Sharing Knowledge across Boundaries

Abstract

Practical solutions concerning the strategic use of knowledge and its management depend upon the relevant organizational context. By applying the ‘learning ladder’ model (i.e. a compact way of describing the unfolding of multiple organizational knowledge creation, transformation and transfer processes), three different contexts are explored. First, the single firm is considered and the governance of its internal knowledge processes performed according to the tenets of the resource-based view of strategy. Second, the boundaries of the single firm are crossed and the characteristics of the processes of knowledge transfer and production between allied firms are considered. Finally, emerging features of how knowledge is managed among a large number of interdependent organizations and individuals are explored with reference to the case of open source software. The latter context highlights behaviours that seem, in a sense, at odds with the traditional principles of knowledge management. This is puzzling: conventional strategic and knowledge management frameworks break down precisely when dealing with the case of highly distributed, knowledge intensive businesses.