"Knowledge Management is a concept in which an enterprise gathers,
organizes, shares, and analyzes the knowledge of individuals and
groups across the organization in ways that directly affect
performance. It is about helping people communicate and share
information. Knowledge Management envisions getting the right
information, in the right context, to the right person, at the right
time, for the right business purpose."
Prior to the use of information technology, knowledge management
approaches were heavily paper and relationship based. In many
organizations, filing cabinets with labeled files that had to be
physically searched was as sophisticated as things got. Individuals
also retained considerable knowledge in their heads, and the extent of
one's relationships with others in the organization determined one's
success at retrieving that knowledge.
Larger companies sometimes developed more elaborate methods. Procter
& Gamble and Ford, for example, developed corporate libraries that not
only contained external materials like books and magazines, but also
internally generated materials. These were recorded in a card
catalog, and a librarian could be contacted to locate and send
materials to a requester. However, items could only be found based on
data a librarian had placed on a card, and a physical search and
transfer of materials was still required. Many companies maintained
corporate archives as well with similar advantages and limitations
that exclusively contained internal documents.
Information technology has transformed knowledge management by making
it much easier and faster to store and access information. Computer
networking in particular has played an important role. Early attempts
at employing information technology to further knowledge management
consisted of loading documents onto mainframes, where they could be
accessed from remote terminals. This eliminated the need for
physically searching for documents and moving them around. However,
only a few employees with specialized skills could maintain the
documents. Groupware like Lotus Notes then came on the scene, which
allowed regular users to post and edit materials, along with
interacting with one another. Fulltext searching also became
possible, allowing documents to be accessed using a wide range of
queries instead of being limited to a few specific terms attached to
the document by a librarian.
The Internet and private intranets further improved organizations'
knowledge management capabilities by allowing the contents of
documents to be explicitly linked to one another. Search engines have
made it easier to locate specific knowledge more quickly and Web
browsers have replaced specialized user interfaces. Significant
advances in software to help an organization maintain its documents
has also occurred, allowing control over who can view and edit
documents as well as the opportunity to maintain different versions.
Finally, eliminating the need to physically store documents allows
much more information to be retained and made readily available to the
organization.
Additional collaboration technologies, including instant messaging,
have also made it easier for individuals to acquire knowledge from
others, even people they do not know directly within the organization.
Because a significant amount of an organization's knowledge is never
formally documented, improved collaboration among individuals
throughout the organization is a critical aspect of knowledge
management.
By greatly improving the quantity and ease of accessing information,
information technology has transformed knowledge management within the
enterprise. Without information technology, companies had a much
harder time knowing what they knew. Furthermore, by fostering
collaboration, information technology allows much greater knowledge
transfer between individuals than was previously possible. By making
the right knowledge available to the right people at the right time,
the organization can work most efficiently, thereby increasing its
profitability.
Sincerely,
Wonko
"Knowledge Management Overview" by Tiffany Blaine, Information
Technology Toolbox, Inc. (November 30, 2000)
http://knowledgemanagement.ittoolbox.com/browse.asp?c=KMPeerPublishing&r=%2Fpub%2Fkm%5Foverview%2Ehtm |
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