Search results

Leaders of successful organizations are consistently searching for better ways to improve performance and results. Frequent disappointments with past management initiatives have motivated managers to gain new understandings into the underlying, but complex mechanisms ‐ such as knowledge ‐ which govern an enterprise’s effectiveness. Knowledge Management, far from being a management “fad”, is broad, multi‐dimensional and covers most aspects of the enterprise’s activities. To be competitive and successful, experience shows that enterprises must create and sustain a balanced intellectual capital portfolio. They need to set broad priorities and integrate the goals of managing intellectual capital and the corresponding effective knowledge processes. This requires systematic Knowledge Management. With knowledge as the major driving force behind the “economics of ideas”, we can expect that the emphasis on knowledge creation, development, organization and leverage will continue to be the prime focus for improving society.

Globalization has placed businesses everywhere in new and different competitive situations where knowledgeable, effective behavior has come to provide the competitive edge. Enterprises have turned to explicit and systematic knowledge management (KM) to develop the intellectual capital needed to succeed. Further developments are expected to provide considerable benefits resulting from changes in the workplace and in management and operational practices. Changes will partly come from information technology and artificial intelligence developments. However, more important changes are expected in people‐centric practices to build, apply, and deploy knowledge and understanding for support of innovative and effective knowledge‐intensive work. Much remains to be done. Next generation KM methods will still be crude. Our understanding of knowledge and how people use it to work has a long way to go. We need a“theory of knowledge” and perhaps a new theory of the firm to create a solid foundation for future KM. Still, users can expect significant benefits from KM as it develops over the next decades.

Knowledge management (KM) plays important roles in public administration (PA). Each role serves specific constituencies and purposes and is implemented differently. Jointly, they build society’s intellectual capital (IC) to improve the effectiveness of public and private decision making and situation handling. Four public administration KM areas are considered: enhance decision making within public services; aid the public to participate effectively in public decision making; build competitive societal IC capabilities; and develop a knowledge‐competitive work force. Numerous KM approaches are adopted to serve these purposes. Most efforts address specific needs. Only few pursue broad, deliberate, and systematic KM. Examples of these approaches and perspectives are discussed. The premise for KM is that, among many factors, effective and intelligent behavior depends on having appropriate understanding in addition to being informed.

An international survey, sponsored by the Journal of Knowledge Management in association with the Best Practice Club™ and The Benchmarking Exchange, sought to explore the drivers and approaches to creating knowledge‐based organizations from the viewpoint of those practitioners who are actually responsible for implementing Knowledge Management as a business strategy. Three major conclusions have emerged from the study. Whilst organizations recognize the importance of creating, managing and transferring knowledge, so far they have been unable to translate this competitive need into organizational strategies. Secondly, successful Knowledge Management implementation is mainly linked to “soft” issues, such as organizational culture and people. Finally, most organizations are struggling to effectively use Knowledge Management tools and techniques. The study reveals that although most of the survey group understood the commercial or institutional imperative to implement Knowledge Management as an organizational strategy, few benchmarks of best practice have yet to emerge.

The purpose of this paper is to suggest principles and framework for comprehensive societal knowledge management (SKM) for countries to provide acceptable conditions for their citizens and businesses and to participate equitable in the globalized knowledge economy.

Foundations for SKM principles and framework are based on requirements and practical experiences reported in literature and expanded by the author's work and concepts.

Comprehensive SKM is not commonly pursued in spite of its importance for national survival. Many countries need SKM guidelines and concepts and will benefit by development of an acceptable and well‐substantiated framework.

Extensive research should be pursued in scientific, economic, social, and educational fields to identify good SKM options. Understanding must be developed of how best to undertake SKM.

Implications are that comprehensive SKM by nations promises to improve quality‐of‐life worldwide.

Notwithstanding the need for a comprehensive SKM framework, little work has been available until now.

Enterprise performance is determined by the effectiveness of how situations are handled throughout the organization and is determined by many factors, the most important are the quality and availability of pertinent knowledge. Important situations vary widely. Some are well‐known and are handled with routine, even automatized knowledge. Others are complex and require extensive, at times abstract, knowledge. In routine cases, effective situation‐handling involves many steps and relies on different kinds of knowledge to support the primary tasks of sensemaking, decision‐making/problem‐solving, implementation and monitoring. Similar tasks are required for simple and complex personal situation‐handling cases and organizational situation‐handling. This paper presents a situation‐handling model for people and organizations. Its purpose is to strengthen knowledge‐related, and deliberate and systematic knowledge management (KM). The paper portrays processes associated with delivering competent work. It does not deal explicitly with learning or innovation mechanisms. Nor does it detail mechanisms within the primary tasks.

The purpose of this study is to conduct a scientometric analysis of the body of literature contained in 11 major knowledge management and intellectual capital (KM/IC) peer‐reviewed journals.

A total of 2,175 articles published in 11 major KM/IC peer‐reviewed journals were carefully reviewed and subjected to scientometric data analysis techniques.

A number of research questions pertaining to country, institutional and individual productivity, co‐operation patterns, publication frequency, and favourite inquiry methods were proposed and answered. Based on the findings, many implications emerged that improve one's understanding of the identity of KM/IC as a distinct scientific field.

The pool of KM/IC journals examined did not represent all available publication outlets, given that at least 20 peer‐reviewed journals exist in the KM/IC field. There are also KM/IC papers published in other non‐KM/IC specific journals. However, the 11 journals that were selected for the study have been evaluated by Bontis and Serenko as the top publications in the KM/IC area.

Practitioners have played a significant role in developing the KM/IC field. However, their contributions have been decreasing. There is still very much a need for qualitative descriptions and case studies. It is critically important that practitioners consider collaborating with academics for richer research projects.

This is the most comprehensive scientometric analysis of the KM/IC field ever conducted.

The purpose of this paper is to show that third-party quality audits (TPQAs) facilitate performance improvement and give confidence to organisations concerning the process quality of services and products. However, because of inconsistencies and unethical practices often observed in the industry, organisations question the significance of TPQA. A perception exists that its initial purpose as an impartial tool ensuring quality of deliverables is no longer upheld. Hence, the need to determine and explain the influence of the ISO 19011 standard interpretation on the application of the audit guidelines in performing TPQA, to promote consistency in the audit process.

The study employed document analysis of the ISO 19011 standard, followed by semi-structured interviews with certification managers (CBs) to gain insight related to their interpretation and application of the ISO 19011 guidelines.

The CBs interpret the ISO 19011 guidelines differently; hence, their application of the standard to compile their audit documents differ. Adherence to the principles of auditing particularly, integrity and independence were found as the core of the audit process while their disregard reflects failure of the real intent of auditing. The inconsistencies in the audit procedures and documents developed for auditors are ascribed to some CBs’ personal interpretations.

The study explores how the different interpretations of the ISO 19011 standard prevail and are perceived by the CBs and auditors. The findings aim to support standardisation and reduce the variations across and amongst the different CBs and auditors.

This paper aims to explore how professional competences are defined and assessed by clients of professional service firms (PSFs). Extant research has studied the knowledge base of professionals, but limited research has been conducted to develop an understanding of how clients value this knowledge.

The study is based on in-depth qualitative research design, which is suitable for inductive theory building. The collected data consist of interviews with 80 clients and sellers of professional services.

The authors offer a framework detailing the interrelationships between knowledge, experience and references as assessed by clients. In particular, references are used to evaluate experience, which in turn function as a proxy for how clients assess knowledge. Also, the study shows how the clients’ assessment of professional knowledge assets involves multiple levels and factors.

Limited research has been conducted to understand client preferences and PSF competitive advantage from a client perspective. This paper contributes to extant literature on knowledge management by integrating it with insights from recent developments within service marketing focusing on client centricity and the role of clients in value creation. This perspective complements and extends what is already known about knowledge management.

The paper suggests that while it is essential to manage knowledge as such, references and experience has a very central role in selling and commercializing knowledge-intensive services. Thus, to the degree that clients buy knowledge, sellers should think carefully about how experience and references are developed, captured and conveyed to clients. From a client point, the identified framework has value in offering a client-centric conceptualization of knowledge that can be used as a starting point in defining their knowledge needs and in structuring and professionalizing their purchasing efforts related to professional services.

Knowledge-intensive service organizations sell their knowledge and resources to clients directly as experts and indirectly through their services. It is therefore imperative for these organizations to understand how their knowledge is evaluated by buyers. The paper takes a unique client-centric perspective in understanding knowledge from a buyer’s point of view and as perceived by the buyer, which largely has been lacking in existing knowledge management research.