What is Knowledge Management (KM)?

KM is a newly emerging, interdisciplinary business model dealing with all aspects of knowledge within the context of the firm, including knowledge creation, codification, sharing, and how these activities promote learning and innovation. In practice, KM encompasses both technological tools and organizational routines in overlapping parts. 

Rudy Ruggles, a leading KM thinker/practitioners, has identified the following items as integral components of KM: 

  • Generating new knowledge
  • Accessing valuable knowledge from outside sources
  • Using accessible knowledge in decision making
  • Embedding knowledge in processes, products, and/or services
  • Representing knowledge in documents, databases, and software
  • Facilitating knowledge growth through culture and incentives
  • Transferring existing knowledge into other parts of the organization
  • Measuring the value of knowledge assets and/or impact of knowledge management 

Here are some additional overviews on the character of KM:

Why is it important?

Important economics and business theorists have alluded to or identified knowledge as the ultimate competitive advantage for the modern firm. That is, it is a resource that is difficult to impossible to imitate or co-opt, giving its possessor a unique and inherently protected commodity. Therefore, any techniques or methods which sustain knowledge growth and distribution are key to the success of today's organizations. 

A variety of factors have contributed to the growth of and interest in KM. Robert E. Cole identifies eight of them: 

  • Accelerating pace of change 
  • Staff attrition (especially that resulting from years of downsizing and reengineering) 
  • Growth in organizational scope · Geographic dispersion associated with globalization of markets
  • Global integration 
  • Increase in networked organizations
  • Growing knowledge-intensity of goods and services
  • Revolution in information technology 

Following are some observations on how/why KM is being deployed:  

How is it different from other fields?

KM is rooted in many disciplines including business, economics, education, information management, psychology, and sociology among others. These areas have developed perspectives on the workings of individual and systemic knowledge. KM embraces these perspectives, but operates from the basic premise of the "sticky" nature of knowledge. That is, knowledge is dynamically imbedded in networks and processes as well as in the human beings that constitute and use them. Put another way, people acquire knowledge from established organizational routines, the entirety of which is usually impossible for any one person to know. However, routines evolve as people interact with them in response to changes in the market, the particular institution, and the composition of the staff that carry out the routines. This distinction provides the impetus for KM, at least in its current state, to focus on enhancing a firm's innovation potential to leverage it for competitive advantage. This is the "holy grail": a set of activities and tools that intentionally organize and nurture creativity-on a large scale-for effective competition. 

A useful, especially non-jargonny article that further explores the nature of KM is:

What is the KM process?

In order to organize this site, a thesaurus--which has special meaning for information management--was created. It is comprised of KM terms (some of which can be seen in our Glossary) that are grouped in categories. These categories imply the process of KM, which is circular (or spiral, depending on cultural references for growth) and unending. That is, participants in the KM process may enter it at any point, and traverse it repeatedly. Additionally, each category often presents decision-making opportunities, passive and active, and the categories help identify a knowledge domain. The categories are:

  • Asset Utilization
  • Knowledge Evaluation
  • Knowledge Improvement
  • Knowledge Accumulation
  • Knowledge Generation
  • Knowledge Sharing
  • Knowledge Protection

Other frameworks have been developed by leading practioners to envision the KM process and the relationships among its components. One such framework, available from her web site, is this one from Verna Allee.

What are the hot topics?

The hot topics include: