Management is what managers do.

M

A --- The Manager

N

A

G --- Knowledge

E

M

E --- The People

N

T --- Technology/Techniques/Tactics

Aim:

To point out the importance of developing and implementing an

effective system of knowledge management in the modern

organization.

Introduction to Knowledge Management:

Knowledge Management (KM) is defined as the processes

needed to generate, capture, codify and transfer knowledge across

the organization to achieve competitive advantage.

“Intellectual capital is a synonym of Knowledge Management”

Three key reasons why actively managing knowledge isimportant to a company’s success are

Facilitates decision-making capabilities,

Builds learning organizations by making learning routine

Stimulates cultural change and innovation

People:

The biggest challenge in KM is to ensure participation by thepeople or employees in the knowledge sharing, collaborationand re-use to achieve business results. This is achieved througha combination of motivation / recognition and rewards, re-alignment of performance appraisal systems, and othermeasurement systems.

Technology:

KM technology solutions provide functionality to supportknowledge-sharing, collaboration, workflow, document-management across the enterprise and beyond into theextended enterprise. These tools typically provide a securecentral space where employees, customers, partners andsuppliers can exchange information, share knowledge and guideeach other and the organization to better decisions.

Process:

The Process component include standard processes forknowledge-contribution, content management (acceptingcontent, maintaining quality, keeping content current,deleting or archiving content that is obsolete), retrieval,membership on communities of practice, implementation-projects based on knowledge-reuse, methodology andstandard formats to document best-practices and case studies,etc.

Elements Definition

Acquisition Acquisition is a process that covers the activities of the accessibility,

collecting and application of acquired knowledge

Conversion Conversion is a process that converts knowledge acquired from

external and internal sources into useful and applicable forms to

improve productivity and business operations.

Application Application is the process of actual use of knowledge. The

application of knowledge enables organizations continuously to

translate their organizational expertise into embodied products

Storing Storing is the process of keeping Knowledge within the

organization and includes physical resources as well as non-physical

resources

Protection Protection is the process of secure the knowledge asset and keeps it

safe and accessed only by authorized personnel.

There are six knowledge assets in an organization namely:

Stakeholder relationships: includes licensing agreements,

partnering agreements, contracts and distribution agreements.

Human resources: skills, competence, commitment, motivation and

loyalty of employees.

Physical infrastructure: office layout and information and

communication technology such as databases, e-mail and intranets.

Culture: organizational values, employee networking and

management philosophy.

Practices and routines: formal or informal process manuals with

rules and procedures and tacit rules, often refers to “the way things are

done around here”.

Intellectual Property: patents, copyrights, trademarks, brands,

registered design and trade secrets.

a) Knowledge management improves and integrates acquisition,

assimilation, transformation and exploitation of external

knowledge capabilities and by this improves a firm’s absorptive

capacity. The challenge for a firm’s management but also its

knowledge management system is to transform external and

available knowledge, which is ready to use in business operations

and processes

b) Knowledge management improves identifying, absorption and

exploiting useful external knowledge that is the result of business

cooperation of an enterprise

c) Knowledge management improves a firm’s growth willingness,

which has a positive influence on knowledge acquisition,

assimilation, transformation and exploitation capabilities. The

dimensions of absorptive capacity are not realized by themselves.