1 / 12

The Practices of Knowledge Managers: an Activity System Based View

The Practices of Knowledge Managers: an Activity System Based View. Alexandre Perrin (aperrin@audencia.com) Strategy Department Audencia Nantes School of Management France. Statements. KM is a managerial practice (Bain, 2006) 1996  28% of usage 2006  69% of usage

cody
Télécharger la présentation

The Practices of Knowledge Managers: an Activity System Based View

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. The Practices of Knowledge Managers: an Activity System Based View Alexandre Perrin (aperrin@audencia.com) Strategy Department Audencia Nantes School of Management France

  2. Statements • KM is a managerial practice (Bain, 2006) • 1996  28% of usage • 2006  69% of usage • …but companies are dissatisfied with the results • Appointments of people in charge of knowledge management issues: • Chief Learning Officer, Chief Knowledge Officer, Knowledge Manager, Community Coordinator… • They initiate, drive and coordinate knowledge management programs (Earl and Scott 1999)  Paradox: few researches were conducted on these practitioners…none with a “practice-lens”

  3. Literature Review Knowledge as… KM Tools Knowledge Managers as… Technical Approach of KM Individual and collective objects that can be placed on an external support (Walsh et Ugson, 1991 ; Grant, 1991 ; Szulanski, 1996 ; Davenport et Prusak, 2000 ; Argote et al., 2003) Knowledge codification through patents, expert systems or databases (Hatchuel et Weil, 1992 ; Cowan et Foray, 2000 ; Hansen et al., 1999; Alavi et Leidner, 2001; Prax, 2004) - Chief Information/Knowledge Officer(Earl et Scott, 1999) - Chief Protection Officer (Awazu et Desouza, 2004) Social Approach of KM Knowledge built and traded in social spaces (Lave et Wenger, 1991 ; Brown et Duguid, 1991 ; Wenger, 1999 ; Gherardi et Nicolini, 2000 ; Bechky, 2003 ; Kellogg, 2006) Knowledge socialization through communities of practice (Wenger et al. 2002 ; Dameron et Josserand, 2006 ; Soenen, 2006 ; Vaast, 2007 ; Castro, 2007) - Chief Learning Officer (Awazu et Desouza, 2004) - Community Coordinator (Wenger et al., 2002)

  4. Research Questions • A practice-lens: RQ 1. What are the daily actions of knowledge managers? RQ 2. What kind of conflicts can emerge from these practices inside the organization ? RQ3. How these practices evolve over time ? • Objective: study the practices of knowledge managers through the image of the situated activity Level of analysis Organisation Managers Policy Plan What ? Issue Process Practice How ? Whittington (1996, p.732)

  5. Analyzing Knowledge Managers practices: the Activity Based View Artefacts Subject Object RESULTS Division of work Rules Community Adapted from Engeström (1996)

  6. Methodology • Research setting • Multinational corporation with KM function(s) • Three managerial levels: corporate/functions/business units • Qualitative methodology • 18 months of in situ observation (tasks) • 30 interviews conducted (discourses) • 850 pages of internal documents analyzed (artefacts) • Four embedded case studies (managers) • Data triangulation obtained  context • Content analysis with NVivo 2.0  Personal past experience has eased data analysis

  7. Results Artefacts Modify the content offered or select IT tools ? Animate or control tools (codification & socialization) ? Subject Object RESULTS How to ensure common practices in KM How to measure the value of KM ? Division of work Rules Community

  8. Outcomes • An evolving agenda with four domains of activity: • Knowledge portfolio (content) • Tools for codification (backbone) • Governance (rules) • Mindset (culture) (see the content analysis) • Knowledge Managers practices are influenced by: • Their ability to understand the knowledge that need to be managed (eg. Rewriting best practices) • The organization chart (eg. IT dept. vs Sales dept.) • The degree of understanding by stakeholders • The software/IT consultants • Practices evolve according to stakeholders needs

  9. Results – Content analysis (back) Case CKO Case FIRST Case BOOSTER Case KTP Portfolio 6 % 1161 words 56 % 5737 words 49 % 7952 words 20 % 2477 words IT 68 % 13158 words 13 % 1332 words 2 % 324 words 22 % 2724 words Governance 14 % 2709 words 13 % 1329 words 32 % 5194 words 8 % 991 words Mindset 12 % 2321 words 18 % 1844 words 17 % 2759 words 38 % 4706 words  Total 100% 100 % 100 % 100 %

  10. Conclusion • The situated activity model helps to understand • the different influences or conflicts in exercising the function of knowledge management • the underlying causes of birth and death of the function • the competencies needed to hire a knowledge manager (IT/Rhetoric/Writing) • Limit of the study • Quantitative study to be made on the four domains of activity • Conduct a survey inside the French knowledge manager community (CoP-1)

  11. What can we add…

  12. KM Programs vs KM Practices Level of analysis Organisation Managers What ? Policy Plan Problems How ? Process Practice

More Related