Knowledge management,relational learning,and the effectiveness of innovation outcomes

This paper proposes a conceptual model to test the moderating effect of relational learning on the link between knowledge strategies and innovation. To accomplish this, this study is carried out on healthcare organizations. It has been generally accepted that both explicit and tacit knowledge play a basic role in organizational innovation. However, although there are plenty of research works that study the existing relationship between knowledge management (KM) and the effectiveness of the innovation process, there are certain peculiarities with regard to this link, which have yielded some inconclusive results. This paper revisits this research topic with data on KM, relational learning and innovation outcomes from a sample of Spanish hospitals. The results show that a deep and broad knowledge base leads to better innovation outcomes. In addition, this study found that hospitals and/or units that invest and involve themselves in relational learning mechanisms are more likely to foster innovations.     

Knowledge management and organizational performance in the service industry: The role of transformational leadership beyond the effects of transactional leadership

This study examines a comprehensive model comprising of various relationships between transformational and transactional leadership, knowledge management (KM) process, and organizational performance. Data are collected from human resource managers and general managers working in 119 service firms. Exploratory factor analysis and hierarchical regression analysis are used to analyze the proposed hypotheses. The results indicate that transformational leadership has strong and positive effects on KM process and organizational performance after controlling for the effects of transactional leadership. Further, KM process partially mediates the relationship between transformational leadership and organizational performance after controlling for the effects of transactional leadership. Implications and directions for future research are also discussed.     

知识管理系统模型新探

知识管理系统模型中还存在着许多问题,应研究相应的解决思路与方案。对知识管理系统模型特征、建模的思维过程、建模指导框架、模型自组织机制的营建策略、模型组合智能的实现框架、建模过程的中心主线以及模型的根基等方面进行系统分析,以期为知识管理系统建模研究提供一幅崭新的蓝图。     

Knowledge and Knowledge Management in the Social Media Age

Social media comprise the set of tools identified as blogs, wikis, and other social networking platforms that “enable people to connect, communicate, and collaborate.” These tools create a dynamic, complex information infrastructure that enables easier, faster, and more widespread sharing of information. These affordances make possible phenomena such as viral processes, and they can change how we are able to work and organize. This article explores the impact of this emerging knowledge ecosystem (KE) on some prominent characteristics of knowledge and knowledge management (KM) models through an exploratory critical review of popular epistemological perspectives and conceptual foundations underlying KM models. We find that this emerging KE requires a revisiting of both the social aspects of knowledge creation and some popular notions of enterprise knowledge management.     

The Critical Role of Internal Marketing in Knowledge Management in Not-for-Profit Organizations

Australian not-for-profit (NFP) organizations are knowledge-intensive enterprises, but most struggle with knowledge management (KM), while at the same time identifying it as an increasingly important activity they must improve for an increasingly competitive and demanding environment. Replicating “corporate” best KM practices is often misaligned with NFPs’ unique cultures, finances, operations, and missions. This article advances previous work presented in this journal and highlights the importance of internal management practices as vital for success. This article draws from NFP research in knowledge and explores a key enabler (internal marketing) that has been overlooked for building a critical link between NFP staff/volunteers and the organization for building and sustaining KM in an NFP environment. Using in-depth interviewing (32 interviews) and an online survey (179 respondents), this article examines the elements of internal marketing’s benefit/value propositions to staff and the importance of personal relevance. Further, the article also explores the value of socialization strategies (such as communities of practice) as effective internal marketing channels.     

Artificial intelligence and knowledge management: A partnership between human and AI

Emerging artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities will likely pervade nearly all organizational contours and activities, including knowledge management (KM). This article aims to uncover opportunities associated with the implementation of emerging systems empowered by AI for KM. In doing so, we explicate the potential role of AI in supporting fundamental dimensions of KM: creation, storage and retrieval, sharing, and application of knowledge. We then propose practical ways to build the partnership between humans and AI in supporting organizational KM activities and provide several implications for the development and management of AI systems based on the components of people, infrastructures, and processes.     

Technological and Organizational Tools for Knowledge Management: In Search of Configurations

Knowledge Management (KM) is becoming a growing concern in management research and practice because of its role in determining firm innovation capability and in enhancing working life quality of knowledge workers. This requires, even for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) the creation of a sustainable work organization in terms of configuration of organizational and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) tools. With a particular emphasis in the area of Product Innovation (PI) and on the basis of a survey on 127 Italian SMEs, this paper aims at analysing the emergent technological and organizational approaches to managing knowledge in the PI process. Three different KM Configurations emerge: the `technical', the `relational' and the `advanced' approach.     

关于企业实施知识管理的思考

随着知识经济的到来,企业已经开始认识到他们最宝贵的资产是知识,知识不但是生产的关键要素,而且还是企业保持持续竞争优势的重要手段。目前,知识管理(KM)的应用研究集中于各种KM软件的开发与应用,陷入了以此为实现KM标志的误区,而忽略了KM中的文化因素和知识管理的理念基础,给知识管理的正确实践带来了困难。     

How knowledge management mediates the relationship between environment and organizational structure

Literature examining how knowledge management (KM) capability helps organizational structures cope with uncertainty is limited. Thus, this study builds and tests an integrated model to investigate the relationship among environmental uncertainty, KM capability, and organizational structure. Data from 161 firms were collected and analyzed. The results from structural equation model analysis support a mediating KM capability between environmental uncertainty and structural attributes. Environmental uncertainty tends to require firms to increase their KM capability, which in turn manifests itself in structural changes.     

Will enterprise social networking systems promote knowledge management and organizational learning? An empirical study

ABSTRACT

Nowadays, enterprise social media practitioners and researchers are keen to know how the enterprise usage of social media can be converted into the improved organizational performance. Meanwhile, organizational learning has long been considered as one of the measures of organizational performance. This article investigated the impact of enterprise social networking systems (ESNS) usage on knowledge management processes and organizational learning; in particular, we examined the mediating role of knowledge creation and knowledge sharing. Four theories from sociology and strategic management were used to build the hypotheses in the research model. An online survey was conducted to empirically test the model. Our study results showed that ESNS usage directly and indirectly influences organizational learning; and that knowledge management processes (knowledge creation and sharing) mediate the path between the two. This study contributes to the existing literature on enterprise social media for three reasons. First, it is among the first to connect the three independent concepts (social media, knowledge management, and organizational learning) and explore their relationships in one theoretical framework. Second, this work also specifically examines the influence of ESNS (Yammer in this case) on organizational processes and outcomes. Third, this is a pioneering study that employs multiple theories to address the research questions under the organizational social media context. Therefore, the research gives implications for both practitioners and scholars who are interested in understanding the effectiveness of ESNS usage in the modern organizations today.     

Ambidexterity and the evolution of knowledge management initiatives

Current debates on organizational learning distinguish two distinct and mutually exclusive learning modes: exploration and exploitation. The paper deals with the concept of ambidextrous routines in knowledge management (KM) initiatives. The case study-based findings put this understanding into perspective, as the authors have identified KM initiatives that concurrently facilitate exploration and exploitation. The paper elaborates the characteristics of ambidextrous KM initiatives at micro-level; firms use ambidextrous KM practices to create a learning context, defined rather by guidelines and methods than by a definite purpose. The clear separation of KM initiatives' purpose (aim) and their embedded learning routines and methods enables them to be used ambidextrously. Furthermore, this analysis indicates that ambidextrous KM initiatives follow a path characterized by an increasing variety of purposes but a decreasing variety of underlying structures. Consequently, firms create a learning context that can be activated when necessary in ways required either in an exploratory and/or in an exploitative mode.     

Developing learning capabilities through a quality management program

This study examines the development of learning capabilities through the implementation of a quality management program in services, based on a case study of transplantation management. The findings show how the introduction of an online system, based on a quality management program, underpinned the knowledge-building capacity of the organization. The results contribute to service literature by addressing how a quality management program links to organizational learning process directly and through building-up organizational knowledge. The implementation of a quality management program allows knowledge building through identification and socialization of tacit knowledge and combination of explicit knowledge. The development of learning capabilities fostered by the introduction of this program occurs under conditions that contribute to the building-up of organizational knowledge. Organizational learning is enhanced during this implementation through an incremental process that detects errors and corrects behavior and/or alters organizations premises, standards and values. This organizational learning helps to upgrade the overall process.     

以知识创新提升企业知识管理的实施效果

随着知识经济的来临,知识正取代劳动力和资本而上升为企业的核心生产资料,KM逐渐成为企业提升其新型核心竞争力的有力途径。因此,能否正确理解KM中知识创新的内涵、地位与机理,并对企业知识创新系统性能进行有效评估,直接影响着企业KM实施的效率和有效性。     

Social Media in Organizations: Leveraging Personal and Collective Knowledge Processes

By using social media, many companies try to exploit new forms of interaction, collaboration, and knowledge sharing through leveraging the social, collaborative dimension of social software. The traditional collective knowledge management model based on a top-down approach is now opening up new avenues for a bottom-up approach incorporating a more personal knowledge management dimension, which could be synergized into collective knowledge using the social-collaborative dimension of social media. This article addresses the following questions: (1) How can social media support the management of personal and collective knowledge using a synergetic approach? (2) Do the personal and collective dimensions compete with each other, or can they reinforce each other in a more effective manner using social media?

Our findings indicate that social media supports both the personal and collective dimensions of knowledge, while integrating a social collaborative dimension. The article introduces a framework that classifies social software into four categories according to the level of interaction and control. With certain tools, individuals are more in control. With other tools, the group is in control, resulting in a higher level of interaction and a diversity of knowledge and mindsets brought together. However, deploying and adopting these new tools in an organizational context is still a challenging task for management, owing to both organizational and individual factors.     

Managing knowledge work in Asia Pacific contexts: case studies of Hong Kong SMEs

This study explores how knowledge creation and sharing practices are fostered in a sample of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Hong Kong. Our analysis indicates that three types of managerial interventions – initiating intervention, reinforcing intervention and aligning intervention – are particularly useful to promote knowledge management activities among employees. Such findings provide insights into researchers and managers on the important role of managerial interventions in knowledge management (KM) as well as the idiosyncrasies of KM in SMEs in Chinese societies.     

从知识共享到知识和谐:一种知识管理观念

知识共享是知识管理的重要内容,强调将个人知识转化为组织知识,但知识共享存在悖论.文章提出规避知识共享悖论的一种全新理念--知识和谐.在分析组织知识和谐的理论特征和理论价值的基础上,指出组织知识和谐的实现途径,并围绕组织和个人两级主体,阐述了知识和谐的六种功能,给出知识和谐管理的基本框架.     

Knowledge-oriented leadership and open innovation: Role of knowledge management capability in France-based multinationals

This paper discusses the links between knowledge-oriented leadership, open innovation and knowledge management in the international business context. Open innovation has become crucial for an increasing number of multinational enterprises (MNEs) to gain and maintain competitive advantage and become a market leader. Despite the recent proliferation of papers dealing with open innovation practices of MNEs, there is limited work investigating the role of knowledge management (KM) capability on the relationship between knowledge-oriented leadership and open innovation. Given MNEs’ growing interest in open innovation, the lack of research on knowledge-oriented leadership and KM capability in the open innovation context is a significant research gap in our knowledge. In response, we conducted a study on the mediating role of KM capability in the linkage between knowledge-oriented leadership and open innovation (inbound and outbound), using data collected from 172 subsidiaries of MNEs based in France. A structural equation modelling approach is employed to study the impact of the latent variables associated with knowledge-oriented leadership and KM capability on open innovation. The results indicate that higher levels of knowledge-oriented leadership can lead to enhanced KM capability and improved open innovation outcomes. That is, knowledge-oriented leadership has a direct, positive impact on KM capability and open innovation. Also, KM capability is found to mediate the linkage between knowledge-oriented leadership and open innovation. This study provides useful insights for managers who wish to enhance open innovation activities in MNEs, and offers useful guidance to international business scholars, encouraging further research in this area.     

Linking organizational culture, structure, strategy, and organizational effectiveness: Mediating role of knowledge management

Practices of knowledge management are context-specific and they can influence organizational effectiveness. This study examines the possible mediating role of knowledge management in the relationship between organizational culture, structure, strategy, and organizational effectiveness. A survey was conducted of 301 organizations. The results suggest that knowledge management fully mediates the impact of organizational culture on organizational effectiveness, and partially mediates the impact of organizational structure and strategy on organizational effectiveness. The findings carry theoretical implications for knowledge management literature as they extend the scope of research on knowledge management from examining a set of independent management practices to examining a system-wide mechanism that connects internal resources and competitive advantage.     

知识管理战略类型理论评述

知识管理战略类型理论是管理学研究的前沿领域,本文将近年来国内外知识管理战略类型的研究分为战略层、战术层和业务层三个层次,并对每个层次上具有代表性的战略类型进行了系统的阐述和评述。     

Middle managers' role in transferring person-centered management and care

This paper presents a study of the role of middle managers in the knowledge transfer related to a person-centered management and care approach at a physical rehabilitation center. This qualitative research comprises a multi-case study, representing the six middle managers of the organization studied. The main findings generated by this research indicate that despite top management's efforts to disseminate a person-centered approach throughout the organization, the knowledge transfer process mainly depends on the absorptive capacity of middle managers. When middle managers have the capacity to absorb the person-centered approach, often because it is compatible with their values and current practices, this capacity is expressed mainly through their behavioral exemplarity. The results of the study also engender an intervention model illustrating the key role of middle managers in the transfer of a person-centered management and care approach. The model includes macro- and micro-contextual elements that facilitate the transfer.