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The purpose of this paper is to show‐case how modern Knowledge Management Models, specifically that of Earl, can be applied to manage Indigenous Knowledge (IK).

The paper is largely based on the review of both print and electronic resources.

Despite IK being tacit and marginalized it can indeed be managed by use of modern models just like modern knowledge.

Validation poses a challenge and the future of IK will also be challenged unless stringent solutions are unveiled.

The paper suggests a number of ways in which IK can be managed using the contemporary KM models with specific attention to Earl's KM Taxonomy.

The paper shows how IK, a tacit knowledge, can go through the various KM processes of creation/production, storage, processing/codification, transfer and utilization successfully.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how to achieve business improvement using clear organisational goals and well-communicated vision, together with a powerful process modelling technique and an analysis of the adopted e-business development stages.

Employing both business process modelling and improvement complement and reinforce one another. Among different business process modelling techniques, Ould's Riva method was selected to analyse the business processes and to improve the CRM business process in Incom Egypt. In order to get a deeper insight, seven-key decision makers at the case study organisation have been interviewed. E-business development stages have also been elaborated and analysed in the case study. This case study approach enables the researchers to get a complete picture of the problem.

It was found that Incom Egypt aimed to automate their business processes to solve these problems but they failed. Main reasons behind its failure are their unstructured business processes and employees resistance to improvements. Setting clear goals that follow the organisation's mission and vision can direct managers towards better decision making. Therefore, identification of business processes should be among the first steps to understand business structure, where inefficiencies in current activities could be detected, adjusted and improved. Improvements could then follow e-business development stages using Earl's technique.

The primary value of this paper is that business process improvement does not depend on one technique, but rather lies in the combination of process modelling, and e-business development together, which in turn helps decision makers successfully set up effective organisational plans via clarifying business processes. The improved system will provide a roadmap for organisations to make the proper transition to e-business.

The purpose of this paper is to further understanding of how information systems (IS) strategy is developed and implemented in small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs).

The purpose utilizes eight case studies, each one covering an 18‐24 month time span. Qualitative research based on first‐hand experience (action‐research), interviews, meeting minutes, Board papers, final reports. Earl's model of IS strategy development is used as a framework for assessing strategy development and implementation.

All three approaches identified by Earl are valid, depending on business context. All eight companies have been successful in their IS investment, some showing significant bottom‐line benefits.

Shows value of properly managed IS strategy deployment in SMEs. Should encourage SMEs to adopt mid‐ to long‐term approach to IS, linked to business plan. Models for IS strategy development and alignment could be progressed in subsequent research, focussing on some of these company projects and others just starting

Case studies provide real life examples of IS good practice in SMEs. Cases can also be used as “benchmarks”. Supports alignment of IS strategy with overall business strategy. May encourage other companies to explore use of knowledge transfer partnership (KTP) scheme for IS strategy deployment.

The case examples are original and have not been studied before. Strategic options, key decisions, product selections and benefits gained are of value as examples to senior management and IS professionals in industry. Provides examples of how KTP scheme operates.

In an era of unprecedented technological innovation and evolving user expectations and information seeking behaviour, we are arguably now an online society, with digital services increasingly common and increasingly preferred. As a trusted information provider, libraries are in an advantageous position to respond, but this requires integrated strategic and enterprise architecture planning, for information technology (IT) has evolved from a support role to a strategic role, providing the core management systems, communication networks and delivery channels of the modern library. Furthermore, IT components do not function in isolation from one another but are interdependent elements of distributed and multidimensional systems encompassing people, processes and technologies, which must consider social, economic, legal, organisational and ergonomic requirements and relationships, as well as being logically sound from a technical perspective. Strategic planning provides direction, while enterprise architecture strategically aligns and holistically integrates business and information system architectures. While challenging, such integrated planning should be regarded as an opportunity for the library to evolve as an enterprise in the digital age, or at minimum, to simply keep pace with societal change and alternative service providers. Without strategy, a library risks being directed by outside forces with independent motivations and inadequate understanding of its broader societal role. Without enterprise architecture, it risks technological disparity, redundancy and obsolescence. Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, this conceptual chapter provides an integrated framework for strategic and architectural planning of digital library services. The concept of the library as an enterprise is also introduced.

The purpose of this paper is to present a conceptual framework to evaluate e‐business strategic capabilities using structural equation modelling (SEM) approach.

The paper identifies three e‐business capabilities, namely business strategy, supply chain strategy and e‐business readiness. These capabilities are further decomposed under technology, organization and people dimensions to assess their contribution for business effectiveness. A questionnaire is designed and implemented using SEM technique. Survey data from 143 firms from the UK are collected to test our theoretical model. In particular, we have tested a positive, mediating/reciprocal relationships among multidimensional measures of business strategy, supply chain strategy and e‐business adoption. Further hypotheses are developed to evaluate a direct positive impact of e‐business on company's performance.

This empirical analyses demonstrate several key findings: success of e‐business in UK firms is attributed to the strong positive co‐relationship of supply chain strategy to business strategy and to e‐business adoption; within the technology‐organization‐people dimensions, e‐business adoption and business strategy emerges as the strongest factors for the company's performances for the adopter of e‐business group, whereas supply chain capabilities and business strategies is relatively a stronger contributory factor towards business success for non‐adopter of e‐business.

It is expected that the results from this study will provide useful guidelines for companies to assess their strengths and weaknesses towards adopting an effective e‐business implementation strategy.

This paper seeks to investigate how small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) are using information and communications technology (ICT) to try and gain a competitive advantage.

A joint methodology of questionnaire survey and semi‐structured interviews was used for both phases of the study. The research method used consisted of mailed questionnaires being sent to over 200 firms with follow‐up telephone interviews. This paper combines a significant literature review with primary data collected from the various SMEs.

This paper provides sound evidence that SMEs can gain competitive advantage through the use of ICT. More than 70 per cent of the respondents identified ICT as aiding their business in one or more of the accepted competitive areas. However, there is potential for SMEs to gain further advantages by using an integrated and strategic approach in their use of ICT.

The research has direct implications for UK SMEs. It will be interesting to undertake an international comparison of ICT assimilation in SMEs.

This research identifies the need for a coherent reference framework for SMEs to assess, manage, and utilise existing and future e‐business tools.

SMEs tend to use their ICT independently rather than in an integrated manner. They are not always able to take advantage of methodologies generally developed for large firms. Currently SMEs are not taking advantage of supply chain management and customer relationship management applications. A significant majority of SMEs are not using knowledge management techniques.

The purpose of this paper is partly to complete Earl's framework, but more importantly to seek out the limits of what can be known and what cannot be known by each of the schools in his taxonomy, by addressing the absent epistemological foundation of what is being managed in his seven schools of knowledge management.

For each of the seven schools, the paper explores three related issues: the role of knowledge management systems in mediating between individual knowers and the community that needs to know; the context of Earl's knowledge management schools in terms of their focus on process and problems; and the consequences of the processes for identifying and validating knowledge.

Earl's framework survives this examination of its knowledge basis, suggesting that it is more robust, and captures more differences, than originally claimed. However, revelations about what can and cannot be known in each school suggest that knowledge management cannot be “done” until users and designers have greater sensitivity to the epistemological plasticity of what they purport to manage.

The paper's value lies in the re‐direction of knowledge management it suggests – a re‐direction away from technical solutions and towards examination of the epistemological and philosophical problems which are the chief reason for the continuing disappointment with knowledge management in many quarters.

The aim of this paper is to report the finding of an exploratory research project that considered how public service organizations may conquer the debilitating effects of enterprise dementia.

Building on the seminal research of Michael Earl, this project sought to solicit the view from the front, which in this case are the middle managers of the Canadian public service. Specifically, the aim was to determine which of Earl's schools of knowledge would be most appropriate in curbing the organizational memory loss and taming the information anxiety that are common place today.

The sample of public service middle managers overwhelmingly opted for a single strategy. The organizational school surfaced as the strategy most likely to fit respondents' perceived needs. Through collaboration, Earl's organizational school focuses on maximizing the use of social networks with a view to knowledge sharing.

This paper provides a compendium of knowledge strategies that may be useful for public service executives.

This the first project to consider how Earl's taxonomy of knowledge strategies may be implemented in a Canadian public service environment.

This chapter uses a historical lens to analyse the role of governance institutions in shaping enterprising places using the context of the English city of Coventry in the early to late Middle Ages. Using historical documentation as an empirical method, this chapter examines the formation, evolution, growth, maturation, decline of institutional structures, related governance mechanisms and their interactions with other institutional influences that shaped the entrepreneurial nature of the city and its economy. The chapter discusses aspects of success, failures and discontinuities that beset the entrepreneurial landscape of the city and draws parallels to some contemporary developments in UK’s entrepreneurial governance.

The chapter is underpinned by a research methodological approach that is historical and processual in nature and relies on historical documentation including archival sources of empirical material and other published data which have not previously been studied in the context of entrepreneurship and public governance. The research method and approach addresses a methodological and conceptual void in extant entrepreneurship literature.

The empirical findings from archival sources of data and their analysis sheds a new interpretive light on the nature of enterprising places as a combination of continual historical synergies in the specific context of Coventry. The chapter specifically focuses on the role of merchant and craft guilds as a unique presence in the entrepreneurial landscape of Coventry in the early to late Middle Ages and their contribution as powerful institutional and governance forces in shaping the city’s economic history. The guilds and associated governance institutions exercised and enacted multiple economic, legislative, regulatory, civic, municipal, socio-cultural and religious roles and left a strong imprint on the city’s economic destiny that endured for several centuries. Through the interpenetrative influences of these guilds with other political, royal and religious institutional structures of their day, the economic history of the city and its enterprise was woven together in a fabric of cooperation, discord and power struggles. The historical analysis provides a powerful narrative in charting this story and draws parallels to ongoing struggles in contemporary developments in Coventry’s entrepreneurial governance and leadership.

The chapter contributes a historic and contextually enriched sensibility in understanding the entrepreneurial and economic history of Coventry as viewed through the lens of institutional interactions and provides a valuable study that draws parallels between the past and the present. It provides a historically informed approach in understanding the current context of the nation’s local and regional economic policies and attempts to understand how enterprise and enterprising places thrive and sometimes struggle to survive within such a landscape.

The chapter is a unique take on the analysis of entrepreneurship and institutional governance of a city’s local economy in that it takes a historical perspective of issues that animate current public discourse. A historical approach to studying entrepreneurship provides a longitudinal and macro perspective to studying ideological debates that shade contemporary economic, political and socio-cultural governance. The analysis draws interesting parallels to the power discourses and dynamics and ideological conflicts that shaped institutional influences across centuries that impacted upon the city’s economy and use that as a backdrop to comment upon contemporary developments in the policy landscape viewed as an articulation of a political-ideological agenda. The analysis provides and calls for a greater application of historical sensibilities in governance and entrepreneurship scholarship in order to glean valuable lessons.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the relationship between governance and knowledge management in an Australian university, paying attention to the ways in which the notions of knowledge, constructions of the role of governing councils and shared understandings about performance in committee roles, might impact on the university's future success.

Earl's taxonomy of knowledge is extended to reflect more recent literature and used as the framework of analysis for a qualitative case study which is based on observations and interview data garnered from key governance committees.

The paper illustrates that effective governance and strategic success are dependent on appropriate knowledge manipulation activities. The authors conclude that in the case example, the types of knowledge targeted are narrow and committee members are focused on processes that do not effectively enable the creation or transfer of knowledge.

This is a single case study and further research would be required in order to confirm the exploratory findings.

An important shift in improving effective knowledge strategies in the organisation will involve the reconceptualisation of the role of knowledge in the university.

This paper makes two major contributions to the literature; the extension of Earl's typology to reflect current knowledge management literature, and the identification of a lack of knowledge management as a major weakness in university governance. The paper begins to unravel the practical issues that constrain strategic decision making.