Strategies%20for%20managing%20information%20and%20knowledge%20in%20e-business

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• Chapter 8
• Strategies for managing information and knowledge
  in e-business
• Paula Goulding

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Introduction

• Across all industries, information and the
  technology that delivers it have become critical,
  strategic assets for business firms and their
  managers.
• (Laudon Laudon 2000)

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Why worry about information and knowledge?

• Because of integrative role of information
• how to manage people / info / IT / processes /
  structures to implement strategies and achieve
  desired results for organisation

Use of the information resource
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Why worry about information and knowledge?

• Because of the need to understand own requirements

• Roles
• Responsibilities
• Accountabilities
• Types of decisions
• Actions
• Relationships

What do these imply about need for information
/ knowledge?
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Why worry about information and knowledge?

• Adopt holistic perspective and critical eye
• do not have specialist knowledge of IT
  professional, but
• can discern where IT can/should be deployed to
  enable appropriate use of information by people
  in organisation
• must balance
• opportunities / risks / opportunity costs of IT
  investments against
• capabilities of people in business to use
  information to run organisation and improve
  business performance

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Why do managers need to take responsibility?

• Need to understand organisational approach to
  information / knowledge management
• How organisation collects, stores, manages,
  disseminates information / knowledge

What information managers need to receive
pass on?
What managers need to KNOW
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What is data, information, knowledge?

• Data
• Meaningless points in time and space
• Out of context

100
5
principal
interest
interest rate
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What is data, information, knowledge?

• Information
• An artefact, a way of describing the
  significance for some agents of intrinsically
  meaningless events
• (Dretske 1981)
• information is data recorded, classified,
  organised, related or interpreted within context
  to convey meaning
• (Blumenthal 1969)

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What is data, information, knowledge?

• That collection of data which when presented in
  a meaningful manner and at an appropriate time
  improves the knowledge of the person receiving it
  in such a way that he/she is better able to
  undertake a necessary activity or make a
  necessary decision
• (Galliers 1987)

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What is data, information, knowledge?

• It is worth remembering for our purposes
• that
• Information cannot exist independently of the
  receiving person who gives it meaning and somehow
  acts upon it
• (Liebenau Backhouse 1990)

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Information
Principal 100 Interest rate 5 Interest in 1
year 5
Open bank account

• Pieces of data may represent information
• Depends on understanding of person receiving
  data

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Knowledge

• Patterns that emerge from data and information
• Receiver recognises and understands patterns and
  their implications
• Derived from individuals transforming data and
  information in a processing hierarchy that
  enables action
• (Wilson 1996)

Interest Principal x Interest rate Principal1
Interest1 Principal2 P2 I2 P3
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Knowledge

• a fluid mix of framed experience, values,
  contextual information, and expert insight that
  provides a framework for evaluating and
  incorporating new experiences and information.
  It originates and is applied in the minds of the
  knowers. In organizations, it often becomes
  embedded not only in documents or repositories
  but also in organizational routines, processes,
  practices and norms
• (Davenport Prusak 1998)

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Knowledge

• Demonstrated through recognition and
  understanding of patterns, similarities and their
  implications
• Blend of
• personal experience and expertise
• values and constructs used to interpret the world
• information and context to generate new insights,
  understanding, and know-how

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Knowledge management

• Concerned with capturing, storing, manipulating
  data and information to enhance a managers
  ability to gain insights, understand patterns,
  trends and relationships
• Aid to decision making and control activities
• Helps to envisage and predict the future
• Relies on interaction between relevant
  information and an experienced person in given
  context for new knowledge to be generated

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Why focus on knowledge management?

• Knowledge-based industries are becoming leading
  industries

2000s Software/hardware Telecommunications Media
/ publishing / film and television Pharmaceuticals
Finance/stockbroking Some retailing
1900s Steel Oil / gas Coal Some manufacturing
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Issues and challenges in knowledge management

• Need to understand core knowledge processes in
  organisations
• Identification
• Acquisition
• Development
• Sharing distribution
• Utilisation
• Retention
• Strategies developed for KM need to take account
  of organisational culture and context, reliance
  on information, existing and required knowledge
  processes

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Developing K M strategies

• If knowledge is essential to ability of
  organisation to innovate, compete and deliver
  value to customers, then developing strategies
  for exploiting knowledge assets is important.
• Relationship between organisational strategy and
  the use of knowledge and intellectual assets
  knowledge management strategy
• Decision made about mix of strategy, business
  processes, products and services, technology and
  people that it exploits to compete, influences
  the types of knowledge resources an organisation
  requires
• Closing gap between what resources an
  organisation has, and what it requires is vital
  in articulating a KM strategy

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Systems school

• Capture specialist knowledge in knowledge-bases
• Other experts have access
• Individual / group-held knowledge made more
  widely available
• Tends to be domain specific
• Codification of technical know-how (data
  expertise) to those qualified to use it

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Systems school

• Reward systems must recognise knowledge creation
  and contribution
• Only feasible because of IT
• IS capture / store / organise / display knowledge
  
• Knowledge is explicated, codified, stored in
  repository

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Cartographic school

• Mapping organisational knowledge
• Record and disclose who knows what
• people finder database
• Aims to ensure knowledgeable people are
  accessible to others for consultation, advice,
  knowledge exchange
• Gateways to knowledge
• Tacit and explicit
• Exchange may be through conversation and contact

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Cartographic school

• Rewards based on exchange of knowledge
• Requires
• Communications network
• Culture of support and knowledge sharing
• Role of IT
• Connect people via intranets
• Locate knowledge sources and providers via
  intranet / extranet / Internet

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Process school

• Performance of key business processes is enhanced
  by supporting operating personnel with
  information and knowledge
• Emphasizes knowledge re-use, transfer, best
  practice
• Knowledge (expertise, experience, learning) and
  information (intelligence, feedback, data
  analysis) provided via IS/IT to staff
• Supply and distribution of knowledge is not
  limited
• Aims to enhance core capabilities with knowledge
  flows

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Organisational school

• Use of networks to share and pool knowledge
• Knowledge communities
• Groups of people with common interests, problems,
  experiences
• Inter or intra-organisational
• Codified and personalised knowledge exchanges

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Organisational school

• Require a human hub?
• More successful where culture supports
  sociability and networking
• Knowledge communities are as much social networks
  as IT-enabled communities

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Selecting an approach to K M

• Requires clear understanding of the knowledge
  requirements of proposed business strategy
• A clear articulation of contribution of
  knowledge-based performance and innovation
• Audit of organisations existing capability and
  gaps or weaknesses
• Gaps imply need for access to certain knowledge
  capital and capabilities

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Developing KM Strategies

• Codified or Personalised Approach?
• Standardised or customised products/services?
• Mature or innovative product/service?
• Staff rely on explicit or tacit knowledge to
  solve problems?
• Balance between technology people is dependent
  on organisations competitive strategy
• Successful implementation of KM strategy will
  need to recognise role of humans in knowledge
  creation and use, appropriate reward mechanisms,
  and creation of culture of knowledge sharing

(Hansen et al. 1999)
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Becoming a knowledge-based organisation

• Success factors
• Corporate culture that recognises role of
  knowledge and intellectual propriety in success
  of organisation
• Creation, exchange and utilisation of knowledge
  are valued and respected
• Attention paid to attitudes and structures that
  support building of knowledge culture
• KM regarded as on-going strategic initiative
• Becomes invisible as absorbed into everyday
  routines and behaviours

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Benefits of developing a knowledge culture

• Developing knowledge assets are fundamental to
• Innovation
• Delivering value to customers
• Quality assurance
• All these contribute directly to organisations
  profitability and long-term viability
• Ability to combine and renew intellectual and
  physical assets that drives innovation and
  creates dynamic capabilities, crucial for
  sustainable competitive advantage