Strategic Experimentation and Knowledge Management

Abstract

Historically, the focus of IT infrastructure has been to capture the knowledge of experts in a centralized repository (Davenport & Prusak, 1998; Grover & Davenport, 2001). These centralized databases contained knowledge that was explicit and historical (e.g., competitor pricing, market share), and the IT infrastructure served to facilitate functional decision-making or to automate routine tasks (i.e., in re-engineering). The users of technology approached the repository to obtain data in a narrowly defined domain (Broadbent et al. 1999). Consequently, IT originally played a significant yet ultimately limited role in the strategy creation process. Management information systems (MIS) arguably generated information that was less applicable to strategy creation, as noted in early writings on the linkage between MIS and strategic planning (Holmes, 1985; Lientz & Chen, 1981; Shank et al., 1985).