Organizational knowledge documentation in project-based institutes: A case study at the satellite research institute

Abstract

Purpose

Employees, as the most important assets of an organization, acquire a great deal of experience, skills and knowledge throughout the time period they work for the organization. If their skills and technical knowledge are not documented properly, these will be lost once the employees leave the organization. Therefore, documentation is necessary for preserving this invaluable knowledge, avoiding duplication and preventing repeated mistakes that occurred in the past and, providing the junior staff with experiences gained by their predecessors. Thus, this research aims to elaborate on the role of organizational knowledge management (KM) as an essential tool for turning tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge and sharing the gained experiences with others.

Design/methodology/approach

This research is developmental applied research with qualitative approach and it was conducted using thematic analysis method. This method includes a semi-structured interview with 18 researchers conducting research projects at the Satellite Research Institute under the supervision of the Iran Space Agency.

Findings

The projects contain knowledge that is a combination of “know why”, “know what”, “know who” and “know how”. A large amount of this knowledge is, indeed, the tacit knowledge. Most of this tacit knowledge is not reflected in the project documents. Generally, the documents contain results only and they do not include experience, technical details, methodology, analysis and mistakes that were made during research activities. Documentation challenges fall into three major types: technical, human resources and administrative.

Originality value

Considering the necessity of documentation within the knowledge transfer process and its important role in KM; and, with respect to the lack of technical knowledge and experience transfer observed in the documents of Satellite Research Institute, this research proposes some steps that need to be taken to turn the knowledge sharing into an organizational culture.

Citation

Navidi, F., Hassanzadeh, M. and Zolghadr Shojai, A. (2017), "Organizational knowledge documentation in project-based institutes: A case study at the satellite research institute", The Electronic Library, Vol. 35 No. 5, pp. 994-1012. https://doi.org/10.1108/EL-10-2015-0196