Knowledge Management In Networks Research Articles

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Structure and Dynamics of a “T-Shaped” Knowledge: From Individuals to Cooperating Communities of Practice

In a fast-changing environment, organizations face conditions of growing complexity that challenge decision-making and innovation activities, highlighting an increasing need to develop dynamic capabilities. In this scenario, our focus is on service science's recent call for “T-shaped professionals,” identified as people possessing both functional/disciplinary expertise and ability to apply knowledge across different contexts. Starting from this notion and by adopting a viable systems approach (vSa), we shift focus from individuals to organizations, providing an interpretation of the structure and dynamics of a “T-shaped knowledge” to be developed with respect to a distributed knowledge management network in which organizations pursue learning-by-interaction and knowledge cocreation.By integrating the vSa and the distributed knowledge management framework (DKMF), our proposal provides a multidimensional vSa-DKMF metamodel to assess the relational conditions among cooperating organizations as well as to provide guidelines for the construction of a knowledge network built on the idea of T-shaped knowledge. To illustrate the practical aspects of vSa-DKMF, we focus on the case of open communities of practice as an emblematic example of developing a T-shaped knowledge starting from a specialized (“I-shaped”) knowledge.

Use of social network analysis tools to validate a resources infrastructure for interinstitutional translational research: a case study

How can knowledge management and innovative technology, cornerstones of library practice, be leveraged to validate the progress of Clinical and Translational Science Awards? The Indiana Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute (Indiana CTSI) promotes interdisciplinary research across academic institutions. Using social networking tools and knowledge management skills enabled the department of knowledge informatics and translation to create a visualization of utilization of resources across different Indiana CTSI programs and coauthorship and citation patterns. Contacts with different resources per investigator increased; every targeted program was shown to be linked to another. Analysis of publications established a baseline to further analyze the scientific contribution of Indiana CTSI projects. Knowledge management and social networking utilities validated the efficacy of the Indiana CTSI resources infrastructure and demonstrated visualization of collaboration. The bibliometric analysis of publications provides a basis for assessing longer-term contributions of support to scientific discovery and transdisciplinary science.

Transforming knowledge workers into innovation workers to improve corporate productivity

This paper deals with the productivity improvement of knowledge work. The productivity of knowledge work is improved through innovations with knowledge creation. The author points out that knowledge is created through the knowledge worker’s mental activity involving the interaction of three important factors, i.e., information, knowledge and insight. Knowledge workers can augment their capability to exploit knowledge and information through their personal learning efforts and/or through access to appropriate external knowledge and information sources. Although importance of sharing information and knowledge has been widely discussed in earlier studies for knowledge management and social networking services, there were only few discussions on the importance of the third factor, insight. The author discusses that insight is the key for knowledge creation and it has a special nature different from the other two: it cannot be acquired through learning, but can become usable by activating undeveloped portions of native capabilities. Only knowledge workers who have good insight have the awareness to realize innovations necessary in business. These people are newly defined as Innovation Workers. In order to substitute for inefficient conventional on-the-job trainings to nurture innovation workers, a Timed-PDCA concept is proposed in this paper. The use of the Timed-PDCA concept makes it possible to visualize the progressive status of knowledge work as well as on-going thoughts of workers, and also periodically to enforce the worker for seriously evaluating the current situation and revising the action plan towards the final goal. Repeating such a process helps cultivate undeveloped portions of native capabilities of the worker. Visualization of work progress and worker’s thoughts enable supervisors to coach workers in a timely and appropriate manner. Thus, use of the Timed-PDCA concept makes it possible to pursue productivity improvement in the current works including nurturing innovation workers concurrently. Although its application can be usefully made on any knowledge works to be managed on the time axis, managing the business-to-business sales process was chosen as the first concrete application. The paper introduces the development details of the system and its managerial effects after deployment.

The Total Entropy Model of Fractal Supply Chain Network System

It is pointed out that the entropies of structure, information and the effectiveness entropy between knowledge and organization structure are main entropy sources of supply chain network in this paper. Firstly, establish entropy model of fractal supply chain network organization structure. Secondly, fractal knowledge management network outside independently organization structure is set up. Moreover, knowledge and organization structure to have the whole similarity, and its entropy model is established. Furthermore, the effectiveness entropy model is builded. Finally, the entropies of structure, information and the effectiveness entropy are summed to research. And the model shows that fractal structure has prominent effect of dropping entropy.

Network closure's impact on firms’ competitive advantage: The mediating roles of knowledge processes

This study draws on the knowledge management and social network disciplines to examine the effect of network closure on organizations' competitive advantage. We hypothesize that the level of network closure affects an organization's capability of knowledge identification, knowledge transfer, knowledge protection and knowledge institutionalization; these capabilities in turn affect an organization's competitive advantage. Thus, we model network closure as indirectly affecting an organization's competitive advantage. A Partial Least Square (PLS) analysis of the survey data of 78 Chinese petrochemical firms shows that network closure can both enhance and decrease an organization's competitive advantage. Network closure enhances an organization's competitive advantage by facilitating knowledge protection and transfer (via institutionalization), but decreases competitive advantage by hindering knowledge identification. Environmental dynamics that the organizations encounter are observed to moderate the effect of network closure. Combining our results with the findings from the literature, we propose that organizations operating in a dynamic environment, where the domain knowledge is in a state of flux, need to place great importance on knowledge identification; such organizations should choose a sparse network that allows them to receive diverse knowledge. In contrast, organizations operating in a stable environment should opt for a dense network to protect their knowledge and facilitate transfer of required knowledge.

Who exactly is the moderator? A consideration of online knowledge management network moderation in educational organisations

In the knowledge society, the appearance and development of new networked working and learning environments is increasingly common. In the Accelera project, which is the basis for this paper, we have developed an online community of practice which enables experiences and knowledge to be shared between various educational agents, and analysis of the processes generated, in order to produce and validate a model for the networked creation and management of knowledge.One of the key elements in the networked Knowledge Creation and Management model considered in this article is the moderator. We discuss their skills, the role they play in knowledge networks, the moderation and participation criteria they should follow, and their professional development and the training required to work well as a moderator. Findings indicate that a consideration of the moderator’s inherent objectives in online environments and the tasks derived from these objectives leads to the acquisition and development of administrative and technical (organisational) knowledge and competences as well as other more complex knowledge and competences related to pedagogical, intellectual and social factors, without ignoring the need for them to understand and be familiar with the workings of CSCL where they will intervene.

The Entropy Model of Fractal Supply Chain Network System Based on Fuzzy AHP

The entropies of structure, information and the effectiveness entropy between knowledge and organization structure are main entropy sources of supply chain network. Entropy model of fractal supply chain network organization structure is established. Moreover, the basic principle and process of fuzzy AHP are introduced. Fractal knowledge management network outside independently organization structure is set up based on fuzzy AHP. Knowledge and organization structure have the whole similarity, and its entropy model is established. Finally, the entropies of structure, information and the effectiveness entropy are summed to research. And the model shows that fractal structure has prominent effect of dropping entropy.

The Total Entropy Model of Fractal Supply Chain Network System

The entropies of structure, information and the effectiveness entropy between knowledge and organization structure are main entropy sources of supply chain network. Entropy model of fractal supply chain network organization structure is established. Fractal knowledge management network outside independently organization structure is built. Finally, the entropies of structure, information and the effectiveness entropy are summed. The model shows that fractal structure has prominent effect of dropping entropy.

Special corner: Visual Categorization and Image Management Systems

This special corner consists of three selected papers that were presented at the Visual Categorisation and Image Management Systems (VCIMS) workshop organised by V. Bonnardel, M. Oakes and J. Tait and sponsored by the Multimedia Knowledge Management Network chaired by S. Rueger that took place at the University of Sunderland on the 18 June 2006. The VCIMS workshop offered the opportunity to bring together Cognitive Psychologists, Visual Neuroscientists, Information Retrieval scientists to promote integration from interdisciplinary approaches on visual categorisation in natural and artificial systems. Categorization is the ability to determine that an entity belongs to a particular group of objects and by this mean to recognize, differentiate and understand objects. Objects are classified in function of attributes defining their category memberships. There are different theoretical views that specify the nature of category-relevant attributes and the strategy in distinguishing between exemplars and nonexemplars of a given category. In the classical view, categories are mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive discrete entities. They are characterized by a list of necessary and sufficient attributes, so that any object belongs univocally to one and only one category. More recent theories, such as prototype theory, acknowledge that natural categories are graded and that some members of the category, based on their properties, are more central than others. For these theories it is essential to evaluate the relative relevance of the different properties. Hammer, Hertz, Hochstein and Weinshall propose a novel approach to determine the ‘dimension weighting’ (property relevance) in category learning. In their approach, learning strategies are based on a restriction indicating whether two exemplars belong (positive equivalence constraint, PEC) or not (negative equivalence constraint, NEC) to the same category. PEC differs from NEC on several aspects. PEC specifies within-category variations whereas NEC specifies between-category variations, and if NEC are more common than PEC (i.e., number of pair comparisons from between category objects is larger than that from within category objects) they are less informative. Indeed, if two objects are from the same category, it can be deduced that at least some of the shared dimensions are relevant to that category and all non-shared dimensions are irrelevant, but if two objects from different categories differ by more than one dimension, it is impossible to know which of these dimensions is relevant for discriminating between categories. Probably because of this difference in the amount of information, performances in a categorization task are better in PEC condition. When the amount of information is made equal in the PEC and NEC conditions, participants are divided in two groups: those who used the NEC strategy successfully and those who do not. These individual differences highlight fundamental distinctions between the two strategies. PEC is used more intuitively but not perfectly while NEC is potentially more accurate but not implemented by all participants. Interestingly, a similar asymmetry is observed in machine-learning where NEC is V. Bonnardel (&) Department of Psychology, University of Winchester, Winchester, UK e-mail: valerie.bonnardel@winchester.ac.uk

Ontology-based Collaborative Inter-organizational Knowledge Management Network

An international association advancing the multidisciplinary study of informing systems. Founded in 1998, the Informing Science Institute (ISI) is a global community of academics shaping the future of informing science.

Evidence-Based Knowledge Management: an approach to effectively promote good health-care decision-making in the Information Era

The sharing of information and the growth of knowledge together represent a foundation for the promotion of quality improvement of health care systems. This paper concerns knowledge, not only from an epistemological point of view, but also from a pragmatic one. In our paper, knowledge is discussed as the hub to promote better decision making and continuous professional development. Effective thinking is particularly needed. The critical point is to think about how health care systems can develop both an effective knowledge management network and how health-care organizations can actually be based on it. In this way, knowledge and knowledge hierarchy are defined according to Russel Achkoff's vision. Generally, knowledge is crucial in decision-making, and Evidence-Based Medicine has its roots in knowledge. In particular, information management is the basis for a significant production of knowledge to promote good health-care decision-making. Thus, relationships between knowledge management and Evidence-Based Medicine are discussed, and a new paradigm is proposed: the Evidence-Based Knowledge Management. Finally, the role of Evidence-Based Knowledge Management within Clinical Governance is discussed together with some considerations about clinical governance implementation problems in Italy.

Social Networking: An Opportunity for Health and Social Care?

Following on from previous articles which looked at knowledge management and electronic networking, this article looks at social networking as a further opportunity for health and social care to make use of the expertise of the workforce.

Data, information and knowledge in regional innovation networks

PurposeThe purpose of this article is to investigate data, information and knowledge in regional innovation networks. Emphasis has been put recently on regional innovation systems, where various actors are involved in innovative processes. The article responds to the need to study matters related to knowledge management and information quality in such environments.Design/methodology/approachRegional innovation networks and data, information and knowledge as well as research on them are discussed at a theoretical level. An existing innovation network of the Lahti region, Finland, was utilised as a pilot environment when building the knowledge management framework that is introduced. The framework is based on established knowledge management literature and practice.FindingsThe results confirm that the aspects of data, information and knowledge need to be addressed systematically in regional innovation networks. They are intertwined with knowledge management and network management. The knowledge management framework introduced incorporates, apart from information quality considerations, future‐oriented self‐transcending knowledge as well as knowledge vision and knowledge assets. Considerations of absorptive capacity and information brokerage in the regional knowledge environment are emphasised.Research limitations/implicationsThe limitations of the framework will be assessed in future studies. This will also improve understanding of practical implications. Research implications are related to data, information and knowledge quality – as well as absorptive capacity between the two subsystems of the regional innovation system.Originality/valueThe article combines in a novel way research fields that have previously barely been combined – information quality, knowledge management and regional innovation networks. It provides new insights into a societally important theme and shows possible avenues of further research.

Web-Based Enterprise Knowledge Management for Product Life-Cycle

Currently, Internet/Intranet-based enterprise knowledge management for product life-cycle plays a very important role. For modern enterprises, knowledge management is applied to enhance the core power of competition and development. The internet/intranet-based enterprise knowledge management will be helpful to all the stages of the whole product life-cycle, including the excavation of knowledge, verification flow, knowledge sharing and innovation, coding management technology, knowledge attribute view and application knowledge-unit technology etc. This paper mainly discusses how to implement overall structure of networked knowledge management, construction, key technology specification and practical application of enterprises.

Brave New Workplace: How Individual Contracts are Changing Our Jobs

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to bridge the knowledge management (KM) and strategic business network literatures from the viewpoint of SMEs.Design/methodology/approachThis paper presents a typology of KM and strategic business networks; thus the paper is based on a literature review and analysis.FindingsThe paper provides a typology of the strategic SME network types and their key KM challenges based on a synthesis of existing literature.Research limitations/implicationsIt is suggested that longitudinal case studies of KM practices in strategic SME networks should be conducted. An empirical multi‐case study has already been started.Originality/valueThe presented SME network typology can benefit SME managers facing networking and KM challenges. Besides, it is suggested that a common strategy should be developed for all types of networks to enable the creation of knowledge‐based competencies and capabilities.

Knowledge management in different types of strategic SME networks

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to bridge the knowledge management (KM) and strategic business network literatures from the viewpoint of SMEs.Design/methodology/approachThis paper presents a typology of KM and strategic business networks; thus the paper is based on a literature review and analysis.FindingsThe paper provides a typology of the strategic SME network types and their key KM challenges based on a synthesis of existing literature.Research limitations/implicationsIt is suggested that longitudinal case studies of KM practices in strategic SME networks should be conducted. An empirical multi‐case study has already been started.Originality/valueThe presented SME network typology can benefit SME managers facing networking and KM challenges. Besides, it is suggested that a common strategy should be developed for all types of networks to enable the creation of knowledge‐based competencies and capabilities.

Being a librarian: metadata and metadata specialists in the twenty‐first century

PurposeThis paper aims to forecast the changing roles of librarians – especially catalogers and metadata specialists – in today's technology‐driven research, teaching, and learning environments, in which information seekers behave more and more self‐sufficiently and move well beyond library collections in their pursuit of information.Design/methodology/approachPlaces the roles of librarians and library collections in the larger context of knowledge management and campus information network processes, which occur in every knowledge community, with or without a library. Explores and provides examples of how knowledge creators can collaborate with information technology experts and librarians to transform how faculty members teach and conduct research; how students learn; and how libraries support these activities.FindingsLibrarians need to make their collections and services much more visible through human and technological interconnections and greatly improved delivery of information content. Metadata and metadata specialists are strategic assets for libraries, but the service model for cataloging faces critical challenges. Two tables list these challenges and the implications for metadata specialists.Originality/valueOffers new observations and insights into how librarians can continue to contribute to saving information seekers' time and advancing the state of knowledge in the increasingly interconnected world of the web. Drawing from the larger context of the global infosphere, information‐seeking behavior, and changing roles for library collections and information systems, forecasts the role of metadata and metadata specialists in libraries.

RELAÇÕES INTERORGANIZACIONAIS E COMPLEMENTARIDADE DE CONHECIMENTOS: PROPOSIÇÃO DE UM ESQUEMA CONCEITUAL

RESUMO O presente artigo aborda o tema sobre a complementaridade de conhecimentos entre Pequenas e Médias Empresas (PME) em um contexto em rede. Com base na revisão analítica das teorias de redes interorganizacionais, buscou-se a compreensão da relevância estratégica das redes na complementaridade de conhecimentos entre as empresas. Para aprofundar tal problemática, o artigo teve como objetivo geral a proposição de um esquema conceitual com a finalidade de auxiliar na compreensão da dinâmica de complementaridade de conhecimentos em um contexto das redes. A pesquisa empírica foi conduzida por meio de entrevistas com os dirigentes de empresas e instituições localizadas na Agivest (Brasil), na Tecnópole do Futuroscope (França) e no Pólo de Informática de São Leopoldo (Brasil). Os resultados da pesquisa sinalizam que a existência de um ambiente de sinergia e complementaridade de conhecimentos em um contexto vai muito além da proximidade física entre as empresas, sofrendo forte influência de elementos, como fatores contingências, coerência, conectividade, mecanismos de coordenação e espaços de interação.

Extending RDF in distributed knowledge-intensive applications

The resource description framework (RDF) has become a formal language tool to specify the semantics of distributed systems, such as web services nowadays. In fact, it can also be extended to describe entities and relationships within specific application environments to support knowledge sharing and ontology construction. This paper presents two case studies on a network management knowledge model and a distributed workflow system process ontology. With practical experiences, the authors suggest how RDF can be applied innovatively and effectively to reengineer data integration solutions in different novel knowledge-intensive areas, which, in the past, were built upon traditional modelling languages, such as XML.