion evaluation by many HR
departments.
• KM is now even recognized as an organizational
resource to be managed under ISO Standard
9001:2015.
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From physical to knowledge assets
• Knowledge has become increasingly more valuable than the
more traditional physical or tangible assets.
– Airlines consider the SABRE passenger reservation system as more
valuable than their airplanes.
– In the manufacturing sector, Just-In-Time (JIT) inventory systems is
rapidly providing more value that the inventory themselves.
– Human talent are also increasingly considered more valuable to
physical assets
• This has led to a change in focus to the useful lifespan of a
valuable piece of knowledge (knowledge asset).
• Content analysis and cost-benefit analyses are needed
to manage these “intellectual capital” in the best possible
way.
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 If the company were to
lose this knowledge or

Intellectual capital start from scratch, it would

be costly and time-
consuming.

• Intellectual capital is the value of a company's employee

knowledge, skills, business training, or any proprietary information
that may provide the company with a competitive advantage.
• The value of these knowledge assets is at least equal to the cost
of re-creating this knowledge.
• Intellectual assets may be found at the strategic, tactical, and
operational levels of an organization.
• Examples of intellectual capital include:
– Competence: the skills necessary to achieve a certain (high) level of
performance.
– Capability: strategic skills necessary to integrate and apply
competencies.
– Technologies: tools and methods required to produce certain physical
results.

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Levels of intellectual capital

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Ancient ways of coding knowledge
• The ancient Inca of Peru used knotted strings
called “khipu” to keep track of their business.

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Organizational Perspectives on Knowledge Management
• Wiig (1993) considers knowledge management in organizations from three
perspectives, each with different horizons and purposes:
1. Business Perspective – focusing on why, where, and to what extent the organization
must invest in or exploit knowledge.
o Strategies, products and services, alliances, acquisitions, or divestments should be considered from
knowledge-related points of view.
2. Management Perspective – focusing on determining, organizing, directing, facilitating,
and monitoring knowledge-related practices and activities required to achieve the desired
business strategies and objectives.
3. Hands-on Perspective – focusing on applying the expertise to conduct explicit
knowledge-related work and tasks.

• The business perspective easily maps onto the strategic layer, the management
perspective to the tactical layer, and the hands-on perspective may be equated
with the operational level.

• As with KM, there is no best perspective, instead added value can come from
combining 2 perspectives to get the most out of KM.

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Why is KM important today?
• The major business drivers behind today’s increased interest in and
application of KM lie in four key areas:

1. Globalization of business: organizations today are more global (multisite,

multilingual, and multicultural) in nature.
2. Leaner organizations: We are doing more and we are doing it faster, but
we also need to work smarter as knowledge workers, adopting an increased
pace and workload.
3. Corporate amnesia: We are more mobile as a workforce, which creates
problems of knowledge continuity for the organization and places continuous
learning demands on the knowledge worker. We no longer expect to spend
our entire work life with the same organization.
4. Technological advances: We are more connected. Advances in information
technology not only have made connectivity ubiquitous but have radically
changed expectations. We are expected to be “on” at all times, and the
turnaround time in responding is now measured in minutes, not weeks.

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KM in the work environment
• Today’s work environment is more complex due to
the increase in subjective knowledge items.
• Knowledge workers are increasingly being asked to
think on their feet,” with little time to digest and
analyze the sheer volume of incoming data and
information.
• KM is considered as a significant response to
managing this challenge due to its ability to handle
both explicit and tacit knowledge.
• Still, it took 3 generations of KM to get to where it is
today.
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Iterations of KM
• We are now entering the third generation of
knowledge management.
– 1st generation: the emphasis was placed on KM being
containers of knowledge or IT (Intranets and internal
knowledge management systems).
– 2nd generation: the emphasis swung to focus on the human
and cultural dimensions of KM, forming communities of
practice.
– 3rd generation: currently the focus is on the importance of
shared context. This is characterized by the advent of
metadata to describe the content in addition to the format of
content, content management, and knowledge taxonomies.

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KM for Individuals, Communities, and Organizations
• This 3-tiered view of KM helps emphasize why KM is important today:

• For the individual, KM:

– Helps people do their jobs and save time through better decision making and problem solving.
– Builds a sense of community bonds within the organization.
– Helps people to keep up to date.
– Provides challenges and opportunities to contribute.

• For the community of practice, KM:

– Develops professional skills.
– Promotes peer-to-peer mentoring.
– Facilitates more effective networking and collaboration.
– Develops a professional code of ethics that members can follow.
– Develops a common language.

• For the organization, KM:

– Helps drive strategy.
– Solves problems quickly.
– Diffuses best practices.
– Improves knowledge embedded in products and services.
– Cross-fertilizes ideas and increases opportunities for innovation.
– Enables organizations to stay ahead of the competition better.
– Builds organizational memory.
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Critical KM challenges
• Manage content effectively
• Facilitate collaboration
• Help knowledge workers connect and find experts
• Help the organization to learn and make decisions
based on complete, valid, and well-interpreted
data, information, and knowledge.

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Components of KM

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Summary
• KM is not necessarily “completely new” but has been practiced in a wide
variety of settings for some time now, albeit under different monikers.
• Knowledge is more complex than data or information; it is subjective,
often based on experience, and highly contextual.
• There is no generally accepted definition of KM, but most practitioners
and professionals concur that KM treats both tacit and explicit
knowledge with the objective of adding value to the organization.
• Each organization should define KM in terms of its own business
objectives; concept analysis is one way of accomplishing this.
• KM is all about applying knowledge in new, previously unencumbered or
novel situations.
• KM has its roots in a variety of different disciplines.
• The KM generations to date have focused first on containers, next on
communities, and finally on the content itself.

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Unit checkpoint
1. Use concept analysis to clarify the following terms:
a) Intellectual capital versus physical assets.
b) Tacit knowledge versus explicit knowledge.
c) Community of practice versus community of interest.
2. “Knowledge management is not anything new.” Would you
argue that this statement is largely true or false? Why or
why not? Use historical antecedents to justify your
arguments.
3. What are the three generations of knowledge management
to date? What was the primary focus of each?
4. What are the different types of roles required for each of
the above three generations?
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