Tactical Knowledge Management Best Practices:
- Knowledge Sharing: Perhaps the most important process in KM, it plays a determinant role for both knowledge reuse and knowledge creation. The factors below summarize the key considerations with the exception of cultural issues, which are discussed further down.
- Explicit knowledge: Depends on articulation of needs, awareness of knowledge, access to knowledge, guidance in the knowledge sharing process, and completeness of the knowledge sources (Bukowitz & Williams 1999). IT systems and content management are extremely important in this process.
- Tacit (embodied) knowledge: This depends on socialization, particularly within informal networks. Culture is particularly important in this area. Tacit knowledge can rarely be effectively codified without losing the essence that makes it so valuable to begin with, so the focus should be on supporting work relationships. IT has a secondary supporting role in this context, primarily as an expert finder and as offering support in the socialization process (e.g. through groupware applications).
- Embedded knowledge: Use of scenario planning, after action reviews, and management training (Gamble & Blackwell 2001). IT has a role in mapping, modeling, creating simulations, and as an embedded knowledge repository.
- Knowledge Reuse: Involves three roles, the knowledge producer, intermediary, and consumer (Markus 2001), which are involved in creating, preparing, and actually reusing the knowledge. Two keys elements here are culture and cost - particularly relating to tacit knowledge (where indexing the source rather than the knowledge itself is often more viable). Markus identifies four reuse situations:
- Shared work producers
- Shared work practitioners
- Expert seeking novices
- Miners of secondary knowledge
- Knowledge Creation: This process depends upon knowledge sharing (as defined above), collaboration, and access to relevant information and data. Cook and Brown (1999) suggest that knowledge creation is an interplay between knowledge and knowing, or in other words, putting knowledge into practice. The role of management in this process was identified as:
- Enabling knowledge sharing: As above
- Creating suitable work related environments: The focus here is on unstructured work environments where experimentation, trial and error, and theory in use are promoted. Self-organizing, semi- or fully-autonomous project teams are identified as one useful tool in this endeavor.
- Providing access to collaborative IT systems: Groupware applications can be used for this purpose. These must support and not interfere with the ideal work environment.
- Providing access to relevant data and information: From information systems, data warehouses, data mining, etc. These can act as building blocks in the knowledge creation process.
- Knowledge Acquisition: The firm can acquire knowledge externally from customers, suppliers, competitors, partners, and mergers. The role of KM varies in each process (as does the type of available knowledge), but at its core its function is to establish the right channels to transfer relevant knowledge from existing partnerships into the firm, and to integrate this knowledge as best as possible. To do so, KM can use a wide range of tools including:
- Common IT systems
- Common projects
- Interaction and socialization
- Involvement of partners in certain organizational processes (e.g. design)
- Cultural alignment (for mergers or joint ventures)
- Setting up the right incentive systems
- Identifying and protecting crucial knowledge assets: when such knowledge should not be shared with a partner
Read more:http://www.knowledge-management-tools.net/KM-best-practices.html#ixzz47VY3Hhfr
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