In this paper, we conceptualize visual representations (e.g., sketches, CAD drawings, and prototypes) as „artifacts of knowing‟ serving the purposes to share, transform, and symbolize organizational knowledge. First, we propose a comprehensive definition of visual representations by integrating insights from the literature domains of knowledge management and organizational culture. Building on the reviewed literature, we then develop a conceptual framework that articulates the visualization process in terms of a cyclical pathway between the formats (e.g., from sketches to prototypes) and the functions (e.g., from knowledge sharing to knowledge symbolization) of visual representations. After suggesting managerial recommendations for the use of visual representations in organizational knowledge management, we conclude our paper by pointing out the limitations of the current literature, and by suggesting directions for future research on visual knowledge management.
In this study we look at an innovative approach to knowledge management, namely the use of graphical representations for conveying a specific type of knowledge. We focus on business strategy and investigate how this type of knowledge can best be communicated by comparing textual and visual representations. Through a controlled experiment we examine the effect of knowledge representation on understanding and recall of participants in Europe and East Asia. The results show that knowledge visualization is superior to text, independent of culture, and that culture does not have a negative mediating role on the reception of knowledge. However, we also find that subjects underestimate the benefits of visual representations of information for building up knowledge in both cultures. We believe that these findings reveal the hidden benefits of visualization for knowledge work. Communicating knowledge with visual formats or representations thus seems a promising, but undervalued practice for international, intercultural contexts.
This article aims at providing better understanding of the applicability of Semantic Web tools and technologies in practice. It introduces a case study of the use of semantic technologies for extraction, integration and meaningful search and retrieval of expertise data, as an example of the new approaches to data integration and information management. In particular, the paper discusses the process of building expert profiles in a form of ontology database by integrating competences from structured and unstructured sources. The results of the case study show that emerging Semantic Web technologies such as the OWL 2, SPARQL, SPIN rule language, and public vocabularies such as FOAF, DOAC, bibTeX, Dublin Core and other can be used for building individual and enterprise competence models. The proposed approach extends the functionalities of existing enterprise information systems and offers possibilities for development of future Internet services. This allows organizations to express their core competences and talents in a standardized, machine processable and understandable format, and hence facilitates their integration in the European Research Area and beyond.
This paper describes a framework for the design of performance evaluation systems in collaborative networks. This framework is composed by a performance information reference model and a multi-criteria decision support method. When used in combination by the members of a collaborative network, results in specific models that result from a collective and negotiated construction.
Knowledge communication is an essential mechanism to facilitate intra- and inter-organizationalnowledge transfer. In order to improve the efficiency of knowledge communi-cation, organizations need to pay particular attention to the clarity of conveyed knowledge in order not to create confusion, misunderstandings, or misapplication of knowledge. In this con-tribution, we show where and how the concept of clarity matters for knowledge management in general, and for knowledge communication in particular. We review and operationalize the clarity concept so that it can become the object of a systematic management effort. Further-more, we show ways of how clarity can be pro-actively and systematically managed. We have tested our conception of clarity in a survey on clarity in knowledge-focused presentations, and we present the results in this paper. An outlook on future research on clarity in knowledge management concludes the article.
As pointed out by several scholars, inter-organizational collaboration is an important vehicle for knowledge creation. But the process of integrating knowledge across organizational boundaries entails great complexity. In this paper, we argue that visualizing knowledge in inter-organizational meetings is a conduit of knowledge sharing, and enables innovative re-combinations of organizational competences. We propose an experimental design to uncover the advantages and possible disadvantages of using visual techniques as a support for inter-organizational knowledge sharing. In particular, we compare the process and the outcome of knowledge sharing in inter-organizational teams supported with 1) software-based visualization, 2) poster-based visualization, and 3) text-based methods. The first results of our experiments suggest that software-supported teams outperform the control groups in knowledge-sharing tasks, and exhibit greater satisfaction with teamwork process and outcome. After discussing relevant implications for both researchers and practitioners, we point out limitations of our study and suggest directions for future research.
Technological change and high competitiveness are essential for organisations in today’s fast-paced society. Information and knowledge assets thus need to be current and easily accessible. With implementing core knowledge processes such as identification and accumulation, msg systems ag – a medium-sized IT and consulting company – introduced a knowledge management system with the aim to externalise implicit knowledge. Implicit knowledge is intuitive knowledge that is generally gained through personal experience [Nonaka and Takeuchi 1995]. In this regard Probst et al.’s (2006) knowledge process concept helped identify and adapt these processes. The core knowledge processes were then implemented by the Codebeamer system, an OpenSource collaboration platform based on wiki technology. The system’s development was continuously adopted and improved by using a prototype-specific approach since its productive start two years ago. This paper describes this implementation project for a knowledge management system (KMS) in an IT consulting and system integration company.
The paper explores the application of Web 2.0 technologies in the engineering product development domain. Growing on data collected from a number of industrial development projects, related to several different products in various industry segments, the paper analyses the dichotomy between the prevailing hierarchical structure of CAD/PLM/PDM systems and the emerging principles of the Social Web, e.g. the self-organization of its users. It introduces the concept of Engineering 2.0, intended as a more bottom up and lightweight knowledge sharing approach supporting early stage design decisions within cross-functional product development teams. A set of scenarios related, for instance, to the application of blogs, wikis, forums and tags in the engineering domain are eventually presented, highlighting opportunities, challenges and no-go areas.
Siemens is well known for ambitious efforts in knowledge management, providing a series of innovative tools and applications within the intranet. References@BT is such a web-based application aimed to support globally sharing knowledge, experiences and best-practices within the Building Technologies Division. As a reaction to the demand of employees, a new microblogging service, tightly integrated into References@BT, was implemented in March 2009. In this paper, we comprehensively describe motivation, experiences and advantages for the organization in providing an internal microblogging application. Because of the tight inte-gration, we also outline general facts of the knowledge management application.
This paper introduces a new process-oriented visualisation method for risk assessment in groups. Today, in corporate risk assessment there is a lack in visual facilitation methods for collaborative assessments of risks. Existing visualisation methods emphasize analytical purposes. However, they are not useful for the facilitation of risk assessments in a group, such as the board of management. The described risk visualization approach offers a visual dialogue oriented approach to improve the quality of organisational risk-assessment in groups and goes hand in hand with already established risk management processes and systems. Secondly, this paper introduces the “ETH Baugarten Value Lab”, where we tested the tool on touch displays.
Bringing together knowledge bearers is a crucial factor for innovation in highperformance sports. Since the capabilities of a growing amount of nations are converging, every detail counts to win a competition. To harness the competence, experience and knowledge of various stakeholders, the Innovation Network Alpine Skiing has developed a custom-designed knowledge and idea management system. Having adapted Web 2.0 technologies to the requirements of innovation in the special environment of high-performance sports, the knowledge workers are enabled to easily contribute to the innovation process. The Wiki-based solution called “SkiBaserl”1 is successfully used in several development projects within the German Skiing Association. This article delivers an outline of the development process, the implementation and an evaluation of the tool.
30.000 advisory calls per year! How to analyze, rate and improve them interactively? For getting these goals a novel technique is introduced, which is based on a structure similar to a music score. Via a “duet”, guided by the advisor called, the main contents of the dialogue are extracted and stored automatically. At this, trained speech recognition is applied for the (known) advisor’s part for monitoring and controlling the call’s course, and keyword spotting is used for the (unknown) “customer” to pick out instances from sets of expected values. The results thereof fill an abstract score annotated to the call conducted. Then, because of the strong structure of such scores, the archive of all these dialogues is an ideal base for retrieval, exploration, comparison and clustering of calls, using e.g. graphical tools like knowCube®.
An internally developed knowledge transfer methodology ensures at Credit Suisse that irreplaceable know-how (implicit and explicit) remains within the firm – even when keypersons leave, e.g. retirement, internal job mobility, extended absence or general leaving. The methodology tested in theory and in praxis was developed by supporting over 70 keypersons and became part of the organisation in 2008. By covering general aspects of knowledge transfer as well as enhancing the human capital development in the business, the methodology provides a basis for organisational development: Due to transparent tasks and functions efficient and sustainable changes are possible.
Although receiving significant attention in management research, the organizational competence concept still remains difficult to apply, due to the vagueness of the theoretical construct, and due to the lack of pragmatic procedures to make it actionable. According to recent research, knowledge visualization may mitigate the elusiveness of the competence concept by assisting the identification, management, and communication of competences. In this paper, we thus review the academic literature in search for conceptual representations designed to support organizational competence mapping at the intra-, and inter-organizational level. By taking a synoptic overview of the collected representations, we single out the building blocks of competence visualization, and develop a corresponding classification. Drawing on this classification, we position twelve existing competence representation methods in an integrative framework to assist practitioners in selecting the right representation method and to inform scholars about future research and development needs.
With the accelerated growth of the blogosphere, automatically analyzing blogs (specifically extracting information) becomes increasingly important. Here, we focus on the fundamental task of automatically detecting blog topics in order to support users to explore a collection of blogs by focusing on different particular topics according to their interests. We show that topic exploration can be significantly improved (by up to 33%) by using a novel approach to
Extreme Programming focuses on spreading knowledge through many collaborative practices like pair programming, planning game, and retrospectives. The basic idea behind these practices is to share the work specific knowledge across the development teams as well as the management quarters. This knowledge sharing is said to have an accelerated effect when it is combined with the retrospectives analysis of the knowledge gained and the process performed. This inherent property of Knowledge Management (KM) facilitated by retrospective analysis is being used to teach Extreme Programming (XP) methodology as a graduate level Software Engineering (SE) course and is showing a notable effect on the learning process. The paper describes the KM issues in XP practices and how these issues are being managed for the students to present them with a profound learning experience.
Professional translation services are often perceived as quite expensive and people tend to go for the lowest price possible when commissioning a translation. To stay capable of competing with lay translators, professional translators have to continuously increase the efficiency of their work process. Researching information consumes a considerable part of the time needed for producing a high-quality translation. This work evaluates whether Web 2.0 applications with their social and collaborative characteristics have the potential to support the professional translator in his daily work. Here the main focus of attention is on a possible increase in efficiency of search and knowledge management processes. In phase one of the study we conducted a survey to determine the translator’s preferred search tactics, knowledge resources, and communication channels. Secondly, we conducted user tests on a Web 2.0 social media sharing platform followed by open interviews to find further evidence for the potential of Web 2.0-based collaborative applications in the professional translator’s business.
In this paper we present a novel, semantic-based approach for supporting the software development process in a distributed environment. The approach is based on collecting and preserving knowledge used in the software development process in order to support its usage in similar cases later on. One of the main advantages of this approach is possibility to collect required knowledge automatically by observing the behaviour of a software engineer. The approach has been implemented in the TEAM software system and evaluated in three real-world use cases.
In this position paper we present a vision of how the stories that people tell in Internet weblogs can be used directly for automated commonsense reasoning, specifically to support the core envisionment functions of event prediction, explanation, and imagination.
Many enterprises loose work time because they lack of global search solutions or their solutions are not able to satisfy the needs in a reasonable time. This results in costs for lost work time as well as increased response time. We present a novel approach to federated search engines that use case based reasoning to rerank results according to the searchers needs and therefore leads to a higher quality of search results and faster information retrieval.
In recent years the visualization of knowledge has been gaining wider attention: visualization is said to enhance human capabilities for knowledge intense activities such as decision making and strategic thinking. However, this is a recent field and still widely unexplored. Thus far, the advantages of knowledge visualization have been investigated mainly through anecdotal evidence and qualitative studies. In this paper, we propose an experimental approach to further comprehend the role of visualization in fostering knowledge sharing. We plan to compare the elicitation and evaluation processes of groups who are provided (1) with an optimal visual support, (2) with a sub-optimal visual support, and (3) without any visualization. The goal of our research is to apply the experimental approach – widely used in studying GSS (Group Support System) but seldom used in knowledge management – to shed light on the role of visualization for knowledge-intensive tasks in groups. We report first preliminary results of an experiment with 56 MBA students and also outline the limitations of our approach.
The stories told among members of an organization are an effective instrument for knowledge socialization, the sharing of experiences through social mechanisms. However, the utility of stories for organizational learning is limited due to the difficulties in acquiring stories that are relevant to the practices of an organization, identifying the learning goals that these stories serve, and delivering these stories to the right people and the right time in a manner that best facilitates learning. In this paper we outline a vision for story-based organizational learning in the future, and describe three areas where intelligent technologies can be applied to automate story management practices in support of organizational learning. First, we describe automated story capture technologies that identify narratives of people’s experiences within the context of a larger discourse. Second, we describe automated retrieval technologies that identify stories that are relevant to specific educational needs. Third, we describe how stories can be transformed into effective story-based learning environments with minimal development costs.
In this paper we propose a classification and systematic description structure based on the pattern paradigm for interaction scripts in Second Life that aim at facilitating knowledge sharing and knowledge integration in groups. We present eight examples of such interactions, a description structure to formalize them, and classify them into four classes according to their design scope and added value. Based on this classification we distinguish among sophisticated 3D collaboration patterns, seamless patterns, decorative patterns, and pseudo patterns.