This thesis is a collection of four manuscripts linked by the aim of extending strategic alignment thought into the knowledge management domain by explicitly including the concept of knowledge strategy into the discussion of strategic alignment. In the first paper, a set of common knowledge strategy dimensions was synthesized and used to link two existing knowledge strategy typologies. The key finding of the study was that the two typologies operated at different strategic levels, allowing for the creation of portfolios of the lower order types under each higher order type. In the second paper, a model of strategic alignment between business, information system and knowledge strategy was presented and tested using survey data. It was found that the combination of aligned information and knowledge strategies with their associated business strategy resulted in higher performance for defenders, analyzers and prospectors and that the alignment of non-viable strategies led to worse performance than individual non-viable strategies alone. In the third paper, case studies provided examples of alignment and misalignment which were used to populate a framework linking alignment and performance. Four explanations for firms’ location in the model were provided, focusing on appropriate versus inappropriate alignment, conscious versus unconscious misalignment, antagonistic alignment versus misalignment, and strategic alignment versus misalignment. In the final paper, the Strategic Orientation of Knowledge-Based Enterprises (STROKE) instrument was developed to capture the orientation of knowledge strategy employment in firms. During the development process, a new statistic was developed to aid in the validation of card sorts during the scale development step of instrument creation. / Thesis (Ph.D, Management) -- Queen's University, 2009-04-12 16:39:28.315

In the knowledge economic era, how to effectively accumulate and explore knowledge becomes the key factor to the success of MNCs in the global market. ¡§Human¡¨ will be the main source to create the competitive knowledge, also plays an important role of the process in knowledge management. Therefore, knowledge and human capital investment will be the most important resources for enterprises to keep competitive advantage. The main purpose of this research is to develop a framework of knowledge strategy and human capital in subsidiaries of MNCs. Using quantitive interview research, samples are from 6 companies in 3 industries. The major findings of this study are listed below: 1. ¡§Active subsidiary¡¨ and ¡§early entryer¡¨ will have positive effect in human capital investment. 2. The more subsidiary adapt ¡§global innovator¡¨ and ¡§local innovator¡¨ these two knowledge strategies, the more they will emphasize on human capital localization and top manager¡¦s competence. 3. ¡§human capital investment¡¨, ¡§top manager¡¦s competence¡¨ and ¡§ employee¡¦s ability of entrepreneurship¡¨will have positive effect on subsidiary¡¦s performance. 4. In the network between HQ and subsidiary, ¡§outflow of knowledge¡¨ will have positive effect on subsidiary¡¦s performance.

For the revolution of ¡§the Third Wave¡¨, theorists have made arguments of the new tasks of organizations. Davenport and Prusak(1998: 19) have argued that the knowledge of the work force, the efficiency of organization¡¦s utilization of knowledge, and the speed of acquisition and utilization of new knowledge have become the only lifeblood of competitive advantage of organizations. Organizations make employees achieve some degree of ¡§knowing¡¨ by the usage of ¡§justified beliefs¡¨. So that they would be capable of the performance ,which is necessary for the organization to create value in the market and survive. Thus helping employees to obtain the knowledge necessary for performance more efficiently has become one of the major issues of management. Trying to conclude arguments of working knowledge, organizational learning, and knowledge management in literatures, we build up a framework to analyze the structure of knowledge management system in organizations. First, We draw different types of important working knowledge to organizations out of the operation styles of knowledge in organizations. Also, we sum up different characteristics of learning behaviors in different levels in organizations and the relationships between the learning behaviors and the knowledge base of organizations. Therefore, we could find out the relationship between the working knowledge needed by organizations, the learning behaviors, and the knowledge management system in organizations. Based on the literature review and qualitative data analysis and, we have the findings as follow: 1. Organizations that need tacit working knowledge to help employees to finish tasks would make learning assumptions of Constructionism; therefore they would focus on the construction of shared meaning. Information system that makes the communication easier would be needed most. Those who need explicit knowledge would make learning assumptions of Congnitivism and need integrated data base which give updated and correct information. 2. Organizations that develop knowledge strategy in existing knowledge domains intend to learn from the internal resources. Therefore they would need a system that helps to find the experts who know the answers and provide solutions. Organization that explore in new knowledge domains more likely to learn from the outside resource. Usually they send a group as learning agent for the organization. This agent would learn then integrate the new knowledge and the needs and operations of the organization. For this reason, the kind of knowledge system needed is to convey the new integrated knowledge from the agent to the rest of the organization. 3. The societal sub-system like language in common play more important role in knowledge management system than information system along.

In recent years, due to rapid changing environment, the focus of maintaining organizational competence has shift from innovation of products and technology to efficient management of knowledge. There are many factors which will influence the way an organization engage in knowledge management. The study is about if external factor of organizational external environment and internal factors including organizational culture and organizational strategy will influence the process of knowledge management. And the study is also about if these factors will have effect of organizational knowledge management strategies selection. In the part of external environment, the measurement is based on environmental heterogeneity and environmental hostility. The research result reveals that organizations with high environmental heterogeneity and high environmental hostility tend to adopt the organized market knowledge management governance structure and knowledge creation strategies of knowledge exploitation and knowledge exploration. In the part of organizational culture, the study is based on the organizational culture typology of Wallach¡]1983¡^. The research result reveals that innovation organizations tend to adopt the extended organized market and the firm knowledge management governance structure and knowledge creation strategies of knowledge exploitation and knowledge exploration. In the part of organizational strategy, the study is based on the organizational strategy typology of Miles & Snow¡]1978¡^. The research result reveals that prospector organizations tend to adopt the extended organized market and the firm knowledge management governance structure and knowledge creation strategy of knowledge exploration. The results can be reference of organizational knowledge management strategies selection.

The construction industry is facing an alteration of generations in the years to come and even though knowledge transfer has been studied since the 1990’s many companies are still struggling to improve their knowledge strategy. For construction companies this is even more problematic due to the nature of the industry. The construction industry is characterized by project-based organizations where project members are changed in almost every project. Working under similar conditions are consultants, and some consultancies are notable for managing their knowledge well. By benchmarking three notable consultancies against a construction consultancy, some key success factors of the consultancies’ knowledge transfer were found and applied on the construction consultancy. The study is characterized by Hansen et al.’s (1999) codification and personalization strategies, which say that knowledge should either be stored in technical databases or shared through social interaction. A literature review of the three consultancies was conducted and the study of the construction consultancy was based on interviews and observations. The companies’ knowledge processes were then described and categorized into technical and social infrastructure. Where similar strategies have been used in the three consultancies, these have been analyzed to be their key success factors in knowledge management. These factors are summarized as: 1) Clear and standardized routines. 2) User friendly and up-to-date technical systems. 3) Global interaction and collaboration. 4) An organizational culture of knowledge sharing. Based on the four key success factors and previous literature on the subject some suggestions for improvement at the construction company were compiled. Even though the four studied organizations all are management consultants their way of working differs. Since three consultancies were studied it should provide a certain range of advice and recommendations that can be adapted to different organizations. The key success factors analyzed are also mostly connected to large, global organizations working under projected-based conditions, which also should be applicable to numerous companies. The findings are therefore believed to be useful for consultancies as well as construction companies. / Byggindustrin står under de kommande åren inför ett generationsskifte, och trots att kunskapsåterföring har varit ett känt ämne sedan 1990-talet kämpar fortfarande många företag med att förbättra sin kunskapsstrategi. I byggföretag är detta ännu mer problematiskt på grund av industrins natur. Byggindustrin karaktäriseras nämligen av projektbaserade organisationer där projektmedlemmarna byts ut till varje projekt. Konsulter jobbar under liknande förhållanden, och det finns några konsultföretag som är kända för att hantera sin kunskap på ett bra sätt. Genom att jämföra (genom benchmarking) tre kända konsultbolag med ett byggkonsultföretag är några nyckelfaktorer för konsultbolagens framgång i kunskapsåterföring framtagna, och dessa är sedan applicerade på byggkonsultföretaget. Studien präglas av Hansen m. fl.:s (1999) kodifikations- och personaliseringsstrategi, vilka innebär att kunskap antingen ska lagras i tekniska databaser eller delas genom social interaktion. En litteraturstudie av tre kända konsultbolag utfördes och studien av byggkonsultföretaget baserades på intervjuer och observationer. Företagens kunskapsprocesser beskrevs sedan och kategoriserades som teknisk och social infrastruktur. Där liknande strategier observerades i alla tre företagen har dessa analyserats som deras nyckelfaktorer för lyckad hantering av kunskap. Nyckelfaktorerna kan sammanfattas enligt följande: 1) Tydliga och standardiserade rutiner. 2) Användarvänliga och uppdaterade tekniska system. 3) Globalt samarbete och interaktion. 4) En kunskapsspridande företagskultur. Baserat på dessa fyra nyckelfaktorer och även på studerad litteratur i ämnet var några förbättringsförlag till byggkonsultföretaget framtagna. Trots att de fyra företagen alla är managementkonsulter så arbetar de på väldigt olika sätt. Eftersom tre konsultföretag var undersökta så borde det ge en bred variation av förslag som skulle kunna bli anpassade till olika sorters organisationers behov. De analyserade nyckelfaktorerna är framförallt kopplade till stora globala organisationer som arbetar under projektbaserade förhållanden, vilket borde gälla för många typer utav företag. Resultatet borde därför vara användbart för konsultbolag, men även för byggföretag.

The construction industry is facing an alteration of generations in the years to come and even though knowledge transfer has been studied since the 1990’s many companies are still struggling to improve their knowledge strategy. For construction companies this is even more problematic due to the nature of the industry. The construction industry is characterized by project-based organizations where project members are changed in almost every project. Working under similar conditions are consultants, and some consultancies are notable for managing their knowledge well. By benchmarking three notable consultancies against a construction consultancy, some key success factors of the consultancies’ knowledge transfer were found and applied on the construction consultancy. The study is characterized by Hansen et al.’s (1999) codification and personalization strategies, which say that knowledge should either be stored in technical databases or shared through social interaction. A literature review of the three consultancies was conducted and the study of the construction consultancy was based on interviews and observations. The companies’ knowledge processes were then described and categorized into technical and social infrastructure. Where similar strategies have been used in the three consultancies, these have been analyzed to be their key success factors in knowledge management. These factors are summarized as: 1) Clear and standardized routines. 2) User friendly and up-to-date technical systems. 3) Global interaction and collaboration. 4) An organizational culture of knowledge sharing. Based on the four key success factors and previous literature on the subject some suggestions for improvement at the construction company were compiled. Even though the four studied organizations all are management consultants their way of working differs. Since three consultancies were studied it should provide a certain range of advice and recommendations that can be adapted to different organizations. The key success factors analyzed are also mostly connected to large, global organizations working under projected-based conditions, which also should be applicable to numerous companies. The findings are therefore believed to be useful for consultancies as well as construction companies. / Byggindustrin står under de kommande åren inför ett generationsskifte, och trots att kunskapsåterföring har varit ett känt ämne sedan 1990-talet kämpar fortfarande många företag med att förbättra sin kunskapsstrategi. I byggföretag är detta ännu mer problematiskt på grund av industrins natur. Byggindustrin karaktäriseras nämligen av projektbaserade organisationer där projektmedlemmarna byts ut till varje projekt. Konsulter jobbar under liknande förhållanden, och det finns några konsultföretag som är kända för att hantera sin kunskap på ett bra sätt. Genom att jämföra (genom benchmarking) tre kända konsultbolag med ett byggkonsultföretag är några nyckelfaktorer för konsultbolagens framgång i kunskapsåterföring framtagna, och dessa är sedan applicerade på byggkonsultföretaget. Studien präglas av Hansen m. fl.:s (1999) kodifikations- och personaliseringsstrategi, vilka innebär att kunskap antingen ska lagras i tekniska databaser eller delas genom social interaktion. En litteraturstudie av tre kända konsultbolag utfördes och studien av byggkonsultföretaget baserades på intervjuer och observationer. Företagens kunskapsprocesser beskrevs sedan och kategoriserades som teknisk och social infrastruktur. Där liknande strategier observerades i alla tre företagen har dessa analyserats som deras nyckelfaktorer för lyckad hantering av kunskap. Nyckelfaktorerna kan sammanfattas enligt följande: 1) Tydliga och standardiserade rutiner. 2) Användarvänliga och uppdaterade tekniska system. 3) Globalt samarbete och interaktion. 4) En kunskapsspridande företagskultur. Baserat på dessa fyra nyckelfaktorer och även på studerad litteratur i ämnet var några förbättringsförlag till byggkonsultföretaget framtagna. Trots att de fyra företagen alla är managementkonsulter så arbetar de på väldigt olika sätt. Eftersom tre konsultföretag var undersökta så borde det ge en bred variation av förslag som skulle kunna bli anpassade till olika sorters organisationers behov. De analyserade nyckelfaktorerna är framförallt kopplade till stora globala organisationer som arbetar under projektbaserade förhållanden, vilket borde gälla för många typer utav företag. Resultatet borde därför vara användbart för konsultbolag, men även för byggföretag.

Even though power and influence of children on family buying behavior is growing little is known about their involvement. Previous studies of family and household consumption often neglect the role of children in decision-making, but nowadays, children are becoming one of the most powerful influencers in family buying behavior. They dominate family buying decision and can influence their parents in many product categories from cars till regular grocery shopping and therefore the question arises, what influences children when requesting products and what strategies they use to make their parents yield to their requests. Thus, this research paper tries to explain how are influence strategies that children use and family complexity related to parents buying behavior of groceries. The primary data have been collected through an electronic questionnaire, which resulted in sample of 164 parents respondents from around the globe. The data were analyzed by using various statistical tools and concluded that (1) aggressive, persuasion, rational and knowledge strategies are positively affecting parents buying behavior, (2) non-traditional family structure has positive impact on buying behavior, (3) older children have more influence power over parents buying behavior and (4) number of children has no significant influence on parents buying behavior.

90年代後，軟體產業善用強大的知識力量建構數位王國，在知識經濟狂潮裡獨據鰲頭，他們如何利用知識征服全球的祕密，一直引發各界好奇。本研究嘗試設計一套「全新且視覺化」的衡量模式以分析、瞭解及解釋軟體產業推行知識管理之情形，取代個案研究無法見林的遺憾，從宏觀角度觀諸整個產業的現況。 　　透過前測的檢驗，確認此種衡量模式測量變項的問卷內容，將它命名「知識管理雷達圖衡量模式」，藉由「知識管理雷達圖」的視覺呈現，能輕易地辨識軟體公司實踐知識管理的深度與廣度，是屬於「知識管理實踐成效六大類型」的何類；除此之外，本研究更提出5個假設，企圖解開幾個「知識管理雷達圖衡量模式」與軟體產業所衍生的疑竇，例如：軟體公司的特徵（資本額、員工數、上市上櫃情形、年營業額以及業務重心）的不同，知識管理的實踐深度（或廣度）有顯著差異嗎？「知識策略」與「資訊科技」是否顯著相關等等。 　　在發出447份附上回郵信封的問卷、213份e-mail電子問卷，並持續進行近4個星期的監控及問卷追縱後，最終回收率為21.03%，有效問卷回收率則是19.69%。經過資料分析，發現目前高達9成軟體公司皆從事過知識管理的相關活動，然而實踐知識管理的程度卻僅僅「三顆星」等級，顯示未來努力的空間仍不少；仍有7%左右的軟體業者，在各大要素的努力乏善可陳，這些公司屬於「不知不覺」型，絲毫沒察覺知識時代已經來臨，未來前景堪憂。在假設檢定方面，其結果出乎意料，公司的規模大小、上市上櫃與否、年營業額多寡以及業務範疇的差別，皆不影響知識管理的成敗，似乎在宣告「知識管理」非大企業的專利，無名小卒亦有出頭日的機會。 / Since the 1990s, software industry has been good at building a virtual kingdom by its incredible knowledge power. And now it is a pioneer navigating by the flooding water of knowledge-base economy. Everyone is curious to understand how software firms manipulate their knowledge spells to have the world in hands. Nevertheless, the researches of industrial knowledge management usually focused on case study of best practices and resulted in many myths. Unlike them, one of the purposes of this thesis is trying to develop a new and visual knowledge management measurement model, using it to judge and explain the software industry's implementation of knowledge management and analyzing whole industry in a macro view. 　　The questionnaire operationalized to measure the variables of the new measurement model was verified after pretesting. Then the new model is framed and named “Radar Visual Measurement Model of KM.” Through a radar graph, to judge the depth and breadth of the software firm's achievements of knowledge management and to position the kind of “The Six Types of Knowledge Management Achievement” are easy to accomplish. Furthermore, five hypotheses are set up to explore some suspicions between software industry and “Radar Visual Measurement Model of KM,” such as “Are the performances (depth and breadth) of knowledge management significant different if one software firm's characteristics (included the capital, the amount of employees, listed or not listed, revenues and major scope of business) differ greatly from the others' ?” or “Is there a significant relationship between ‘knowledge strategy’ and ‘information technology’ ?” and so on. 　　After sending 447 mails (each one accompanied by a qestionnaire and a self-addressed stamped envelope) and 213 electronic questionnaires by e-mail, monitoring and tracing returns were begun and continued about four weeks. The final response rate is 21.03% but the valid response rate is 19.69%. Then the result of the qualitative data analysis indicates that 1) it's a common phenomenon in the software industry that over 90 per cent of software firms have ever performed knowledge management but the average level of performance depth only belongs to ‘three-star’ class. So all the software firms have to keep on making their extra efforts in the future. 2) There are near 7 percent of software firms doing nothing effort on five dimensions called ‘Unconsciousness’. They are unaware that the knowledge era is coming; therefore, they probably have a dark future. Moreover, two of the five hypotheses are not supported by the facts and surprised us. They point out that the scale of a company, the situation of listed, the total revenues and the scope of business don't affect the performances of knowledge management. In other words, they may proclaim that KM is not a monopoly of a large enterprise and a small firm still has its chance to be strong by knowledge management.

企業透過創新以積極回應環境變遷的要求。企業新產品或服務的創新程度應依環境的需求決定。面對環境變遷，顧客需求可能改寫，企業如何取得正確的顧客需求成為重要問題；相反的，身處顧客需求已知的環境，競爭的重點轉為產品的品質與成本，企業內部如何充分分享知識以提升產品品質與降低成本成為重要議題。成功創新的企業是「如何」採行知識網路定位獲取所需要的新顧客需求及產品品質與成本等創新驅動因素，提升知識基礎與知識策略並進而影響創新能力？知識網路定位、知識基礎與知識策略對於創新能力的影響「有多大」？台灣資訊電子業又是如何透過知識網路定位同時達成上述的知識處理過程，提升創新能力？本研究試圖回答這些問題。 企業回應環境變遷所採行的企業策略可分為積極回應環境的前瞻者〈Prospector〉、固守環境穩定的防衛者〈Defender〉以及兼具前二者部份特色、試圖極大化獲利機會並同時極小化風險的分析者〈Analyzer〉(Miles et al., 1978)。企業回應環境的創新能力從本身具備的技術基礎與滿足市場需求所需具備技術間的差異程度可區分為激進式創新以及漸進式創新。文獻中對於企業創新能力的探討，主要有知識策略以及知識基礎二大觀點，知識策略強調企業回應環境需求變遷程度，設定新產品或服務創新程度、所需的激進式或漸進式創新能力，進而決定投資資源於探索新知識以及運用既有知識專案的比例，經由探索策略以及運用策略，提升企業回應環境需求的創新能力；知識基礎則強調企業的人力資本、組織資本以及社會資本等知識存量是提升企業創新能力的關鍵因素。如何調和知識基礎與知識策略產生正向的交互作用是提升企業創新能力的重要議題 (Cook & Brown, 1999)。 本研究檢視上述相關文獻，指出社會資本與人力資本、組織資本特性上的差異。鑲嵌不同社會資本〈新市場機會及信任〉的不同知識網路定位〈相對創業型定位及相對緊密型網路〉在環境變遷中提供企業不同程度的取得新市場機會〈如相對創業型定位有助於企業了解新市場顧客需求〉，促進知識基礎與知識策略對於企業創新能力的提升。本研究並且進一步在分析者企業策略的框架下，提出創新能力為因變數、知識策略與知識基礎為自變數、知識網路定位為調節變數的研究假設模型。 接著，本研究進行質性及量化實證研究，質性研究是從個案研究資料庫找出研究個案數量相對多且品質佳的創新個案：1980年代製造業的昇陽二號以及1990年代服務業的亞馬遜網路書店，逐篇檢視找出對應相關變數及其間關係，以初步檢驗本研究的研究模型。接著，為一般化本研究模型的解釋力，從重要的量化實證文獻中找出衡量各變數的問項整理成問卷，以台灣資訊電子業上市企業共341家為母體樣本，寄發問卷給各家企業之經理人，共取得69份有效問卷〈有效回收率為20.23%〉，將這些問卷資料以淨最小平方法演算後分析發現，採行分析〈者〉企業策略的台灣資訊電子業上市企業的實證資料支持絕大部分研究假設。在著重漸進式創新、漸進式創新專案對於激進式創新專案人力資本有顯著排擠效果的設計製造代工思維下，企業的知識網路定位透過知識策略與知識基礎提升創新能力。 本研究基於實證結果，除在理論上以知識網路定位銜接知識基礎與知識策略顯著提升對於創新能力的解釋力以及從產業創新階段觀點解答目前文獻對於組織知識網路定位的矛盾：同時採行相對創業型定位及相對緊密型網路成效差 (e.g., Koka & Prescott, 2008) vs. 同時採行二種知識網路定位成效好 (e.g., Capaldo, 2007) 外，同時也對實務提出建言：經理人應觀察產業所處的創新階段決定所需要提升的創新能力〈激進式或漸進式〉，盤點知識基礎〈人力資源及組織資本〉，透過知識網路定位〈相對創業型定位或相對緊密型網路〉與知識策略〈相對知識探索或相對知識運用〉的搭配，提升所需的創新能力。 / Firms aggressively respond to environmental change through innovations. Radicalness of innovations should be guided by environmental demand, or customers’ requirement. When customers’ requirement changes or is unknown, how do firms explore customers’ requirement becomes a crucial question. Contrarily, when customers’ requirement is known or unchanged and competition emphasizes on product/service quality and cost, how do firms exploit knowledge to increase quality or/and to decrease cost becomes a crucial question (Abernathy & Utterback, 1978). How does an innovative firm successfully adopt a proper knowledge networking which acquires above drivers (i.e., new customer requirement, product quality/cost) and facilitates the firm’s knowledge base and knowledge strategy to increase innovation capability? To what extent of knowledge networking, knowledge bases and knowledge strategies combine to affect firm innovation capability? This study tries to answer these questions. According to firms’ responsive degree to environmental change, firms can be categorized into Prospectors, Analyzers, and Defenders from a corporate strategy perspective (Miles et al., 1978). ‘Prospectors’ aggressively respond environmental changes, ‘Defenders’ pursue a stable environment, ‘Analyzers’ attempt to minimize risk while they maximize profit. Corporate strategy directs how does a firm respond environmental change and pursue innovation capabilities (Koka & Prescott, 2008). According to discrepancy degree between market demand and firms’ existing technologies base, innovation capabilities which firms pursue can be categorized into radial innovation capability and incremental innovation capability. Two major schools argue different sources of innovation capability. Knowledge-based scholars (e.g., Subramaniam & Youndt, 2005) argue that innovation capability is from firms’ knowledge (e.g., human capital, organization capital and social capital) utilization and accumulation. Contrarily, knowledge strategy scholars (e.g., Atuahene-Gima, 2005) emphasize importance of adaption. Firms are required to adapting to environmental change, setup radicalness of new product or innovation capability, and deicide resources allocating on exploration projects or/and exploitation projects. Firms increase innovation capability through knowledge exploration strategy and knowledge exploitation strategy. Knowledge-base perspective indicates source of firms’ innovation capability. However, it assumes environment changes slowly or companies are able to dominate environmental change. Contrarily, knowledge strategy perspective indicates direction of firms’ innovation capability for adapting to environment. However, it assumes firms’ knowledge base is fruitful and can be utilized for strategy execution. How does a firm positively interplay knowledge base and knowledge strategy to increase innovation capability is a crucial question (Cook & Brown, 1999). I review literature and firstly indicate that social capital’s characteristic is different from human capital and organization capital. Different degrees of knowledge networking (relatively entrepreneurial positioning and relatively prominent networking) embedding different social capital (new opportunities and trust) facilitates firms’ new opportunities accessibility to increase innovation capability via knowledge base and knowledge strategy. This research deducts eight hypotheses and builds a model which includes innovation capability (dependent variable), knowledge base and knowledge strategy (independent variable), and knowledge networking (moderating variable). Further, I conduct a qualitative research and a quantitative research to test the model. I find Sun-2 workstation in 1980s and Amazon.com website innovation cases from databases and elucidate corresponding variables relationships. Then, I collect items which measure variables from premier journals’ articles to generate a survey questionnaire. I send questionnaires to 341 Taiwan ICT firms’ managers. The firms are listed on Taiwan Stock Exchange. Final 69 effective samples are received (return rate = 20.23%). I use PLS to analyze the data and find that most hypotheses are supported. This quantitative research finds that Taiwan ICT firms emphasize on incremental innovation capability, and incremental innovation projects cannibalize radical innovation projects in human capital, knowledge networking influences innovation capability via knowledge base and knowledge strategy. This research concludes that 1. knowledge networking bridges the gap between knowledge base and knowledge strategy and increases innovation capability, 2. Corresponding knowledge networking, knowledge base, knowledge strategy, and innovation capability on distinct stages of industrial innovation resolves knowledge networking dilemma: A firm which simultaneously adopts relatively entrepreneurial positioning and relatively prominent networking performs worse (e.g., Koka & Prescott, 2008) or better (e.g., Capaldo, 2007), 3. Managers should determine innovation capability portfolio (relatively more radical innovations or relatively more incremental innovations?) by product market’s stages of industrial innovation, check existing knowledge base (human capital and organization capital), adopt corresponding knowledge networking (relatively entrepreneurial positioning or relatively prominent networking), knowledge base and knowledge strategy (relatively exploring knowledge or exploiting knowledge) to increase determinative innovation capability.

The theme of this diploma thesis is Knowledge Management that is becoming the focus of business companies. The theoretical part of the work is divided into several chapters that discuss the basic principles of Knowledge Management. The aim of this work is to describe the principle of knowledge management and create a basic draft of the knowledge base for the KPMG company. In the introductory part of the work, terms commonly used in knowledge management are explained. Further, the knowledge capital of the company, types of knowledge management and the related knowledge strategies are described. Second half of the theoretical part concerns the responsibilities, tasks and roles in knowledge management. The last chapters of the theoretical part describe the individual phases of knowledge management introduction in a company. The practical part of this thesis is focused at analysis of KPMG company knowledge management and design of a knowledge base that can substantially reduce the time necessary for completion of certain deliverables. The chapter concerns mainly with description of the system architecture of the knowledge base, that the author has designed for the KPMG company.