Abstract
At the hour when the economic activities leaned with technology (e.g., the Internet) give some signs of maturity, the field of the economy of knowledge does not appear any more to rise out of the possible, but more out of the probable. Vis-a-vis the appearance of new strategic trades for the companies, an evolution of the trades related to technology Internet is done day. Thus, the references of awaited competences, although in adaptation to the changes of the occupied trades, make it possible today to identify the broad outline of the knowledge related to the employment occupied by the “net-workers” and “knowledge workers”(Bouchez, 2004). When we are interested by the individuals and collectives behaviors in companies, we are surprised by the new practices of knowledge’s acquisition, at the point to note an impact on the concept of power and to consider another reading between knowledge and power.
TopNew Knowledge Acquisition Practices
Like any other universe of work, the context of the net-organizations obliges one to request a certain number of acquired knowledge with technique dominant. By preoccupation of creativity and/or a need for development of a solution to waiting customer, the control of the basic tools proves sometimes insufficient. In reaction, the employees are brought to seek on the fabric of the examples whose technical support brings a solution a priori to the encountered problem.
The Net is a kind of library opened permanently and especially activates, as much in the multitude of the adopting Web sites of the technical solutions interesting for the inspiration, that in the richness of the personal and/or Community sites offering technical solutions turn-key. It frequently sometimes happens to me to go to seek scripts on the Net, to import them, then to make an fusion-adaptation of it on a site in the course of creation. (Tugdual T., developer, undertaken creation of teaching products multi-media)
This practice is connected with a knowledge acquisition which exceeds the simple one copy-to stick in the direction where it obliges with a comprehension a minima framework in which is used the source to copy.
The speed of evolution of the tools leads the employees thus to learn as a practitioner. It is the case observed with Brieuc B., a young Web designer, whose training of tools of animation and graphic creation rested more on an experiment than on the reading of a technical handbook. This self-mading is possible with a realization of the work based on mediatization of tools in perpetual evolution (from where the reactivity) but having the advantage of a common language and an ergonomics runs.
This experimentation returns to the idea of codevelopment. “The offer catalogues proposed to the customer is not, most of the time, that a base of contact. It is very often modulated and supplemented to arrive at a response to the chart” (Pol-Aurélien S., charge large accounts engineer, company of Web sites lodging and development). The use this knowledge-to adapt is far from being obvious insofar as many companies consider the recourse to the NTIC either like an additional layer of their communication network, or as a solution of “moothing” of what exists. Multitude of the technical solutions developed in company with the wire of time (e.g., a specialized distribution’s company which using four different customers data based), on the one hand, and the variety of the potentialities of the Internet, on the other hand, leads more to research of “an over-measure” than of “a loan with employment.”
The acquisition of the knowledge does not rest so much on a control of qualified know-how but more on one aggregate practical (copying, sef-mading, adaptation) of the experiments.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Knowledge Management: Methods and tools used to conserve the knowledge in the organization.
Knowledge Workers: Workers population whose base their professional activity on the knowledge.
Power: A has power on B when A obtains B of the behaviors, or actions, that B would not have had without the intervention of A; the power is the exercise of a capacity of influence.