KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT

Concept of knowledge management

Knowledge management (K M) involves the identification and analysis of available and
required knowledge assets and knowledge assets related processes, and the subsequent
planning and control of action to develop both the assets and the processes so as to fulfill
organizational objectives

Knowledge management is the management of an environment where people

generate tacit knowledge, render it into explicit knowledge and feed it back to the
organization. This forms the base for more tacit knowledge, which keeps the cycle going
in an intelligent, learning organization. It is the process of creating, institutionalizing and
distributing information and best practices to solve business problems rather than
continually reinventing the wheel.

Data, Information and Knowledge

Data represent observation or facts having no context and are not immediately or directly
useful. Information results from placing data within some meaningful context, often in
the form of a message. Knowledge is that which a person comes to believe and value on
the basis of the systematic organized accumulation of information through experience,
communication, or inference

DIKE flow
Data information knowledge expertise

Data arranged in a meaningful sequence is what is called as “information” and capability

and experience of using information to make judgments and the ability to link them to
decisions or actions is said to be “knowledge”. When knowledge is applied to specific
subject or discipline, for an extended period of time, then it is defined as “expertise”

Knowledge is highly contextual and depends largely on the mental models,

experience, values and beliefs of individuals and organizations.

Importance of knowledge management

For a company operating in the uncertain global environment, source of lasting
competitive advantage is knowledge. When markets shifts, technologies proliferate,
competitors multiply and products become obsolete virtually overnight; successful
companies are t hose that are consistently create new knowledge, disseminate it widely
throughout the organization and quickly embody it in new technologies and products.
 IMPLEMENTATION OF KNOWLEDGE
MANAGEMENT
Following steps are suggested

1. knowledge creation : to discover, realize, conclude, articulate and discuss

for creating new knowledge.
2. knowledge capture : includes documenting, digitizing, extraction,
representation and storage of relevant knowledge
3. organizing knowledge : structuring, cataloguing, abstracting, analyzing
and categorizing of knowledge for specific usage
4. knowledge access : presentation, display, notification, profiling and
searching the knowledge for specific application.
5. knowledge application or use : includes application of knowledge for
business performance, providing service, making new products and continuous
learning at organizational level.

The set of KM processes primarily involves people. thus, KM activities are

fundamentally linked with collaboration, interaction with people and the systems,
which support this.