Knowledge Flows

Abstract

Recalling from previous discussions, this book is not concerned solely with discussing knowledge management or testing for tacit knowledge. The former topic is well handled through a great deal of literature dating from the 1990s to the present day. The latter subject as we saw in the previous chapter tends to take place at the level of the individual and although a variety of techniques exist, the one by Sternberg’s group is arguably the most practical. It is the flow of (tacit) knowledge in an organisation that should also be considered for the richness it provides both at the level of the staff member and holistically at the company-wide level. As one would expect, the measurement of knowledge flows brings with it another set of complexities including but not limited to, the culture of the firm, the cultural background of the individual employee, the degree to which ICT is in place within the company, the size of work groups and the formality or structure of the groups themselves. A study of intra-organisational flows needs to understand the parameters that will have an impact on the likelihood of soft knowledge being transferred from one individual to the next.