U7A1 Strategic and planning issues, including ideas of intellectual capital

1)      What are the major steps involved in developing a KM strategy?

A good knowledge management strategy is composed of the following components:

• An articulated business strategy and objectives (products or services, target customers, preferred distribution or delivery channels, characterization of regulatory environment, mission or vision statement);
• A description of knowledge-based business issues (need for collaboration, need to level performance variance, need for innovation, need to address information overload);
• An inventory of available knowledge resources (knowledge capital, social capital, infrastructure capital);
• An analysis of recommended knowledge leverage points that describes what can be done with the above-identified knowledge and knowledge artifacts (Dalkir, 2011, “Knowledge managemanet in theory and practice”  pp.316-317).

2)      What are the major elements of a KM strategy and processes involved in each step?

Knowledge audit should be the first step in any Knowledge Management initiative. Knowledge audit assesses what knowledge assets are possessed by a specific organization. By knowing what knowledge is possessed, it is possible to find the most effective method of storage and dissemination

Intellectual capital is all the knowledge resources possessed by organization and its dynamic development and renewal can ensure organization’s advanced position in the market competition at the era of knowledge economy. A consensus has been developed that intellectual capital can be characterized as consisting of three components – human capital, external capital, internal capital (Edvinsson and Malone, 1997; Stewart, 1997; Sveiby, 1997).

Innovation refers to the entire process encompassing the use of creativity and research to generate new ideas, feasibility studies to evaluate their cost-effectiveness, risk analysis, design and development, new policies and procedures, market research and marketing, and implementation of the new product or service

3)      What are the key steps in the evolution of an innovative new idea and the institutionalization of a best practice that forms the object of reuse?

Evolution of an innovative idea or knowledge creation: 

This process depends upon knowledge sharing (as defined above), collaboration, and access to relevant information and data. Cook and Brown (1999) suggest that knowledge creation is an interplay between knowledge and knowing, or in other words, putting knowledge into practice. The role of management in this process was identified as:

1. Enabling knowledge sharing: This is a proccess consisting of several underlying activities:

• Explicit knowledge: Depends on articulation of needs, awareness of knowledge, access to knowledge, guidance in the knowledge sharing process, and completeness of the knowledge sources (Bukowitz & Williams 1999). IT systems and content management are extremely important in this process.
• Tacit (embodied) knowledge: This depends on socialization, particularly within informal networks. Culture is particularly important in this area. Tacit knowledge can rarely be effectively codified without losing the essence that makes it so valuable to begin with, so the focus should be on supporting work relationships. IT has a secondary supporting role in this context, primarily as an expert finder and as offering support in the socialization process (e.g. through groupware applications).
• Embedded knowledge: Use of scenario planning, after action reviews, and management training (Gamble & Blackwell 2001). IT has a role in mapping, modeling, creating simulations, and as an embedded knowledge repository.

2. Creating suitable work related environments: The focus here is on unstructured work environments where experimentation, trial and error, and theory in use are promoted. Self-organizing, semi- or fully-autonomous project teams are identified as one useful tool in this endeavor.
3. Providing access to collaborative IT systems: Groupware applications can be used for this purpose. These must support and not interfere with the ideal work environment.
4. Providing access to relevant data and information: From information systems, data warehouses, data mining, etc. These can act as building blocks in the knowledge creation process.

The object of knowledge reuse:

Knowledge Reuse involves three roles, the knowledge producer, intermediary, and consumer (Markus 2001), which are involved in creating, preparing, and actually reusing the knowledge. Two keys elements here are culture and cost – particularly relating to tacit knowledge (where indexing the source rather than the knowledge itself is often more viable). Markus identifies four reuse situations:

• Shared work producers
• Shared work practitioners
• Expert seeking novices
• Miners of secondary knowledge

4)      What are the different approaches that may be undertaken in order to achieve an optimal balance between creativity and organizational structure?

There is no single recipe that can apply to every organization. Dalkir writes that If the organization is too fluid, there will be no solid connection of knowledge work to business goals, and it will be difficult to have clear accountability. If the balance shifts too much in favor of institutionalization, however, the organization risks becoming too formal, which can stifle innovation and the open communication necessary for creative work to take place .

Some of the factors leading to balance which are used in several role model companies in the field of KM are:

■ Consistency between core values, business strategy, and actual work environment.

■ Stress on personal freedom, cooperation, and community.

■ Top leaders as good role models.

5)      What are the different types of knowledge assets that result from KM initiatives?

The terms Intangible Assets (Petty & Cuganesan,2005), Knowledge Assets/Capital or Intellectual Assets/Capital are often used as synonyms. The term Intangible Assets can often be found in the accounting literature, the term Knowledge Assets is used by economists and IC is used in the management and legal literature. But all refer essentially to the same thing: the intangible value contained in the heads and relationships of employees, management staff, customers and other stakeholders.

Dalkir (20119 defines some of the knowledge assets as competence, capability, technologies.  Capability is the skills needed to apply competence, which are demanded to achieve a goal. Technologies are helping in these process.

Charmain Smith writes in his article in the webmagazine Chron (1) that intellectual assets include items such as blueprints, customer lists, drawings, formulas, recipes, software coding and written trade secrets. These ideas serves as the foundation for the creation of additional intellectual assets that help build and expand the business’s success. These items are original ideas created by and for the business but are not certified or registered. These intangible items represent the business’s individual operations and processes and often set the business apart from its competition. For a small business new to its industry, these intellectual assets can be the items that fill the industry’s voids or establish new benchmarks for the industry.

(1) http://smallbusiness.chron.com/intangible-asset-organization-foster-creativity-38490.html

6)      Who are the major categories of stakeholders who should be involved in the strategy formulation process?

The major categories that should be involved in strategy formulation are KM experts, people who have knowledge for the organization and an advocate who will sell the idea to the management. It is important to interview key stakeholders as senior managers, human recourses , IT, and major business managers.

7)      What is the role of management and leadership in organization and in IKM?

Leadership and management are processes that are similar in many ways. Leadership involves influence like management. Leadership and management include working with people

But there are differences. Someone argues that leadership and management are different concepts. Abraham Zaleznik writes in the Harvard Business Review in 1977 that managers are reactive and prefer to work with people to solve problems but they do so with low emotional involvement. He believes that leaders are emotionally active and involved. They seek to shape ideas instead of responding to them and act to expand the available options to solve long-standing problems.

Warren Bennis and Bert Nanus (1985) presents some key differences between leaders and managers.

Leaders:

1. do the right things;
   2. see people as great assets;
   3. seek commitment;
   4. focus on outcomes;
   5. see what and why things could be done;
   6. share information; and
   7. promote networks.

While manager’s:

1. do things right;
   2. see people as liabilities;
   3. seek control, create and follow the rules;
   4. focus on how things should be done;
   5. seek compliance;
   6. value secrecy; and
   7. use formal authority (hierarchy).

To be effective, organizations need to nourish both competent management and skilled leadership.

8)      Why it is important to conduct an audit before eliciting stakeholder objectives?

Auditing activity has in the past been generally informal, accomplished through participation in meetings and discussions with members of the Board of Directors.  The audit should protect the interests of diverse stakeholder groups in a manner consistent with ethical standards. Understanding the expectations of stakeholders is another goal.

9)      What are the major differences between the short-term and long-term strategy? How do they fit together?

Long-term strategy defines the company’s vision, mission and objectives.  A company’s planning process begins with defining the vision of the company, setting forth the mission, identifying objectives and then designing a tactical strategy to achieve the mission. In some instances, companies are very good at articulating or designing a strategic plan but fail to execute a short-term operational plan. Both long-term strategic and short-term operational planning are important to the future success of any organization. Without a tactical short-term plan, operations management is unable to identify the milestones that are important to achieving the overall strategy set forth in the business plan. Therefore, it is necessary to coordinate operational short-term plans to ensure that they are effective in achieving the basic mission of the company.

10)   What are the relationships among human, structural, and relationship capital?

Intellectual capital has three elements:  Human capital • Structural capital • Relationship capital

The structural capital is dependent on human capitals –  as soon as this capital is influenced by the human capital, it would be flourished clearly and independently from the capitals. Customer (realtionship) capital can be seen as a bridge for defining and changing intellectual capital into market value. The more the staffs’ knowledge and learning abilities will be, the more efficiency they have in their job skills, the better effective training courses they take in line with organization activities, and the more they take part in decision making process, the more the organization will develop. Those organizations which have a better relationships with capitals and they are well informed about the needs and demands and try to adapt themselves to new demands are highly motivated to give better services. (Salehi & Jahanian, 2013, “Managing Intellectual Capital in Organizations”)

11)   Why are intellectual assets difficult to manage?

An organisation’s most valuable resource is its knowledge – an aspect of its intellectual capital. Knowledge can be tacit (embedded in the minds of employees and, therefore, difficult to manage) or explicit (expressed in some record from which it can be retrieved).  Brenda Massetti  (1999) writes in her article “Measuring Intellectual Assets”  that the intangibility of intellectual assets has made them difficult to measure and manage. For example, the accounting concept of “goodwill” is simply the amount left after deducting measurable costs from the selling price. It is not precisely attributable to specific assets. One person’s knowledge is often another person’s data, information, or wisdom. The focus usually goes on what goes where in the hierarchy rather than on how much value is being derived for the organization.

However there is some attempts to classify intellectual assets into 1) a semipermanent body of tacit and explicit knowledge about a task, person, or organization; and, 2) the capital resources (human, structural, and relational) that augment this body of knowledge. This classification can produce intellectual asset measures that can be targeted for research and investment.

U6A1 Technologies and IKM

1)      What is the role of technology in organization and in IKM?

The role of the technology in IKM is important. Technology helps to build knowledge out of information. Knowledge Management requires technologies to support the new strategies, processes, methods and techniques to better create, disseminate, share and apply the best knowledge, anytime and anyplace, across the team, across teams, across the organisation and across several organisations, especially its clients, customers, partners, suppliers and other key stakeholders.

2)      How can be technology used in supporting IKM?

The key technologies are communication and collaboration technologies that are web based for internet and intranet usage, as well as mobile technologies such as PDA’s, PC’s, telephone and videoconferencing. New technologies acts as intelligent agents and assistants to search, summarise, conceptualise and recognise patterns of information and knowledge.

Data mining is a technology based on knowledge discovery on databases. One example of the use of data mining is the one used by the online store Amazon, to recommend to the user similar products to the ones he/she is looking for.

A database is a collection of data organized to efficiently serve many applications by centralizing the data and minimizing redundant data (McFadden, Hoffer, & Prescott, 2000).

A document library is typically the location where all documents are stored. The library should be context relative and allow the ease of control over any document type.

Typical Intranet use is to give employees access to company documents, distribute software, enable group scheduling, provide an easy front end to company databases, and let individuals and departments publish information the need to communicate with the rest of the company.

3)      What are the current information technology development trends?

One of the most talked about concept in information technology is the cloud computing. Clouding computing is defined as utilization of computing services, i.e. software as well as hardware as a service over a network. Typically, this network is the internet.

Another emerging trend within information technology is mobile applications (software application on Smart phone, tablet, etc.) Mobile application or mobile app has become a success since its introduction. They are designed to run on Smartphone, tablets and other mobile devices. They are available as a download from various mobile operating systems like Apple, Blackberry, Nokia,

The field of analytics has grown significant in the recent years. Analytics is a process which helps in discovering the informational patterns with data. The field of analytics is a combination of statistics, computer programming and operations research. The field of analytics has shown growth in the field of data analytics, predictive analytics and social analytics. Data analytics is tool used to support decision-making process. It converts raw data into meaningful information

(From http://www.managementstudyguide.com/)

4)      What are the main issues and challenges of using information technology in the organizational context?

Electronically generated and stored information is also exposed to change and manipulation in quite a different way to that involved with paper-bound information. The rapid growth of the amount of produced information makes challenging its handling and storing and at a later stage how it will be sorted out or transferred to long-term archives.

5)      What are the main issues and challenges in current debates on information technology?

The  main challenges defined by Eric D. Brown are :

• Find and Keeping Talent
• Business / IT Alignment
• IT Strategy
• Outsourcing

(From http://ericbrown.com/informationtechnologychallenges.htm)

6)    What are the challenges in integrating digital libraries in learning?

Virkus et al (2009) gives an extensive overview of the issues and challenges of integration of digital libraries and VLEs. The issues and challenges are divided into the four categories

Technical

Interoperability is a major concern in the integration of digital libraries and VLE.

The teaching and library communities have different understanding of the uses and purposes of metadata and there are different standards.

Many academics use the VLEs as a location where they could place their reading lists to be accessible by students in a Word or PDF form, which is just a replica of the paper-based process. (Secker, 2005) as cited by Virkus et al (2009) There is a lack of understanding on compilation, dissemination and management of those reading lists

Human and organizational

The stakeholders.

The barriers : issues of institutional infrastructure and politics;inter-professional communication and collaboration (cultural barriers, mutual misperceptions, differences in priorities and visions); staff development  and  access and content.

Organisational culture. The integration of digital libraries and VLEs is similar to the merging of two corporate cultures. The stereotypes, practices and attitudes that constitute the organisational culture need to be exposed in the merging process. There is conflict between the desire for ownership and fear that their work will be reused without acknowledgement of their effort and contribution ((Markland, 2003b) as cited by Virkus et al (2009)

Learning and library resources.

There is a resistance or “discreteness” (Markland and Kemp, 2004 as cited by Virkus et al 2009) within the academic community to consider the access to library materials as a joint activity to working in the VLE or towards the facility to integrate them into the learning materials.

 Teaching and learning. 

Students have both a lack of information seeking and evaluation of sources skills. Providing tools and resources through VLEs will help students both in gaining “good” resources quickly (Markland and Kemp, 2004 as cited by Virkus et al 2009)

7)      How Open Educational Resources can be used to support organizational learning?

Open Educational Resources are teaching, learning or research materials that are in the public domain or released with an intellectual property license that allows for free use, adaptation, and distribution.

In 2001, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), in an unprecedented move, announced the release of nearly all its courses on the internet for free access. As the number of institutions offering free or open courseware increased, UNESCO organized the 1st Global OER Forum in 2002 where the term Open Educational Resources (OER) was adopted.

Our initial findings show that OER do play an important role in teaching and learning, but that it is crucial to also promote innovation and change in educational practices.

There is an established understanding that easy access to educational resources is required to promote lifelong learning in people of all ages. The role of such access in reducing social inequalities, fostering social inclusion of migrants, and supporting education in developing countries is also often emphasized.

U5A1 – Information culture and information literacy

1)      What is the role of information culture in organization and in IKM?

Choo examines in his article “Information culture and organizational effectiveness” the link between IC and organizational effectiveness. He refers to the study of Ginman from 1988 “Information culture and business performances” which reveals that well developed information culture is positively associated with organizational practices that leads to successful business performance. Ginman also concludes that information culture is a strategic goal that should be planned.

Briggle and Mitcham (2009) suggest in their article that information culture could be used as bridge between the different engineering and humanities approaches in the organizations. But then the IC must be information as culture, not just information for, in, or about culture.

2)      How information culture and information-related competencies are related?

In the wide range of approaches information culture is closely linked with information technology, information systems and digital world. Davenport writes in his article “Saving IT’s Soul: Human-Centered Information Management” from 1994 that information technology could be seen as a facilitator of the information culture and there is interaction between information technology and information culture. IC could also be related to common knowledge and information ethics.

3)      What are the current theories, principles, practice and research on information culture and information literacy?

Choo examines in his article “Information culture and organizational effectiveness” the IC as very related to the organizational culture. He adds two new dimensions – information values and norms and information behaviors. By applying them to the model of cultural type introduced be Cameron, K. S., & Ettington, D. R. (1988) he establishes a typology of IC which organizations can use reflect on their dominant culture type, to compare how that differs from their preferred culture, and to discuss what kind of cultural change would benefit the organization.

Information literacy is a broader concept than the skills-based literacies and depending on the viewpoint of the particular commentator, it contains them or lies alongside them. Information literacy is a central topic for the information sciences. IL is associated with issues as varied as information overload, lifelong learning, knowledge management, and the growth of the information society. (David Baden, 2001)

4)      What are the main issues and international trends in the research and practice of information culture and information literacy?

The main issue in research and practicing IL is to agree on the definition and meaning of it. This will facilitate the further job in the field.

5)      What are the main issues and challenges in current debates on information culture and information literacy?

During recent years discussions about the terms information literacy and information skills, and the nature of the concepts have intensified again in the UK. Researchers from Manchester Metropolitan University and the University of Leeds, finds that in many instances both terms are used to describe what is essentially the same concept: ‘information literacy’ and ‘information skills’ can be described as synonyms

Short review of “COMMUNITY ORGANIZATIONAL LEARNING…” case study

COMMUNITY ORGANIZATIONAL LEARNING: CASE STUDIES ILLUSTRATING A THREEDIMENSIONAL MODEL OF LEVELS AND ORDERS OF CHANGE

Douglas D. Perkins, Kimberly D. Bess, Daniel G. Cooper, Diana L. Jones, Theresa Armstead, and Paul W. Speer

Vanderbilt University

What are the main ideas in this article?

In this analysis, which is rooted in organizational learning theory, the authors suggests that organizations that empower staff and volunteers through opportunities for learning and participation at the individual level are better able to succeed in terms of organizational-level learning and transformation. They authors concentrates their study at change on community-level, examining a number of small non-profit organizations.

Browsing different theories they concludes that a learning organization is a best case or best practice, an organization that has both the infrastructure and the culture necessary to support the process of organizational learning. The individual is seen as an active agent and acts to intervene in organizational processes. Organizational learning, by contrast, refers to the capacity of an organization to transform its underlying structures, cultural values, and objectives in response to, or in anticipation of, changing environmental demands (Argyris & Schon, 1996). Hence, a learning organization depends on openness to new ideas and change at both the individual and organizational levels.

What kind of approaches to learning organization the author describes?

If organizational learning signifies the process, then the learning organization represents the ideal or goal. Learning organization theories highlight the interdependent relationship between individual and organizational learning viewing the individual as the agent of organizational learning and change.

What are the main conclusions, recommendations and lessons learned?

During conducting the study the authors defines as a big challenge the management-oriented learning organization literature with context very different from the community context in at least two important ways. First, organizational theorists tend to assume that the same organizational goals, structures, and processes can apply across very different organizational contexts. In business organizations, profit may be a goal that can be generalized across contexts; however, there is a need to understand how these assumptions might apply in smaller community-based nonprofit organizations, many of which rely heavily on volunteer members to carry out the work of the organization (Herman & Renz, 1999).  Second, connecting the organization to its environment is a learning organization principle, but for it to be relevant to community psychology, it is important to identify what particular aspects of the environment are relevant to what kinds of organizations. The local-to-global political context is especially important to an organization’s ability to address root causes of problems.

Despite its limitations, the authors believe learning organization theory, which explicitly addresses multilevel change in human communication, knowledge, and decision-making systems, can make a contribution to community-based nonprofit and volunteer organizations and inform community psychologists’ efforts to help transform such organizations and engage in systemic community change.

Learning is seen as partially overlapping at each level— mutually reinforcing, but there are also independent aspects.

The proposed three-dimensional spatial framework  can help organizational researchers and administrators to identify the ideal goal of transformational change at all three levels and diagnose where a given organization is currently and where it may decide to target more activity or resources to maximize change at all three level

To diagnose whether an organization is a “learning organization” and transformative at that level, they authors ask questions such as: Are curiosity, creativity, systems thinking, critical reflection, and dialogue encouraged in the organization?

To understand whether an organization is transformative at the community level, the authors ask questions such as: Do the mission, strategies, and tactics of the organization address structural root causes of community problems? Do they deal with issues of social, political, and economic oppression, liberation, and justice? Does the organization involve significant and representative numbers of community members in important decisions and operations and in active and meaningful ways?

The analysis findings suggest that second-order change becomes more challenging as one moves from the individual and group or team levels to the organizational and community levels. It also suggests that organizational learning is not a sufficient condition for transformative community change, nor did we expect it to be.

At the individual level, all three case studies offeres opportunities not only for role and task-related learning, but also for some form of personally transformative learning.

Still many of the organizations studied are lacking the structures and processes to support organizational learning.

By studying organizational learning through this study examines both individual-level psychological and material empowerment and organizational-level resource exchange. Although it remains unclear whether higher level change is necessarily dependent on change at lower levels, the analysis does suggest that human capital capacity development makes a difference—those organizations that empower staff and volunteers at the individual level through opportunities for learning and participation fare better in terms of organizational- and community-level learning and transformation.

What methods are used to reach those conclusions?

The team have made a database of over 2000 non profit organizations and volunteers from which they telephone interviewed 270. Further they chose to case study 16 of them. At the end it was presented three contrasting cases.  From these three cases through applying different OL theories the final conclusions were drawn.

Learning organization

1)      What is the nature of learning organization and what are its main components?

A learning organization is the term given to a company that facilitates the learning of its members and continuously transforms itself.  According to Peter Senge (1990:3) learning organizations are organizations where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning to see the whole together. The learning organization develop as a result of the pressures facing modern organizations and enables them to remain competitive in the business environment.

Senge identifies five basic disciplines that characterize learning organization:

Systems thinking ; Personal mastery ; Mental models; Building shared vision; Team learning

2)      How learning, learning organization and information and knowledge management are related?

There is a broad range of definitions of what learning is but briefly presented learning is connected with knowledge as peoples learning experience contributes to acquiring of new knowledge in the community if externalize. According to Kai Pata all learners are part of communities of practice that have certain common knowledge and skills.  Learning is conceptualized as the observed change in the state of the knowledge that results from knowledge building.  Knowledge management should thus examine that all conditions for learning are available and should have the learning organization as a model .

3)      Describe the main current theories, principles, practice and research on learning and learning organization.

Noel Entwistle and his colleagues has conducted similar research to Säljö’s study. Entwistle has been described as the first person in the English-speaking countries to grasp the importance of the Swedish work. Using the works of Marton and Säljö (1976) they were able to identify deep and surface approaches but they also noted the presence of what was considered to be a third approach, the strategic approach, where students were aiming towards top achievement, using whichever of the deep or surface approach was deemed necessary

From the 1970s on, research on human cognition as information-processing has revealed the ‘constructive’ nature of human learning. Learning consists of complex information processing, problem-solving, decision-making in uncertainty and the urge to transfer knowledge and skills into new, unknown settings

• According to the empirical approach all reliable knowledge is based on experience.
• In the rationalist approach thinking is considered the only reliable source of knowledge.
• According to the pragmatic and socio-historic approach or educational theory as social constructivism, knowledge is distributed among individuals, tools and communities, such as those of professional practitioners

Further I can point out Argyris and Schön’s(1974,1978)concept of double loop learning and Nonaka’s SECI KModel of knowledge creation and conversion.

4)      Please present different perspectives in current debates about the learning and learning organization.

The Learning organization concept was coined through the work and research of Peter Senge and his colleagues. It encourages organizations to shift to a more interconnected way of thinking.

Joel Baum writes in his article “Organisational learning” that the field lacks a unified dependent variable. Learning in organization occurs simultaneously, in many places, on different subjects, and with different speeds. How does dispersed learning affect the distribution of knowledge in organizations? How do organizations manage this uneven, distributed knowledge production process, and how do they derive strategic advantage from it? A related question is, How does dispersed learning aggregate to induce larger changes (e.g., of strategies or structures)?

A few new directions have emerged in research on formal rules. One direction is the comparative study of rule making and rule changing, e.g., comparing rule change in different organizational and societal contexts, and comparing different kinds of rule change (e.g., Schulz and Beck, 2000). A second direction is related to the legal context of organizational rule making (Edelman, 1990; Sutton and Dobbin, 1996; Sitkin and Bies, 1994).

5)      What are the main issues and trends in this field (learning and learning organization)?

Issues:

In some organizations a lack of a learning culture can be a barrier to learning. An environment must be created where individuals can share learning without it being devalued and ignored, so more people can benefit from their knowledge and the individuals becomes empowered. A learning organization needs to fully accept the removal of traditional hierarchical structures (O’Keeffe, T. 2002 “Organizational Learning: a new perspective”). Organizational size may become the barrier to internal knowledge sharing. When the number of employees exceeds 150, internal knowledge sharing dramatically decreases because of higher complexity in the formal organizational structure, weaker inter-employee relationships, lower trust, reduced connective efficacy, and less effective communication.

In his book The Dance of Change form 1999 Senge states that there are many reasons why an organization may have trouble in transforming itself into a learning organization. One is that an organization does not have enough time. Employees and management may have other issues that take priority over trying to change the culture of their organization. The team may not be able to commit the time an institution does not have the appropriate help or training. For an organization to be able to change, it needs to know the steps necessary to solve the problems it faces. As a solution, a mentor or coach who is well versed in the learning organization concept may be necessary.  Also, the change may not be relevant to the organization’s needs. Time should be spent on the actual issues of the organization and its daily issues. To combat this challenge, a strategy must be built. The organization should determine what its problems are before entering into the transformation. Training should remain linked to business results so that it is easier for employees to connect the training with everyday issues.

Trends:

In their study from 2012 “The High-Impact Learning Organization Series”  David Mallon, Janet Clarey and Mark Vickers reveals new findings which can help the organizations to  improve their activity. The findings are:

• Organizations investing in organizational learning delivered profit growth three-times greaterthan their competitors over the last four years. If you can keep your employees current and skilled, you can evolve and perform better than your competitors.
• The key to success is no longer simply developing great content, but rather arranging it and delivering it with a focus on “continuous capability development.”
• high-impact OL professionals need to continuously train themselves.

6)      Can you indicate some good models and practices of learning organization and technology applications that support the development of learning organization?

Based on the study by Bersin & Associates, titled “High-Impact Learning Culture: The 40 Best Practices for Creating an Empowered Enterprise” (June 10, 2010), Oracle and other companies offers HILO solutions that have a strong learning foundation.

http://www.oracle.com/us/chro-docs/june-2013-chro-deck4-1961622.pdf

Single- and double-loop learning and organizational learning.

This model of learning goes back to some work that Argyris and Schön did in 1974, but it found its strongest expression and grounding in organizational dynamics in 1978. Single-loop learning with it’s emphasis on the detection and correction of errors within a given set of governing variables is linked to incremental change in organizations. Double-loop learning involves interrogating the governing variables themselves and often involves radical changes such as the wholesale revision of systems, alterations in strategy and so on. We examine the notion of theories of action, single and double-loop learning, and the organizational orientations and practices linked to each.

Communities of practice.

This notion has been popularized by Lave and Wenger (1991) and Wenger (1998). Explores the idea that organizations may be a constellation of communities of practice.

Organisational quality and organisational change: Interconnecting paths to effectiveness

Organisational quality and organisational change: Interconnecting paths to effectiveness

Ian Smith

 In this interesting article Ian Smith for La Probe university in Australia analyze the common between managing organisational change and managing organisational quality.  Organisations adopting a quality enhancement focus are concerned with continually improving organisational performance and effectiveness – working actively to review, asses, enhance and maintain any and all aspects of organisational performance

The author introduce several quality frameworks which has been developed enabling an organisation to define and set expectations, to work to meet those expectations, to asses if the set standard has been met, and giving pointers and assistance to where and how to improve quality.

repeatable over time; and . involves all staff. and is characterised by: . clear specification of roles, responsibilities and procedures; . open and active commitment to quality at all levels; . willingness to engage in self-evaluation; . clarity and consistency of procedures; . explicit responsibilities for quality control and quality assurance; . emphasis on obtaining feedback, from a range of constituencies; . clear commitment to identifying and disseminating good practice; . prompt, appropriate, and sensitive managerial action to redress problems, supported by adequate information; . prompts continuous improvement; and . includes the specification of standards and acceptable evidence

Further to change management Smith points out that between 50 percent and 70 percent of change efforts are reported as failing, either fully or partly. This statistic makes worrying any manager undertaking or considering a change initiative.

The author makes brief review of Kotter’s “eight step” change modell and Doppelt’s “wheel of change model”

The modell of Doppelt may be of particular value and relevance to the higher education sector. Doppelt’s primary focus is achieving organisational change in the context of achieving environmental sustainability

Than Smith compare both models and concludes that althoug different in the structure the important in both is the same – establishing a sense of urgency about the need to change and disrupting business-as-usual mindsets and set ways of working; creating a vision of the ideal future and engaging people in the organisation with the change agenda overall and with actions to achieve the change; communicating the change vision widely and consistently and at all levels of the organisation; empowering people in the organisation to do think and act differently to take risks, explore new ways of working and overcome barriers to innovation and individual/organisational learning; enabling feedback loops in the organisation,

Further the author explores the comonalities between quality and change. There are common elements between an organisational quality cycle and an organisational change cycle. The latter typically involves: agreeing on objectives which the organisation aims for; assessing the current state – by self assessment and/or external review – or a combination of both; prioritising – identify the most important things; deciding on actions required, setting and implementing action plans; and reviewing and assessing.

Both are typically concerned with improving ways of working – changing both broad organisational cultures and attitudes and reworking specific infrastructure, systems process and procedures. Both assume that a finite and static state is not desirable – rather that organisations will benefit from continual review, adaptation and improvement. Both are concerned with striving for optimal organisational performance. Quality initiatives focus primarily on measures and outcomes. Change initiatives focus primarily on managing the processes to achieve those outcomes. Effective organisational change can help to enhance quality and the pursuit of enhanced organisational quality can form a key impetus for making changes

At the end Smith presents the program of organisational reform applied in La Trobe University.

The goal of the change program is university to operate more effectively and to review how the university approaches its fundamental business of research, teaching and learning. Administrative Change Program (ACP) is a key element of the organisational reforms. and the program objective is to improve the quality and efficiency of professional, administrative and technical functions and services in the university, while reducing the cost of these services. It is important that the impact of the change program is measured and evaluated. The modells of Kotler and Doppelt have been applied here.

The conclusion the author draws at the end is that managing change is inherent in organisational quality enhancement – change and quality go hand-in-hand. Information providers and professionals operating in an environment of rapid and complex change should add to their managerial “toolkits” an understanding of the powerful interconnections between managing both organisational quality and organisational change – and a proactive approach to both.

Unit 3 assignm 3 – School knowledge management framework and strategies: The new perspective on teacher professional development

School knowledge management framework and strategies: The new perspective on teacher professional development

Research by Jingyuan Zhao, Harbin institute of technology, China.

What are the main ideas in this article?

The research focus on the problems of the teacher professional development in China, and analyze the relationship between teacher learning, teacher professional development and school knowledge management.  The results of the research  reveals knowledge management strategies which can improve the teacher professional development, including school organizational structure and knowledge leaders, establishing teacher knowledge management system of teacher professional development, encouraging team learning and knowledge sharing, establishing performance assessment mechanism of knowledge applications and development.

What kind of approaches to information management and knowledge management the author describes?

 They author describes knowledge management approach with focus on organizational learning.

What is the relationship between information management and knowledge management?

According to the author information technologies provide systemic support and assistance for the professional development of teachers.  The explosion and fast flow of knowledge brought by information technologies have great impact on teachers. Teachers need to learn new knowledge, alter teaching method, and engage in teaching by the model of student-centered learning. Further he states that there is a mutual influence relationship between knowledge management and teacher professional development and school teachers who realize that their personal knowledge management and professional performance are positively correlated have better knowledge management.

What are the main conclusions, recommendations and lessons learned?

They author comes with his own definition on KM – it aims to provide suitable information for the right person at the correct time.  He specifies that school knowledge management is the systematic management and application of schools all tangible and intangible knowledge assets  including the science and technology equipment, the experiences and professional capabilities of teaching staff, and promotes the knowledge acquisition, sharing and application of school teachers and administrative staff so as to achieve schools’ innovations. School knowledge acquisition is to introduce external knowledge to schools, and make tacit knowledge among schools’ members explicit and through various activities of professional development.

Zhao defines five enabling factors of school knowledge management : these are leadership and administration, school learning culture, cooperation and interaction mechanism, performance management and evaluation, support system of information technologies. How to transform  teachers’ individual tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge and then spread it into the organizations of teacher teams is an important task for knowledge management. Team learning, teacher cooperation and knowledge sharing mechanisms can help teachers to spread tacit knowledge.

The objective of school knowledge management is to set up school learning system to facilitate teachers’ learning so as to improve teacher professional development. Schools should help teachers with professional development by means of school knowledge management strategies, including schools own Chief Knowledge Officer!  Construction of learning school and knowledge-friendly school culture, school knowledge management system of teacher professional development, team learning, teacher cooperation and knowledge sharing mechanism, and assessment mechanism of knowledge operation and development.

What methods are used to reach those conclusions?

Zhang has made questionnaire and sent it to 200 schools, than collected the results and applied the theories of different researchers in the field of KM to draw his own conclusions.

Unit 3 assignment 1

1) What are the main components of information and knowledge management infrastructure? Please describe these components.

In an organizational context, knowledge management infrastructure includes five components:

• organization culture
• organization structure
• organisation’s information technology infrastructure
• common knowledge, and
• physical environment (Becerra-Fernandez and Sabherwal, 2010).

Organization culture reflects the norms and beliefs that guide the behaviour of the organization’s members. It is an important enabler of knowledge management in organizations. Most definitions focus on the core values, norms and underlying beliefs that define the appropriate way individuals act and behave in an organization.

Attributes of enabling organizational culture include understanding

• the value of knowledge management practices,
• managing support for knowledge management at all levels,
• incentives that reward knowledge sharing, and
• encouragement of interaction for the creation and sharing of knowledge

The Information Technology Infrastructure is the combination of data processing, storage, and communication technologies and systems (databases, servers, computers, information devices, etc) and the processes that make it all work. It comprises the entire spectrum of organization’s information systems, including transaction processing systems and management information systems. It consists of databases and data warehouses, as well as enterprise resource planning systems.

Common knowledge provides unity to the organization. It includes:

• a comon language and vocabulary,
• recognition of individual knowledge domains,
• common cognitive schema,
• shared norms, and
• elements of specialized knowledge that are common across individuals sharing knowledge

Common knowledge helps enhance the value of an individual expert’s knowledge by integrating it with the knowledge of others.

The physical environment within the organization is another important foundation upon which knowledge management rests. Key aspects of the physical environment include:

• the design of buildings and the separation between them;
• the location, size, and type of offices;
• the type, number, and nature of meeting rooms; and so on.

Physical environment can foster knowledge management by providing opportunities for employees to meet and share ideas. Coffee rooms, cafeterias, water coolers, and hallways do provide venues where employees learn from and share insights with each other.

 Organizational structure determines the manner and extent to which roles, power, and responsibilities are delegated, controlled, and coordinated, and how information flows between levels of management (BusinessDictionary.com).

The most common organisation structures are:

• hierarchical,
• centralised and decentralised,
• flat and tall.

2) What are the main information management processes and knowledge management processes? Please describe these processes.

KM processes refer to the ways that an organization handles knowledge at various stages of its life in an organization (KM cycle).

There are four main knowledge management processes, and each process comprises two sub-processes:

• Knowledge discovery – development of new tacit or explicit knowledge from data and information or from the synthesis of prior knowledge. The discovery of new explicit knowledge relies most directly on combination, whereas the discovery of new tacit knowledge relies most directly on socialization
  • Combination – sub process where  the multiple bodies of explicit knowledge (data and/or information) are synthesized to create new, more complex sets of explicit knowledge.
  • Socialization – the synthesis of tacit knowledge across individuals, usually through joint activities rather than written or verbal instructions.
• Knowledge capture – the process by which knowledge is converted from tacit to explicit form (residing within people, artifacts or organizational entities) and vice versa
  • Externalization –  sub-process through which an organization captures the tacit knowledge its workers possess so that it can be documented, verbalized and shared.
  • Internalization – sub-process through which workers acquire tacit knowledge. It represents the traditional notion of learning
• Knowledge sharing – process through which explicit or tacit knowledge is communicated to other individuals. Typical examples of knowledge sharing is writing books or research papers; Delivering a lecture or making a speech or presentation; participating in a dialogue over coffee or lunch;participating in communities of practice; mentoring a new staff; shadowing an expert
  • Socialization –
  • Exchange- used to communicate or transfer explicit knowledge among individuals, groups and organizations
• Knowledge application – when available knowledge is used to make decisions and perform tasks through direction and routines
  • Direction –  an individual who possesses knowledge advises another
  • Routines –  utilization of knowledge embedded in procedures, rules, norms and processes that guide future behavior

3)  How do information management and knowledge management processes differ?

Information management focuses on the effective management of information.

Knowledge management is  a strategy for creating an environment that encourages using, generating, sharing, and exploiting knowledge.  Capturing knowledge is not purely about technology.

4)  Compare and contrast major knowledge management life cycle models including the Meyer and Zack, Bukowitz and Williams, McElroy, and Wiig life cycle models.

Wiig (1993) is  among the first to address the need for a ‘coherent and practical framework for KM’, which he attempts to create by identifying a set of organizational knowledge processing phases. Wiig’s (1993) model is characterized by the use of colloquial terms to describe each of the four major phases (stages) namely: build, hold, pool, and apply knowledge.(1) Knowledge processing is considered at three levels: the individual, the group, and the organization.

Meyer and Zack’s (1999) KM life cycle focuses more on the architecture of information products, where they uses the term information to include knowledge content. In their definition of information products, Meyer and Zack (1999) include information circulated both internally and externally, in electronic (i.e., information systems) or printed form. The five information (knowledge content) stages of the Meyer and Zack (1999) life cycle include: acquisition refinement, storage/retrieval, distribution, and presentation/use. The Meyer and Zack (1999) model, while overlapping the Wiig (1993) model in terms of its acquisition and storage/retrieval phases, brings a significant contribution to the landscape of KM frameworks, through the refinement phase. The authors were the first to introduce the notion of critically assessing knowledge before allowing it to pass on to the next processing phase.

Bukowitz and Williams (1999) were among the first to introduce the notion of a cyclical sequence of knowledge processing steps In their model, there are phases that are similar, if not identical, to those found in the both the Wiig (1993) and Meyer and Zack (1999) models (get, which is the same as build and acquire; assess is similar to refine; build/sustain is similar to hold and storage/retrieval; and contribute is similar to use/apply and distribution) The get step in Bukowitz and Williams’ (1999) model discusses a similar guiding principle as Meyer and Zack’s (1999) garbage in, garbage out – quality over quantity. However, Bukowitz and Williams take this principle a step further in the use phase, by asserting that, in using the information available, its effectiveness and efficiency are no longer adequate enough. Innovation and out-of-the box thinking now become key elements in the process of applying the knowledge to specific situations. One of the main contributions of the Bukowitz and Williams model is the learn phase, in which individuals learn from their experiences and organizations create an organizational memory. The authors also use the term contribute to describe the phase in which knowledge is acquired, in contrast to the get or acquire. The advantage is that the word  ‘contribute’ better describes the voluntary nature of knowledge management, namely that employees must be motivated and encouraged to post (share) what they have learned to a knowledge repository or organizational memory.

McElroy’s (2003) approach to creating a KM life cycle model is quite different than the previous models. The model starts with a phase called knowledge claim, which immediately requires a validation action, the knowledge claim evaluation. In other words, to be processed, all knowledge must first be deemed worthy, before proceeding further. It is this validation process, in the form of procedural or declarative rules, that results in the formal acceptance and adoption of new organizational knowledge (McElroy, 2003).

• As I couldn’t find any information about life cycle models in the given literature in Unit 3, I took inspiration from the article:

A Holistic View of the Knowledge Life Cycle: The Knowledge Management Cycle (KMC) Model M. Max Evans, Kimiz Dalkir and Catalin Bidian; Journal of Knowledge Management Volume 12 Issue 2

5) Identify the major challenges and benefits of each phase of the KM cycle.

1. a) capture – the challenge is to capture the yet uncaptured and unknown knowledge in the organization. Another challenge is to keep capturing the knowledge up to date as the organizational success rely on that in bigger and bigger scale.
2. b) codify – The benefit here is that once converted into explicit form, the knowledge is easy to be shared and to reach a lot of people as to be sustainable in time. Callenge is that It is difficult to codify tacit knowledge.
3. c) create – if not identified inside the organization, knowledge can be create. Follow the same rules as with capturing.
4. d) share – difficult to find tacit knowledge. Knowledge is property and ownership is important; the provider is unsure if the receiver will understand the message
5. e) acquire – traditional and e-learning. E-learnings advantage is saved time and travel costs, the disadvantage is lack of face2face communications. In traditional is opposite.
6. f) apply – challenge is to decide which knowledge will help to which people and how to make it available for them so they will understand it.

 

Analysis of the article “Practical Knowledge Management: A Model That Works” from Gilbert Probst

I chose to analyze the article  “Practical Knowledge Management: A Model That Works” from Gilbert Probst

https://moodle.hitsa.ee/mod/folder/view.php?id=683540

What are the main ideas in this article?

The goal of knowledge management is to improve organizational capabilities through better use of the organization’s individual and collective knowledge resources. These resources include skills, capabilities, experience, routines, and norms, as well as technologies.  In order  to survive the organizations  are forced to rethink the management of their organizational knowledge bases.

Review on “Using Web 2.0 technologies for communication, collaboration and community building: a Caribbean perspective” Wood, B. (2013).

Wood, B. (2013). Using Web 2.0 technologies for communication, collaboration and community building: a Caribbean perspective, Library Hi Tech News, 30(6), 7 – 11.

In her article on the use of Web 2.0 technologies Beverly Wood describes how they affects the librarian community and all their users in the Caribbean region.

The author specifies that there are some debate over the concept of Web 2.0 by quoting Tim Berners-Lee (in an interview with interview with Scott Laningham from IBM)  who notes that the collaborative nature of the web was always present…  and it is this ideal upon which Web 2.0 builds.