The Role of Fit in Knowledge Management Systems

2008 ◽  
pp. 2157-2177
Author(s):  
Peter Baloh
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Knowledge Creation ◽  
Design Science ◽  
Theoretical Background ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Evolutionary Information ◽  
Knowledge Management Systems ◽  
Organizational Setting ◽  
Processing Theory ◽  
It Support

While most organizations have deployed knowledge management systems (KMS), only a handful have been able to leverage these investments. Existing knowledge management (KM) research offered valuable insights on how to introduce KMS in a sense of innovation-diffusion, yet little guidance has been offered to KMS developers who need to decide on functionalities of a tool they are to introduce in a particular organizational setting. The goal of this paper is to propose theoretical background for design of IS that successfully support and enable decision making, which is seen as the ultimate form of knowledge creation and utilization. By using principles of the design science, design profiles proposed build upon works from organization and IS sciences, primarily the evolutionary information-processing theory of knowledge creation (Li & Kettinger, 2006) and the task technology fit theory (Zigurs & Buckland, 1998), the latter being amended for particularities of the KM environment. Proposed fit profiles suggest that one-size-fits-all approaches do not work and that organizations must take, in contrast with suggestions of extant literature, a segmented approach to KM activities and fitting IT support.

Contingencies in the KMS Design

2011 ◽  
pp. 95-115
Author(s):  
Peter Baloh
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Knowledge Creation ◽  
Business Performance ◽  
Design Science ◽  
Theoretical Background ◽  
Evolutionary Information ◽  
Organizational Setting ◽  
Technological Support ◽  
Processing Theory ◽  
Task Technology Fit

Improving how knowledge is leveraged in organizations for improved business performance is currently considered as a major organizational change. Knowledge management (KM) projects are stigmatized as demanding, fuzzy, and complex, with questionable outcomes—more than 70% of them do not deliver what they promised. While most organizations have deployed knowledge management systems (KMSs), only a handful have been able to leverage these investments. Existing knowledge management (KM) research offered valuable insights on how to introduce KMSs in a sense of innovation-diffusion, yet little guidance has been offered to KMS developers who need to decide on functionalities of a tool they are to introduce in particular organizational setting. The goal of this chapter is to propose theoretical background for design of KMS that successfully support and enable new knowledge creation and existing knowledge utilization. By using principles of the design science, design profiles proposed build upon works from organization and IS sciences, primarily the Evolutionary Information-Processing Theory of Knowledge Creation (Li & Kettinger, 2006) and the Task Technology Fit Theory (Zigurs & Buckland, 1998), the latter being amended for particularities of the KM environment. Proposed fit profiles suggest that one-size-fits-all approaches do not work and that organizations must take, in contrast with extant literature, a segmented approach to KM activities and fitting technological support.

scholarly journals (Neg)Entropic Scenarios Affecting the Wicked Design Spaces of Knowledge Management Systems

Entropy ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 169
Author(s):  
Ulrich Schmitt
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Information Overload ◽  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Design Science ◽  
Knowledge Workers ◽  
Science Research ◽  
General Purpose ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Management Approach ◽  
Knowledge Management Systems

The envisioned embracing of thriving knowledge societies is increasingly compromised by threatening perceptions of information overload, attention poverty, opportunity divides, and career fears. This paper traces the roots of these symptoms back to causes of information entropy and structural holes, invisible private and undiscoverable public knowledge which characterize the sad state of our current knowledge management and creation practices. As part of an ongoing design science research and prototyping project, the article’s (neg)entropic perspectives complement a succession of prior multi-disciplinary publications. Looking forward, it proposes a novel decentralized generative knowledge management approach that prioritizes the capacity development of autonomous individual knowledge workers not at the expense of traditional organizational knowledge management systems but as a viable means to foster their fruitful co-evolution. The article, thus, informs relevant stakeholders about the current unsustainable status quo inhibiting knowledge workers; it presents viable remedial options (as a prerequisite for creating the respective future generative Knowledge Management (KM) reality) to afford a sustainable solution with the generative potential to evolve into a prospective general-purpose technology.

Towards Understanding the Successful Adoption of Blog-Based Knowledge Management Systems

2010 ◽  
pp. 486-495 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joowon Park ◽  
Sooran Jo ◽  
Junghoon Moon
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Corporate Culture ◽  
Symbolic Interaction ◽  
Critical Issue ◽  
Organizational Knowledge ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Knowledge Management Systems ◽  
Organizational Setting ◽  
The World ◽  
Intellectual Power

Knowledge has been recognized as a valuable resource for organizational activities. As businesses are entering the world of Web 2.0, knowledge sharing is widely regarded as a critical issue in the area of organizational knowledge management (KM). Recently, organizations have started adopting blog-based knowledge management systems (KMS) with encouraging results. Used as a tool for sharing organizational knowledge, blogging can aggregate the intellectual power of individual members, serve as innovative KMS, and lead to the creation of a trust-based corporate culture. However, despite the increasing adoption of blogs by organizations, a theoretical framework for understanding a blog-based KMS has not been developed. This chapter attempts to present a framework for understanding a blog-based KMS in an organizational setting, grounded in a socio-psychological approach and the application of social identity and symbolic interaction theories.

Knowledge Management Success Models

2011 ◽  
pp. 32-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Murray E. Jennex
Keyword(s):  
Information System ◽  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Knowledge Creation ◽  
Organizational Memory ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Knowledge Management Systems ◽  
Organizational Processes ◽  
The Past ◽  
Ict System ◽  
Service Components

Alavi and Leidner (2001, p. 114) defined knowledge management systems (KMSs) as “IT-based systems developed to support and enhance the organizational processes of knowledge creation, storage/retrieval, transfer, and application.” They observed that not all KM initiatives will implement an IT solution, but they support IT as an enabler of KM. Maier (2002) expanded on the IT concept for the KMS by calling it an ICT system that supported the functions of knowledge creation, construction, identification, capturing, acquisition, selection, valuation, organization, linking, structuring, formalization, visualization, distribution, retention, maintenance, refinement, evolution, access, search, and application. Stein and Zwass (1995) define an organizational memory information system (OMIS) as the processes and IT components necessary to capture, store, and bring to bear knowledge created in the past on decisions currently being made. Jennex and Olfman (2004) expanded this definition by incorporating the OMS into the KMS and adding strategy and service components to the KMS.

Knowledge Management Success Models

2010 ◽  
pp. 763-771
Author(s):  
Murray E. Jennex
Keyword(s):  
Information System ◽  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Knowledge Creation ◽  
Organizational Memory ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Knowledge Management Systems ◽  
Organizational Processes ◽  
The Past ◽  
Ict System ◽  
Service Components

Alavi and Leidner (2001, p. 114) defined knowledge management systems (KMSs) as “IT-based systems developed to support and enhance the organizational processes of knowledge creation, storage/retrieval, transfer, and application.” They observed that not all KM initiatives will implement an IT solution, but they support IT as an enabler of KM. Maier (2002) expanded on the IT concept for the KMS by calling it an ICT system that supported the functions of knowledge creation, construction, identification, capturing, acquisition, selection, valuation, organization, linking, structuring, formalization, visualization, distribution, retention, maintenance, refinement, evolution, access, search, and application. Stein and Zwass (1995) define an organizational memory information system (OMIS) as the processes and IT components necessary to capture, store, and bring to bear knowledge created in the past on decisions currently being made. Jennex and Olfman (2004) expanded this definition by incorporating the OMS into the KMS and adding strategy and service components to the KMS.

The Role of Situated Embodied Interaction in the Banking Customer Knowledge Creation Process

2010 ◽  
pp. 236-251 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara Värlander
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Knowledge Creation ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Knowledge Management Systems ◽  
Embodied Interaction ◽  
Creation Process ◽  
Service Production ◽  
Point Of Departure

The increased reliance on Knowledge Management systems has made certain theorists to suggest that this will enable a surpassing of proximal knowledge creation, unequivocally leading up to more effective knowledge creation by easy codification and sharing of knowledge. However, in general, too much focus has been put on the potential of KM systems rather than its limits and the role of supporting social processes of knowledge creation has been largely ignored. The aim of the current research is to start to fill this gap in the KM literature by examining how social processes of knowledge creation are used in banking, taking the point of departure in an approach inspired from phenomenology. The paper illustrates how the increased use of KM systems has not decreased the need for relying on locally embedded service production, due to the invaluable knowledge creation processes that are generated through the embodiments of co-present interactions.

E-Cocreation of Knowledge through Informal Communications

2011 ◽  
pp. 135-153
Author(s):  
Kazushi Nishimoto
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Knowledge Base ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Knowledge Creation ◽  
Professional Knowledge ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Knowledge Management Systems ◽  
Free Riders ◽  
It Knowledge ◽  
Informal Communications

It is pointed out that the 21st century is an era of knowledge creation where productivity of knowledge is more important than the productivity of things. Therefore, improvement of the productivity of knowledge is an urgent demand from public organizations i.e., industry, academia and government as well as personal individuals. As a method to achieve it, knowledge management systems have recently been studied and developed. However, there have been few cases that could successfully improve the productivity of knowledge; many systems have been installed but not used. One of the principal problems of the ordinary attempts is, I think, the unbalanced way for sharing the knowledge. For example, experts are required to voluntarily provide their professional knowledge to create and to maintain a knowledge-base with many efforts so that novices as free riders can readily exploit the knowledge-base without any efforts. In order to solve and/or to avoid this problem, I focused on informal communications by chance as places for sharing knowledge and my laboratory has been constructed various e-cocreation systems to support sharing and creating knowledge in the informal communications. This chapter introduces some of the research efforts conducted in the author’s laboratory.

E-Business Knowledge

2011 ◽  
pp. 70-112
Author(s):  
Petter Gottschalk
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Knowledge Creation ◽  
Customer Value ◽  
Business Processes ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Knowledge Management Systems ◽  
Business Knowledge ◽  
Key Factor ◽  
Research Propositions

This chapter documents some of the links between e-business and knowledge management systems that might be explored in future empirical research. The research propositions in this chapter illustrate the need for a contingent approach to knowledge management systems that are to support e-business. Knowledge management systems successfully supporting and improving e-business performance have to satisfy several requirements. First, they have to support the chosen e-business model(s). Second, they have to cause improvements through redesign of e-business processes. Furthermore, more advanced stage of knowledge management technology in terms of codification strategy will be more powerful and successful. These are some of the research propositions presented in this chapter, which represents a rich knowledge base for future empirical studies. The main objective of a knowledge management system (KMS) is to support the creation, transfer, and application of knowledge in organizations (Feng et al., 2005). Electronic business (e-business) is marketing, buying, selling, delivering, servicing, and paying for products, services, and information across networks linking an enterprise and its prospects, customers, agents, suppliers, competitors, allies, and complementors (Weill & Vitale, 2002). Several researchers emphasize the important role of knowledge management systems in e-business (e.g., El Sawy, 2001; Fahey et al., 2001; Holsapple & Singh, 2000; Malhotra, 2000, 2002; Plessis & Boon, 2004; Singh et al., 2004; Tsai et al., 2005). Garud and Kumaraswany (2005) argue that knowledge has emerged as a strategically significant resource for the firm. Accordingly, knowledge creation and transfer becomes a key factor to gain and sustain a competitive advantage (Sambamurthy & Subramani, 2005). E-business processes can create additional customer value through knowledge creation with customers (Kodama, 2005).

Measuring the use of knowledge management systems in supply firms

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 426-441 ◽  
Author(s):  
Piera Centobelli ◽  
Roberto Cerchione ◽  
Emilio Esposito
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Knowledge Creation ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
Service Industries ◽  
Field Analysis ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
High Tech ◽  
Knowledge Management Systems ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Use Of Knowledge

Purpose This paper aims to propose a taxonomic scheme of knowledge management systems (KMSs) and a set of technologies and managerial practices supporting supply firms in knowledge management processes. Design/methodology/approach Based on a field analysis involving a sample of suppliers operating in high-tech manufacturing and service industries, this paper investigates the use of KMSs in the sample investigated. Findings The paper shows that suppliers are generally reluctant to use updated and innovative KMSs replacing traditional ones. This gap confirms that suppliers have difficulties in facing rapid technological changes. The field analysis also points out that suppliers investigated perceive knowledge management mainly as an issue of knowledge transfer and knowledge storage while appear to be neglected the phase of knowledge creation. Originality/value Moreover, the paper highlights a misalignment between the intensity of use of knowledge management practices that support the phase of knowledge creation and knowledge management tools that should support such practices.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document