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The growing number of publications on knowledge management (KM) has addressed heterogeneous topics that lack integration and classification. This article closes the classification gap by presenting a classification scheme, providing an integrated overview of KM publications.

The development of the classification scheme follows a multistep approach. By applying a taxonomy development method, the results of a previous content analysis of 4,290 publications were processed to integrate 3,780 keywords into a classification scheme.

The classification scheme consists of 13 main categories and subcategories with six levels of detail. The scheme covers not only KM-specific keywords but also keywords from related disciplines, indicating a strong interdependence with related research domains.

The scheme provides a starting point for ongoing collaboration within the KM community with the aim of improving the classification results and refining the scheme to manifest the core identity.

The scheme is helpful in understanding whether KM implementation activities in organisations are aligned with overall research activities and topics covered by publications.

Developing a scheme based on a prior content analysis turns out to be a unique and innovative approach that has never before been done in the KM domain.

Despite the importance of brokers in creative projects, limited attention has been devoted to the micro-interactions by which brokers induce others’ collaboration while simultaneously retaining some control over creative production. Building on an interactionist perspective, we develop the concept of brokerage style – i.e., a recognizable pattern in the ways in which a broker interacts with others. By using different brokerage styles in different phases of a creative project, brokers can orient the social interactions among project participants, “charging” those interactions with different types of emotional energy and mutual attention, eventually inducing collective collaboration and limiting participants’ expectations of control. We illustrate our interactionist model of brokerage styles with examples from the music and TV industries.

Explores and presents an agenda for action in introducing and developing information consultancy and brokerage as an alternative information service in Africa. The agenda focuses on co‐ordination and publicity of the services, research, LIS education, market, trends and problems. The author explores the results of a study he conducted in Botswana in order to compile the agenda and concludes that as long as the African communities increasingly consume post‐industrial and information society or western products and services, “ruralness”, poverty, illiteracy and underdeveloped information infrastructure, alone, cannot alienate the information consumers from exploiting and using information consultancy and brokerage services. This article, based on a paper presented by the author at the 13‐SCECSAL conference in Nairobi in July 1998, suggests a need for a conference or pre‐SCECSAL seminar, on the subject in the near future, for information specialists in Africa. A draft directory of information consultants and brokers in Botswana is appended to the paper.

Existing literature is limited in its ability to consider start-ups as a knowledge broker to trigger innovation in a supply chain ecosystem (SCE). In a traditional SCE, start-ups are relatively isolated, leading to structural holes that limit knowledge sharing among members. This paper aims to overcome that limitation and to build frameworks that help to illustrate the interaction between knowledge management and sharing, start-up innovation and an ecosystem from a supply chain perspective.

Following a qualitative approach, this study theorizes about the role of start-ups as knowledge brokers and the implications of knowledge management and sharing with members in an SCE concerning innovation. Conceptual analysis is used for examination, and this study uses a set of qualitative tactics to interpret and generate meaning from the existing literature.

This study develops two frameworks to provide insight into how start-ups can trigger innovation as knowledge brokers in an SCE. The first framework shows how start-ups, and their knowledge base, influence supply chain members and the overall ecosystem, highlighting the isolated function of start-ups and the issue of structural holes in a traditional SCE. The authors propose a model that illustrates how structural holes can be bridged within an SCE, thereby demonstrating how start-ups redefine the ecosystem architecture according to their knowledge broker position in the SCE.

By expanding insight into the concepts of how start-ups can trigger innovation as knowledge brokers in an SCE, this paper extends the so-far neglected area of start-ups and knowledge brokers. This study clarifies the conceptual and theoretical components and processes in an SCE and links the different roles of start-ups as knowledge brokers to the respective supply chain members to better understand the implications on the entire SCE.

The purpose of this paper is two-fold: (1) to offer a conceptual understanding of knowledge brokering from a sociometric point-of-view; and (2) to provide an empirical example of this conceptualization in an education context.

We use social network theory and analysis tools to explore knowledge exchange patterns among a group of teachers, instructional coaches and administrators who are collectively seeking to build increased capacity for effective mathematics instruction. We propose the concept of network activity to measure direct and indirect knowledge brokerage through the use of degree and betweenness centrality measures. Further, we propose network utility—measured by tie multiplexity—as a second key component of effective knowledge brokering.

Our findings suggest significant increases in both direct and indirect knowledge brokering activity across the network over time. Teachers, in particular, emerge as key knowledge brokers within this networked learning community. Importantly, there is also an increase in the number of resources exchanged through network relationships over time; the most active knowledge brokers in this social ecosystem are those individuals who are exchanging multiple forms of knowledge.

This study focuses on knowledge brokering as it presents itself in the relational patterns among educators within a social ecosystem. While it could be that formal organizational roles may encapsulate knowledge brokering across physical structures with an education system (e.g. between schools and central offices), these individuals are not necessarily the people who are most effectively brokering knowledge across actors within the broader social network.

The purpose of this study is to show that an important antecedent of perceived knowledge quality is an employee’s position in the organizational network due to their participation in different interest groups. In particular, this study theorizes that brokers establish a network of groups, which increases perceived knowledge quality vis-a-vis the social capital that employees draw on.

To test this study’s hypotheses on the influence of the structural position of knowledge brokers on the positive effects of social capital on perceived knowledge quality, this study combines data from an online survey with longitudinal archival data from a youth-care organization who used an enterprise social network (ESN) for knowledge sharing.

This study found a mitigating effect of being a broker on the relationship between trust and perceived knowledge quality, and also between inter-team interaction and perceived knowledge quality for lower levels of both trust and inter-team interaction on perceived knowledge quality.

Although the hypotheses are supported, in light of prior research, the authors would have expected stronger and positive effects.

This research is particularly interesting because it emphasizes the important role of social capital. For organizations that deal with trust issues, it might help to stimulate employees to broaden their activity on ESNs by becoming active in multiple groups.

While knowledge sharing on ESNs is generally conducive for creating organizational value, there is a lack of understanding of what drives employees’ perception of the quality of shared knowledge, and how this perception may depend on their position in the social network. To investigate this question, the authors turn to social capital theory.

It is essential for projects to fulfil a wide spectrum of customer expectations including social, psychological, technological, and physical ones. The purpose of this paper is to identify roles within project networks that act as transmitters and linkers of this important knowledge, thereby resulting in appropriate and timely on-ground decision-making.

Qualitative case analysis coupled with social network analysis (SNA) is used to map project actors and identify key knowledge brokers within a complex co-location project. The project network comprised 91 actors from a range of project partners from public and private sectors.

The research identifies key knowledge brokers where selection appears to reflect their “heavyweight” stature, high social capital, technical expertise, and personality. The research recommends early identification of brokers from within and outside the parent organization/s.

The research covers a single, inductive, and interpretive study of a co-location project involving mature project organizations. Wider generalizability of findings to less mature organizations or those operating in vastly different sectors may be limited.

This study contributes to the existing body of literature on knowledge brokerage in projects and assists project managers in identifying and developing relevant brokers.

The study provides further evidence behind the argument that customer needs are translated into appropriate project decisions through key knowledge brokers.

Cooperative relationships between actors located in the same geographical area that are economically independent and culturally distinct are the heart of functioning innovation clusters. This can slow down the creation of common innovation projects, particularly in French innovation clusters where cooperation is influenced by the governmental financing devoted to this system. This research focuses on knowledge brokering activities implemented in this inter-organizational context, showing how they cross knowledge boundaries, structure cooperative dynamics and participate in common strategy-making. The mobilization of the strategy as practice theory allows for an in-depth analysis, shedding light on various practices, resources and practitioners related to the brokering activities taking place within an innovation cluster in Paris. Findings show a widespread development of brokering activities that emerges from cluster governance unit to its networks according to a reflexive relationship progressive structured over time.

This research is based on a longitudinal exploratory analysis of the Parisian cluster Advancity. To capture its organizational dynamics, two databases of the cluster (focused on innovation projects and integration of members), 24 power point files presented to negotiate strategy and 13 interviews with managers and members of the cluster were used. The whole data was triangulated and generated categories of data that can be compared with the concepts of the literature on innovation clusters (governance), brokering activities (knowledge access, learning, networking and implementation) and strategy-making (recursive process and adaptation of the strategy).

The analysis shows the effects of each type of brokering activities on strategy-making across knowledge and organizational boundaries. The practices of implementation activity initially absent from the cluster become, in its mature phase, one of the central activities. Moreover, all the brokering activities are initially handled by the managers of the cluster and progressively are extended to their members, then becoming a widespread activity within the internal networks. The maturation of these practices goes together with the maturation of its own cluster. The practice of experimentation particularly affects brokering activities and produces learning and networking effects within the cluster.

From a managerial point of view, considering the organization of the clusters as a constellation of communities of practice (Wenger, 1998) emphasizes that the knowledge brokerage activities can be extended and delayed within each community that makes up the organization. A top-down approach could therefore suffocate the network. It would be interesting to develop this research approach in future work and complete this research by reinforcing microscopic analysis enabled, for example, by tracking a small number of innovation projects during their lifecycle.

The empirical foundation proposed in this research strengthens the scientific nature of the theory of the activity that is itself integrated in the perspective of the practice (Seidl et al., 2006). The multilevel approach and wealth of the mobilized and analysed empirical data allowed making more visible how a social activity builds itself, develops and creates aperture effects on the strategy driven by innovation at the intersection of different boundaries.

The results of this research provide a theoretical contribution in that they allow to revisit the classification of the activities of a knowledge broker (Hargadon 1998, 2005) in a new organizational context representative of the knowledge-based innovation (Amin and Cohendet, 2004). They are also contributing to the current emerging from the knowledge-based view of clusters (Bahlmann and Huysman, 2008; Arikan, 2009) by mobilizing the theory of the practice (Whittington, 2006; Jarzabkowski, 2005). This perspective helps to discern a particular form of strategy-making within the clusters.