Knowledge management: learning for organisational experience

Abstract

Both intellectual capital and the management of knowledge are strongly emerging themes in today’s organisational world. Many authors and practitioners note that the emerging patterns are that intellectual capital will replace natural resources, commodities, finance, technology and production processes as the key factor influencing competitive advantage. However, knowledge management (KM) is still in its infancy. Aims to identify the critical success factors and best practices of KM through analysing the experiences of several organisations. Starts by defining what is meant by “knowledge” and “knowledge management”, and overviews the methodology used for identifying best practices. The second part is concerned with presenting a systematic and critical review of the published experiences of 40 organisations in KM. The analysis examined the methodologies pursued, IT support used, structures employed, results achieved, and the perceived critical success factors. This analysis allowed the proposal of several “best practices” for successful KM, which are presented and discussed.