Establishing an effective knowledge management environment

Businesses today often find themselves in the process of converting from a production orientation to a service orientation, and realizing that discovery and maintenance of knowledge is critical to surviving in the new knowledge-based economy. These changes are also giving rise to a new type of organizational structure. Boundaries are no longer distinct between organizations, and market and production competencies are being replaced with alliance capitalism and knowledge-based competencies. Vertical integration provides increased human capital and knowledge-based competencies; human resources and the intellect they possess are becoming a valuable resource. To take full advantage of these changes, the organization must learn to share information and knowledge, not only between organizational members but also between organizational partners. This requires that the organization establish an environment that is conducive to effective knowledge sharing, creation, and management. Although it is virtually inarguable that information and communication technology can facilitate a knowledge management strategy, it is important to remember the virtues of constructing the plan prior to implementing it. The logical structure of the plan is of prime importance – without the logical blueprint, the physical implementation is not likely to reach its full potential. Physical implementation of knowledge management is highly individualized to each organization and beyond the scope of this paper, which discusses the importance of the knowledge management environment and methods that organizations may use to enable a learning-orientation. The following section describes the importance of establishing a knowledge management environment with a learning orientation and is followed by a section that discusses organizational learning and its needs, particularly information and knowledge sharing. These sections are followed by a discussion that considers how an organization can support those needs.