Transcript Discussion

Harvard Business Review on
Knowledge Management
Discussion of Chapters 1- 3
MIS 580
September 27, 2005
Arab Salem
1
Contents
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The Coming of the New Organization
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
The Knowledge-Creating Company
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By Peter F. Drucker, 1988
By Ikujiro Nonaka, 1991
Building a Learning Organization
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By David A. Garvin, 1993
2
Drucker: A futurist
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"Productive work in today's society and economy is work that
applies vision, knowledge and concepts -- work that is based on
the mind rather than the hand."
Landmarks of Tomorrow - 1959
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“ … the typical business will be knowledge-based, [...] it will be
what I call an information-based organization
The Coming of the New Organization, 1988

"The most valuable assets of a 20th-century company were its
production equipment. The most valuable asset of a 21stcentury institution, whether business or nonbusiness, will be its
knowledge workers and their productivity."
Management Challenges for the 21st Century,1999
3
Drucker’s Approach

knowledge-based organization
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Knowledge workers
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No middle management
nonprofit organizations
specialists who direct and discipline their own performance
work together as a team to achieve a common goal.
Are we becoming a knowledge society?
4
Nonaka’s Approach

Knowledge Creating Company


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processing of objective information
tapping into the intuitions, insights, and hunches
of employees
Exchange
making it available for testing and
Explicit
Tacit
use in the whole organization
Two types of knowledge
New Knowledge
creation of new knowledge can occur at any
level
5
Drucker vs. Nonaka
Drucker
Nonaka
Examples
services
Manufacturing
Implementation/usage
Find people
Find knowledge objects
Knowledge Transfer
Audience targeted
Context targeted
Approach
Personalization
Codification
Training
One-to-one
Group based
Focus
Knowledge workers
Creation of Knowledge
Knowledge base
Organizational Structure
Flat
Essential role for middle
manager
Model
Export economics
Economics of reuse
6
Garvin's approach

focuses on the importance of having an
organization that learns


five activities that are the foundation for learning
organizations
opening up of boundaries across the
functional departmental boundaries to
stimulate the flow of knowledge
7
Resources

Peter F. Drucker on a Functioning Society
by Joseph A. Maciariello
Leader to Leader, No. 37 Summer 2005
http://www.pfdf.org/leaderbooks/L2L/summer2005/maciariello.html

'The nonsense of 'knowledge
management'', Information Research-An
International by Wilson, T. D.
Electronic Journal, vol. 8, no. 1. 2003
http://informationr.net/ir/8-1/paper144.html
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