Professional schools typically build their raison d'être on the mission of developing knowledge that can be translated into skills that advance the practice of the professions. On the other hand practitioners fail to adopt the findings of research in fields be it medicine, management or engineering. Further, knowledge created is not always in the usage mode, that too in real life practical situation. Action scientists focused on the characteristics and behaviors of researchers to explain this lack of implementation of research knowledge. Identifying the major gaps between scientific knowledge and actual knowledge transfer issues is crucial in today's scenario. Hence, the purpose of this chapter is to identify knowledge transfer issues, discuss the issues and advancements therein, and highlight practical implications of relating theory to practice with focus on management discipline. The issues discussed herein are not only of utmost importance but crucial for understanding, given the current state of management education, organizational science and knowledge management practices.
TopIntroduction
Professional schools typically build their raison d’être on the mission of developing knowledge that can be translated into skills that advance the practice of the professions (Kondrat, 1992; Simon, 1976; Tranfield & Starkey, 1998). However, based on evidence and the cry in the gap of relating theory to practice, this undertaking by professional schools remains elusive ideal or at best abstract and obscure. Getting clear picture for appreciating the connection between theory and practice is a tenacious job for all scholars of all professional schools be it agriculture, business, education, engineering, journalism, law medicine, etc. Several special issues in leading academic journals1 have highlighted growing concerns that academic research has become less useful for solving practical problems and that the gulf between theory and practice in the professions is widening (Anderson, Herriot, & Hodgkinson, 2001; Rynes et al., 2001). On the other hand, organizations are not able to keep pace with the changing times, because of the following reasons:
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Academics are being criticized for not adequately putting their research into practice (Beyer & Trice, 1982; Hodgkinson, Herriot, & Anderson, 2001; Lawler, Mohrman, Morhman, Ledford, & Cummings, 1985).
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There is also increasing criticism that findings from academic as well as consulting studies are not useful to practitioners and do not get implemented (Beer, 2001; Gibbons et al., 1994).
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Professional knowledge workers, as well, are criticized for not being aware of relevant research and not doing enough to put their practice into theory (Van de Ven, 2002; Weick, 2001).
There is a growing concern about the chasm between theory and practice. This is usually referred as a knowledge transfer issue. On the other hand practitioners fail to adopt the findings of research in fields, such as medicine (Denis & Langley, 2002), human resources (Anderson et al., 2001), and management (Tranfield, Denyer, & Smart, 2003. Also knowledge created is not always in the usage mode, that too in real life practical situation. Action scientists such as Argyris and Schon (1996) focused on the characteristics and behaviors of researchers to explain this lack of implementation of research knowledge.
Identifying the major gaps between scientific knowledge and actual knowledge transfer issues is crucial in today’s scenario. Only then, it would be possible to apply that scientific knowledge to real work situation in the world of practice. According to (Schein, 1987; Whyte, 1984) this implementation is possible only if researchers, consultants, and practitioners jointly engage in interpreting and implementing study findings.