Knowledge Management Systems (KMS) Notes

What are Knowledge Management Systems (KMS)?

• Tools aimed at supporting knowledge management.
• Evolved from information management systems and CSCW tools.
• Integrate documentation, communication, and collaboration.
• References: Ganesan, Edmonds & Spector (2001); Greif (1988); Kling (1991)

Main Characteristics of KMS

• Communication among various users.
• Coordination of users’ activities.
• Collaboration on creating, modifying, and sharing artifacts.
• Control processes for integrity and tracking.

Specific Functions of KM Systems

• Communication: e-mail, discussion forums
• Coordination: shared calendars, task lists
• Collaboration: shareable workspaces and artifacts
• Control: audit trails, version control.
• Purpose: Create a culture of sharing and belonging.

Empowering Knowledge Workers

• Encourages a community culture
• Supports reciprocity and collaboration
• Enables users to create, share, and grow knowledge
• Reference: Marshall & Rossett, 2000

KMS Support for Information Functions

• Acquiring, indexing, capturing, and archiving
• Finding and accessing
• Creating and annotating
• Combining, collating, and modifying
• Tracking
• Reference: Edmonds & Pusch, 2002

Collaborative Use of KMS

• Organize shared and reusable artifacts
• Achieve specific group goals
• Address the distributed nature of work
• Reference: Salomon, 1993

Organizational Impact of KMS

• Supports organizational learning
• Ensures responsiveness and flexibility
• Designed for multi-user, dynamic environments
• References: Morecroft & Sterman, 1994; Senge, 1990

Summary of KMS Benefits

• Promotes communication, collaboration, control
• Enables organizational knowledge sharing
• Adapts to evolving business and user needs
• Statistics:
  • 54%
  • 45%

Case Studies

• British Telecommunications:
  • One of the largest telecommunications and network provider in the United Kingdom and operates in many countries around the world.
• Future Media:
  • Focused on elearning or edtech, they developed online trainings and learnings platforms and systems.
• Partnership:
  • British Telecommunications and Futuremedia ilearning developed a net-based learning and knowledge management system called Solstra 2000.

Solstra 2000

• An online learning and knowledge management system.
• Designed to help organizations train employees and manage information using the internet.

Solstra 2000 - Key Features and Purpose

1. Online Learning Platform
2. Corporate university
3. Customize structure
4. Personal homepages and knowledge sharing
5. Access for new members or employees
6. Scalability and global use
7. Custom FAQs and news alert

Examples of Knowledge Application Support Technologies

KM Organizational Architecture

• Refers to the structure or system that a company uses to manage, organize, and use its knowledge and information effectively.

KM Organizational Architecture - Layers

1. Data layer
2. Process layer
3. User interface or UI layer

Knowledge Reuse

• Reusing knowledge means remembering and applying what was learned before.
• Starts by asking the right question.
• Experts are better at than novices.
• Finding the right experts or piece of advice is found using tools like expert directories.
• Knowledge is applied, often by adapting general information to fit a specific situation, a process called recontextualization.

J.P. Morgan Chase

• J.P. Morgan Chase's LabMorgan uses special software to manage and reuse knowledge.
• Helps its employees study new business ideas by showing past feedback on similar ones.
• Saves time and avoids repeating work.
• Focused on improving how they work together, they believe sharing knowledge and working toward a common goal is the key.
• Helped by being in a flexible, innovative part of the company; changing old habits in more traditional areas might be harder.

Three Key Roles in Reusing Knowledge

1. Producer - creates or records the knowledge
2. Intermediary - organizes and prepares it for others to use
3. Reuser - finds, understands, and uses the knowledge

• People often play all three roles at different times.
• Preparing knowledge for reuse (called repackaging) can involve both technology and people.
• Tools can help sort and label information, humans are usually needed to check it and add helpful context.

Four Types of Knowledge Reuse (Markus, 2001)

1. Share Work Producers - people who create knowledge and later reuse it themselves for future tasks.
2. Shared Work Practitioners - people who reuse each other’s knowledge.
3. Expertise-Seeking Novices - beginners who seek expert knowledge to learn or solve problems.
4. Secondary-Knowledge Miners - these are people who search through existing knowledge to find useful information.

Knowledge Repositories

• Intranets or portals of some kind that serve to preserve, manage, and leverage organizational memory.
• Contain valuable content that is a mix of tacit and explicit knowledge.

Knowledge Types (Davenport, De Long, at Beers (1998))

• External Knowledge:
  • Gathered from competitive intelligence, demographic, or statistical data from data resellers and other public sources.
• Internal Knowledge:
  • Store informal information such as transcripts of group discussions, e-mails, or other forms of internal communications.
  • Less formal structure

Knowledge Types (Zack (1999))

• General Knowledge:
  • Widely understood and applicable across many situations
  • e.g., published scientific literature
• Specific Knowledge:
  • Includes knowledge of the local context of the organization

Strategic Implication of Knowledge Application

• To help employees locate and apply existing knowledge efficiently and supports answering key operational questions:

Key Operational Questions

• What have we already written or published on this topic?
• Who are the experts in this area, and how can I contact them?
• Have any of our partners, contacts, and clients addressed these issues?
• What sources did we use to prepare the publications on this topic?
• What are the best websites or internal databases to find more information?
• How can I add my own experience in applying this particular piece of knowledge?

Knowledge Repository

• Should be a one-stop shop for knowledge application.
• Employees are able to find out what they need in order to access, understand, and apply the cumulative experience and expertise of the organization

Challenges in Knowledge Reuse

• Discoverability Issues
• Format Misalignment
• Implicit Knowledge Barriers.

Practical Implications of Knowledge Application

• Establish a centralized organizational knowledge.
• Develop a corporate yellow pages.
• Capture and share best practices and lessons learned.
• Empower a Chief Knowledge Officer to develop and implement a KM strategy for the organization.

Promoting Innovation and Learning

• Foster a culture of open knowledge exchange.
• Encourage the sharing of new ideas, real-world examples, and contextual insights.

Executable Knowledge Design

• Prioritize actionable content—not just static documents, but "chunks of executable knowledge."
• Include tacit and contextual knowledge, such as:
  • “When and where it should be applied?”
  • “Why it works or doesn’t?”
  • “Ground truth”