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Argues that the knowledge management process can be categorized into knowledge creation, knowledge validation, knowledge presentation, knowledge distribution, and knowledge application activities. To capitalize on knowledge, an organization must be swift in balancing its knowledge management activities. In general, such a balancing act requires changes in organizational culture, technologies, and techniques. A number of organizations believe that by focusing exclusively on people, technologies, or techniques, they can manage knowledge. However, that exclusive focus on people, technologies, or techniques does not enable a firm to sustain its competitive advantages. It is, rather, the interaction between technology, techniques, and people that allow an organization to manage its knowledge effectively. By creating a nurturing and “learning‐by‐doing” kind of environment, an organization can sustain its competitive advantages.

In the present postindustrial society, knowledge has become a key resource. However, organizations face innumerable challenges in nurturing and managing knowledge. Unlike manufacturing activities, knowledge activities are difficult to monitor and control, because only a part of knowledge is internalized by the organization, the other part is internalized by the individuals. This duality between individual knowledge and organizational knowledge demands different sets of management strategies in knowledge management. This paper provides a framework that explores the differences between individual knowledge and organizational knowledge, and proposes a set of management strategies for knowledge management. The paper also discusses the ways through which an organization can transform individual knowledge into organizational knowledge.

In today’s competitive environments, a growing number of firms are establishing their presence through the Web sites. Based on Steuer’s (1992) and Rheingold’s (1993) arguments on perceptual experience in the virtual space, this paper provides a theoretical framework that highlights the effects of interactivity, immersion, and association for customers. The paper argues that though interactivity, immersion, and association are critical for attracting customers on a Web site, these characteristics may also lead to social, ethical and privacy concerns among customers that many unscrupulous firms tend to exploit for their advantages. Interactivity has been measured through speed, range, and significance of interactivity. Immersion has been measured through breadth and depth of immersion. Association has been categorized into one‐to‐one or many‐to‐many relationships. Four Web sites, amazon.com, eBay.com, schwab.com, and victoriasecret.com, are analyzed with respect to interactivity, immersion, and association. The implications of the use and abuse of interactivity, immersion, and association are discussed.

Managers in a wide array of organizations are concentrating on knowledge creation as a way to achieve competitiveness. Organizational knowledge, they hope, enables them to bring innovative products/services continuously in the marketplace. However, many are finding it difficult to understand how organizations create knowledge. By using the concepts of individual learning capability and the learning culture of organizations, the present study shows how the sum of individual knowledge does not equate to organizational knowledge. This distinction between individual knowledge and organizational knowledge is an important one, as a majority of studies do not clearly show how individual knowledge is different from organizational knowledge. The study also offers a set of suggestions to managers to develop a learning culture in the organizations.

In electronic commerce, businesses require to integrate two kinds of activities – ones that are embedded into the physical value chains and the others that are built through information into the virtual chain. Although the relative importance of these two kinds of chain depends on the characteristics of the products and services, their integration, nevertheless, plays a critical role in the success of e‐commerce. In e‐commerce, more and more value chain activities are conducted electronically, therefore, businesses should understand the implication of the virtual value chain activities. The virtual chain offers a number of distinct advantages over the physical value chain. Some of these advantages lie in forging alliances between customers and manufacturers, advertising products and services selectively with effects of audio, video, and graphics, and saving time and money in efficiently processing customer orders and enquiries. Besides, e‐commerce offers flexibility in option pricing and customization of products and service, by reducing the constraints of time and space.

The main aim of the paper is to examine some of the strategies that can be matched to increase the effectiveness of the knowledge development cycle. In manufacturing and operational works, the effectiveness of different organizing strategies to enhance the quality of manufacturing processes and products is well established. In knowledge works, however, we lack such frameworks. Unlike manufacturing and operational processes, knowledge development processes are often chaotic, unstructured, and unsystematic, resulting in intangible products. Therefore, the principles of manufacturing strategies cannot be applied in the knowledge development cycle. In knowledge works, organizing strategies should be defined and initiated based on knowledge development phases (e.g. knowledge creation, knowledge adoption, knowledge distribution, and knowledge review and revision). Each phase, in the knowledge development cycle, needs to be evaluated in context of its characteristics on repetition, standardization, reliability, and specifications.

Explores the effect of EDI systems on business process improvement (BPI) and the moderating effect of information intensity of the industry on the relationship between EDI systems and BPI. The data for the study were gathered through a survey of Fortune 1,000 US firms at branch levels. The results of study support the hypotheses that EDI systems spanning between a firm and its suppliers have a direct and significant relationship with BPI factors. Information intensity of the industry was not found to moderate the relationship between EDI systems and BPI; rather, it was found to have a direct and significant impact on BPI factors.

The purpose of this paper is to present a model that tests the relationship between information technology (IT) infrastructure, customer focus, and business advantages.

Customer focus is categorized into: customer responsiveness and product/service innovation. The data for the study are obtained from 116 executives from a number of business organizations.

IT infrastructure is found to have a significant effect on customer responsiveness, but does not show any significant relationship with product/service innovation. IT infrastructure, customer responsiveness, and product/service innovation are found to be significantly related business advantages.

The research is useful for academic scholars and managers as the results of the study show the value of firm‐specific resources such as IT infrastructure in business advantages. The research is also useful as it finds support for the resource‐based view (RBV) of the firm.

The paper exemplifies how IT infrastructure can influence customer focus and thus affects directly and indirectly business advantages.

The goal is to examine the relationship between business process improvement initiatives (BPII), information systems (ISs) integration, and customer focus.

The data for the study were collected at the divisional levels from a list of “Fortune 500” firms. A total of 1,100 questionnaires were mailed to divisional managers and 115 responses were used for the data analysis.

The results of this study support the hypotheses that BPII directly affects customer responsiveness and product/service innovation. In addition, data integration and communication networks flexibility are found to significantly affect customer responsiveness and product/service innovation. Communication networks connectivity did not have any significant effect on customer responsiveness and product/service innovation, respectively. Data integration, intrafirm networks connectivity and networks flexibility are found to significantly mediate the relationship between BPII and customer responsiveness and BPII and product/service development, respectively. Interfirm networks connectivity was not found to significantly mediate the relationship between BPII and customer responsiveness and BPII and product/service development, respectively.

The sample consists of divisions of Fortune 500 firms. Second, the study is cross‐sectional; therefore, it lacks the predictive power to find the long‐term effects of BPII and IS integration on customer focus. A longitudinal study can be a future research endeavor to validate the results of the study.

To business managers, the study clarifies the role of IS integration in customer focus.

Business process redesign (BPR) is a management technique to radically transform organizations for dramatic improvement. Information technology (IT) plays a critical role in BPR. The present study examines the links between IT infrastructure and BPR. The moderating effects of industry type, and information intensity of the firm are also analyzed. Data for the study were gathered through a survey of Fortune 500 US firms at divisional levels. Out of 1,200 questionnaires mailed to Fortune500 firm‐divisions, 124 responses were received. Out of 124 firm‐divisions 73 firm‐divisions were found to be adopting BPR techniques; 39 firm‐divisions were found to be adopting incremental improvement approaches. The rest of the responses were incomplete and could not be used. For data analysis, therefore, only 73 firm‐divisions were considered. The results of the study support the hypotheses that network infrastructure affects the dimensions of BPR (process improvement thrust, and customer focus), but data integration was not found to be significantly affecting the BPR dimensions. The moderating effect of industry type was found to be significantly affecting the relationship between network infrastructure and BPR dimensions. Other relationships were not found to be significant.