knowledge management creation
- 2. Tacit Knowledge Capture • Major approaches to knowledge acquisition from individuals and groups: – 1. Interviewing experts. – 2. Stories. – Or combinations!!!
- 3. Tacit Knowledge Capture …cont’d • The major tasks carried out by knowledge engineers in capturing tacit knowledge: – Analyzing information and knowledge flow. – Working with experts to obtain information. – designing and implementing a knowledge management system or knowledge repository
- 4. Tacit Knowledge Capture …cont’d On the other side are the subject matter experts, and they had to be able to: – Explain important knowledge and know-how. – Be introspective and patient. – Have effective communication skills.
- 5. Tacit Knowledge Capture …cont’d • Multiple experts are often participants in knowledge engineering sessions – cover the range of expertise they represented, – validate the content, – provide different perspective, etc. • Group knowledge acquisition techniques can also be adopted - for knowledge acquisition at the community of practice level
- 6. Interviewing Experts • To render key tacit knowledge of an individual into more explicit forms. – Structured interviewing of subject matter experts is the most often used technique • In many organizations, structured interviewing is performed through exit interviews - held with knowledgeable staff near retirement age. • Content management systems are well suited to publishing their lessons learned and best practices accumulated over their years of experience at the organization.
- 7. Interviewing experts …cont’d • Structured interviewing techniques require – strong communication and conceptualization skills. – a good grasp of the subject matter at hand. • Structured interviewing yield specific data that is often declarative in response to focused questions. • Structured interviews may also be used to clarify or refine knowledge originally elicited during unstructured interactions.
- 8. Two types of structured interview • Open ended – How does that work?” – “What do you need to know before you decide?” – “Why did you choose this one rather than that one?” – “What do you know about . . .”? – “How could . . . be improved?” – “What is your general reaction to . . . ?” • Closed
- 9. Reflective listening • Four major techniques used in reflective listening include – paraphrasing, – clarifying, – summarizing, and – reflecting feelings.
- 10. Paraphrasing • Paraphrasing – the restating of the perceived meaning of the speaker’s message but using your own words. – the goal is to check the accuracy with which the message was conveyed and understood. • Examples of paraphrasing – “What I believe you said was . . .” – “If I am wrong, please correct me but I understood you to say . . .” – “In other words, . . .” – “As I think I understand it . . .”
- 11. Clarifying • Clarifying – lets the expert know that the message was not immediately understandable. – responses encourage the expert to elaborate or clarify the original message so that the interviewer gets a better idea of the intended message. – The interviewer should focus on the content not on the expert’s ability to communicate, – the expert should be encouraged to elaborate or explain by using open questions wherever possible
- 12. Summarizing • Summarizing – helps the interviewer compile discrete pieces of information – Helps to form a knowledge acquisition session into a meaningful whole. – It helps to confirm that the expert’s message was heard and understood correctly. The summary should be expressed in the words of the interviewer.
- 13. Examples • Example of clarifying – “I don’t understand . . .” – “Could you please explain . . .” – “Please repeat that last part again . . .” – “Could you give me an example of that . . .” • Example of summarizing – “To sum up what you have been saying . . .” – “What I have heard you say so far . . .” – “I believe that we are in agreement that . . .”
- 14. Reflecting feelings • Mirrors back to the speaker the feelings that seem to have been communicated. • The main focus is on emotions, attitudes, and reactions, and not on the content itself. • The purpose is to clear the air of some emotional reaction or negative impact of the message.
- 15. Reflecting feelings • Some examples are: – “You seem frustrated about . . .” – “You seem to feel that you were put on the spot . . .” – “I sense that you are uncomfortable with . . .”
- 16. Transcription of interviews • Transcripts of interviews are analyzed in order to identify key concepts, common themes, and major methods or techniques that were mentioned. – If multiple experts were interviewed for the same procedure or subject, then conflict resolution might be needed. • Usually, each individual will be interviewed more than once so that interviewers can validate their understanding of the knowledge that has been elicited, – Each interview will raise additional questions, whether these are aimed at clarifying, correcting, or expanding upon critical elements. • Subsequent interviews are more focused and target a more detailed level.
- 17. Stories • Stories are another excellent vehicle for both capturing and coding tacit knowledge. • An organizational story is a detailed narrative of management actions, employee interactions, and other intra organizational events that are communicated informally within the organization. • A story can be defined as the telling of a happening or a connected series of happenings, • An organizational story can be defined as a detailed narrative of – past management actions, – employee interactions, – or other key events that have occurred and that have been communicated informally
- 18. Stories …cont’d • Conveying information in a story provides a rich context, • It causing the story to remain in the conscious memory longer and creating more memory traces than is possible with information not in context. • Stories can greatly increase organizational learning, communicate common values and rule sets, and serve as an excellent vehicle for capturing, coding, and transmitting valuable tacit knowledge.
- 19. Stories …cont’d • Stories need to evoke some type of response, – the moral of the story – The organizational lesson to be learned should be easily understood, remembered, and acted upon. • Organizational stories should have an impact. • Stories should prevent similar mistakes from being repeated, or they should promote organizational learning and adoption of best practices stemming from the collective organizational memory.
- 20. • Key elements required to use stories to encapsulate valuable knowledge – The story should spring the listener to a new level of understanding; – The story should have a happy ending – The story must be brief and detailed – Listeners should be encouraged – True is better than invented
- 21. Other methods of tacit knowledge capture • Learning by doing • Learning by observations • Ad hoc sessions. • Action learning. • E-learning. • Learning from others through business guest speakers and benchmarking
- 22. Tacit knowledge capture at organizational level • Organizational knowledge acquisition is a qualitatively different process from that which occurs at individual and group levels. • At the group level we are primarily concerned with identifying and coding valuable knowledge, which is mostly tacit in nature, • organizational knowledge capture takes place on a more macro level.
- 23. Tacit knowledge capture …….. • Malhotra (2000) proposed and outlined an approach for knowledge capture at organizational level. • Four major organizational knowledge acquisition processes: – (1) grafting, – (2) vicarious learning, – (3) experiential learning, and – (4) inferential processes.
- 24. Grafting • Involves the migration of knowledge between firms. • It is a learning process whereby the firm gains access to task- or process-specific knowledge that was not previously available within the firm. • Typically achieved through mergers, acquisitions, or alliances in that there is a direct passing of knowledge between firms – An example would be technology transfer or other forms of explicit knowledge.
- 25. Vicarious learning • Vicarious indirect, mediated, remote • processes occur through one firm observing other firms’ demonstrations of techniques or procedures. – Examples are benchmarking studies where companies can adopt the best practices of other industry leaders. • This knowledge is more tacit than that obtained through grafting as it involves learning how to do something or know-how.
- 26. Experiential Learning • Experiential knowledge acquisition involves knowledge acquisition within a given firm—that is, knowledge created by doing and practicing. • Repetition based experience relies on the learning curve to establish routines and procedures. • This type of knowledge is initially tacit but can be easily codified and transferred • Authors also refer to the processes of single- and double-loop learning. – Single-loop learning involves the refinement and improvement of existing procedures and technologies as opposed to developing new ones (adaptivity for efficiency).
- 27. Inferential Processes • Learning is within the firm and occurs by doing. • Knowledge acquisition occurs primarily through interpretation of events, states, changes, and outcomes relative to the activities undertaken and decisions made. • Learning is experimental, deductive learning that seeks to make sense of occurrences and to establish causal links between actions and outcomes. • This type of learning is sometimes called double-loop learning because it involves changing underlying assumptions and frameworks (adaptivity for effectiveness).
- 28. Tacit knowledge capture …….. • The results of all four types of organizational knowledge capture – will ultimately reside in some type of knowledge repository. – is the recipient of organizational memory, and containers are usually some form of database on an intranet or extranet. – Once the capture of such knowledge ocurres – we can proceed more directly to the codification of this content.
- 29. knowledge codification • Knowledge codification is the next stage of leverageing knowledge. • Codification – organization, collection, arrangement; – the creation of content categories; – Organization of knowledge and making it external • A formalized procedure is required for the receipt and codification of individual and group innovations.
- 30. Knowledge Codification …. • converting knowledge into a tangible, explicit form such as a document, • Knowledge can be communicated much more widely and with less cost. • Documents can be disseminated widely over a corporate intranet, which makes them available for reference as and when they are needed, both by existing and by future staff. • There are, of course, costs and difficulties associated with knowledge codification. • The first issue is that of quality, which encompasses – (1) accuracy, (2) readability/understandability, – (3) accessibility, (4) currency, and (5) authority/ credibility.
- 31. Knowledge Codification …. • Knowledge must be codified in order to be understood, maintained, and improved upon as part of corporate memory.