With the rapid and constant changes taking place in information technology and internet, only firms participating in the creation and utilization of knowledge can hope to obtain the advantageous position in today¡¦s knowledge-based economy. Thus, the issues surrounding knowledge management (KM) have attracted more and more concern from both industry and academia. To add value with KM, we need KMS, which involve the application of IT systems and other organizational resources to manage knowledge strategically, are a relatively recent phenomenon. The goal of this research is to find the significant factors that link with KMS use and individual performance by using diamond model and contingency theory, which emphasizes the importance of fit. We combine with three distinct factors of compatibility, including (1) Technology - Task Compatibility (2) Technology - People Compatibility (3) Technology - Organization Compatibility, to mold an integrated model. An empirical survey methodology is applied to test the research model and seven hypotheses are developed in this study, and then we use PLS to analyze it. The results reveal that Technology-Task compatibility contributes most to the use of KMS. It implies that KMS should fulfill the task needs of users, and therefore, people will use more functions of the KM systems frequently. Besides, Technology-People compatibility has similar effect on the use of KMS. This suggests that it will enhance the usage if the KMS is more compatible with users¡¦ past experience and value. We also found that Technology - Organization compatibility has least impact on usage, but it still needed to take into consideration and worthy to discuss in the future research. In sum, unlike much prior research that has focused on only a limited aspect of compatibility, we provide a more comprehensive conceptual definition that disaggregates the content of compatibility into three distinct and separable constructs and the findings of this study provides some suggestions for the KMS research.

Denna studie undersöker hur unga organisationer med växtvärk i behov av att hantera samlad kunskap kan hjälpas genom identifiering och utveckling av designprinciper från tidigare forskning om kunskapshantering. Genom att analysera och applicera dessa designprinciper i organisationens kontext har utveckling av en konceptuell modell av en wiki utförts. 8 st designprinciper har legat till grund för utvecklingen av denna artefakt som har utvecklats under kommunikation med en fokusgrupp inom studiemiljön. Arbetet är av tillämpad karaktär där aktionsforskning och därmed iterativa steg med reflektion har bidragit till identifiering och utveckling av designprinciperna samt den konceptuella modellen. Den utvecklade modellen erbjuder exempelvis ett koncept att använda smart länkningsstruktur i wikin för att kunna ersätta behovet av ett separat learning management system för utbildning. Den använder även kontext- och rollbaserad dirigering för att säkerställa att rätt kunskap landar hos rätt person. / This study investigates how a young organization with growing pains in need of managing collective knowledge can be helped through the identification and development of design principles from previous knowledge management research. By analyzing and applying these design principles in the organization's context, development of a conceptual model of a wiki has been carried out. 8 design principles have formed the basis for the development of this artefact, which has been developed in communication with a focus group within the study environment. The work is of an applied nature where action research and thus iterative steps with reflection have contributed to identification, as well as development of the design principles and the conceptual model. The developed model offers, for example, a concept to use a smart linking structure in the wiki to be able to replace the need for a separate learning management system for education. It also uses context- and role-based routing to ensure that the right knowledge lands with the right person

Disertaciją Sistemos architektūra, grindžiamos žinių valdymo procesais sudaro šie skyriai: 1. Įvadas. 2. Žinių valdymas bei žinių valdymo technologijos. 3. Žinių valdymo sistemų ir jų architektūrų analizė. 4. Sistemos architektūra, grindžiamos žinių valdymo procesais. 5. Žinių valdymo sistemos taikymas organizacijose. 6. Bendrosios išvados. Įvadas apima tyrimo aktualumą, mokslinį naujumą, darbo tikslus ir uždavinius, praktinę tyrimo vertę bei aprobavimą tarptautinėse konferencijose ir seminaruose. Pirmame skyriuje „Žinių valdymas ir žinių valdymo technologijos“ pateikiamas žinių valdymo sąvokos apibrėžimas, apie kurį diskutuoja daugelis autorių, dirbančių mokslo ir pramonės srityse. Žinių valdymas pradedamas nagrinėti nuo žinių apibrėžimo ir jo interpretavimo, plačiai aptariamo literatūroje. Tuomet pereinama prie priemonių, padedančių įdiegti žinių valdymą praktikoje. Antrame skyriuje „Žinių valdymo sistemų ir jų architektūrų analizė“ analizuojamos kitų tyrėjų veikaluose siūlomos žinių valdymo sistemų architektūros. Klasifikuojami ir tiriami tokių sistemų arba sprendimų pavyzdžiai, suskirstant juos į komercinius ir atvirojo kodo šaltinius. Išanalizavus egzistuojančias žinių valdymo sistemų architektūras, trečiame skyriuje „Sistemos architektūra, grindžiamos žinių valdymo procesais“ siūloma žinių valdymo sistemos architektūra, sutelkta į žinių valdymo procesus. Tuomet apibūdinamos informacinės ir komunikacinės technologijos, kurias galima taikyti kiekvienam žinių valdymo... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / The thesis “A system architecture centred on knowledge management processes” consists of these chapters: 1. Introduction. 2. Knowledge management and knowledge management tools. 3. Analysis of knowledge management systems, their architectures and solutions. 4. A system architecture centred on knowledge management processes. 5. Knowledge management implementations in organizations. 6. General conclusions. The introduction chapter covers relevance, tasks, object, scientific novelty and practical value of the research, and work approbation in international conferences. The first chapter presents knowledge management definitions discussed by many authors in academia and industry. To enter into this subject, knowledge determinations and interpretations widely discussed in literature are analysed. Later, tasks which knowledge management solves in organizations and tools which help to put it into practice are discussed. In the second chapter architectures of knowledge management systems suggested by other researchers in literature are investigated. Thereafter, a classification of them and an investigation of examples of such systems or solutions are made. After the analysis of knowledge management discipline and existing knowledge management system architectures, an architecture for knowledge management systems which is knowledge management processes centred is suggested in the third chapter. Then, specifications of information and communication technologies which could be used... [to full text]

The effective use of computer based tools to support decision making in manufacturing industry is critical to business success. One of the most critical areas is during product design and especially in design for manufacture. This research will help in understanding of how manufacturing knowledge can be effectively maintained for an existing knowledge base. The work will use modern product lifecycle management tools in combination with a knowledge based environment in order to explore the effectiveness of the methods produced. This work is a part of the SAMULET (Strategic Affordable Manufacturing in the UK through Leading Environmental Technologies) research program and was done in association with an aerospace manufacturing company. The main focus of this research is to define a novel method for maintaining the machining knowledge associated with manufacturing of Xtra Wide Body (XWB) High Pressure (HP) turbine blade. The four main elements explained in this thesis are, a) the literature review done on knowledge management and knowledge maintenance, b) industrial investigation done on a manufacturing facility, c) detailed explanation of a novel manufacturing knowledge maintenance method d) four iterative case studies used for the evaluation and iterative improvement of the method. The research concludes that the aspect of knowledge maintenance is important. It is imperative to set out a formalised and mandated knowledge maintenance process in an organisation to keep the knowledge up-to-date and relevant. It has been shown that a novel task based knowledge maintenance method comprising a Knowledge Maintenance Process (KMP) and a Knowledge Maintenance Template (KMT) provides an effective route to knowledge maintenance. Three maintenance tasks, check relevancy, knowledge filtering, and integrity checking have been considered in detail for successful knowledge maintenance. Four iterative case studies have been conducted for the experimental evaluation of the maintenance method. As the result of these evaluations a novel method for maintaining the machining knowledge of XWB HP turbine blade was defined.

This thesis analyses the process of knowledge-base adoption in the enterprise environment. Using data from two knowledge-management systems operated by the company, Semanta, s.r.o. we studied the day-to-day interactions of employees using the system and identified the important drivers of system adoption. We began by studying the effect of co-workers' collaborative activities on knowledge creation within the system. It was found that they had a positive and significant impact upon overall knowledge creation and thus on adoption. Secondly, we explored how the newly defined concept of gamification could help determine and encourage an increase in knowledge creation. The use of gamification tools, such as the "Hall of Fame" page, turned out to have significant influence in the adoption process. Thirdly, we examined how users continually seek knowledge within the system and how asking for missing information and being supplied with answers has an impact on adoption rates. It was shown that the quicker the responses and the more experts dealing with requests the greater the impact on knowledge base adoption. Finally, we showed that the size and character of the company deploying the knowledge management system does not influence the adoption drivers. This thesis represents an effort to fill the...

Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the success of a consulting agency’s KMS, examine the relationships between the factors constituting to its success, and explore possible effects of the knowledge management strategies codification and personalization on these correlations. Design/methodology/approach – This paper is a case study researching a Swedish consulting company’s KMS success using a KMS success model by Wu & Wang (2006). The survey’s results were interpreted using standard multiple regression analysis, which helped to investigate and interpret the correlations between the dimensions constituting KMS success. Findings – The findings in this paper suggest that personalization and codification have an influence on the quality of the correlations between the KMS success dimensions leaving the overall structure intact. Additionally the influence of System Quality on Perceived KMS Benefits and User Satisfaction on System Use were not found significant. Research limitations/implications – This study ‘s main limitiation is a sample size and the case study approach, which limit the generalizability of the results to other contexts. Practical implications – The most important implication of this research is the importance of the user for KMS success. A company needs to focus on improving the benefits a user receives from a KMS, which can mainly be achieved by improving the knowledge made available through the KMS, and by providing a proper basis for the KMS, in order to ensure a minimum level of System Quality. Other factors influencing the success of a KMS are incentives, which can help to increase system use and the quality of system use. Originality/value – The paper shows that when researching KMS success one should take the structure of the company’s knowledge management strategy into consideration. It further proves the applicability of the model in different contexts and its validity for accurately measuring KMS success.

Knowledge sharing has been an important issue to the outcomes of Knowledge Management. Although research in the past dealt with many subjects, such as firms and profit and non-profit organizations, the focus has never been on the research team in the university. . This research adopts qualitative oriented research method to investigate the differences of the nature and goals of a research team in the university by participant observation, in-depth interview and secondary data collection. The members of a research lab in the university which has implemented knowledge management in the past six years were observed to find out what factors affecting their knowledge sharing behaviors when using the KM platform under particular situations. Based on the views of organizational behaviors, the factors affecting knowledge sharing were divided into three levels: individual level, group level and organization level. The research found out that the factors influencing knowledge sharing in individual level are subjective value, working attitude, self-satisfaction, altruism, self-evaluation, behavioral resistance and ability. In the group level, the factors are sharing atmosphere, interaction, peer stimulation, group culture, peer affection, society expectation, relationship difference, leadership style and trust. In the organization level, the factors are working pattern and environment, organization culture, system function, KM institution and knowledge content. Finally, the interaction among factors is discussed and a conceptual framework of the knowledge sharing among members is presented. Suggestions and improvements toward future research are then provided.

This thesis initiates from the empirical researches findings which indicate that cognition-action gap exists in knowledge sharing practice. In order to have a deep insight, the researcher conducts a phenomenological qualitative research to explore the context behind this phenomenon. We adopt phenomenological interview technique to explore the lived experience concerning knowledge sharing in knowledge management systems (KMS) called SCTNet. We interview forty-nine teachers who register as the members on SCTNet and are located in different cities in Taiwan. Research findings show that the meaning of knowledge that teachers perceive are¡G the techniques and lived experiences accumulated from the interactions with children¡¦s parents and children, teaching professions and designs, and the beliefs in teaching. The teachers perceive knowledge sharing as the transit power in transforming oneself from alone to belong to the teacher¡¦s professional community and helps oneself expands his/her experience from limited into broader. We find that teachers¡¦ interaction happened in five different fields in the school. These are the places of workshop, demo, gossiping, apprenticeship learning, and ¡§the space between you and me¡¨. In each field, there exist different phenomena of interactions. In the fields of workshop, demo, gossiping and apprenticeship learning, most of the interactions are perceived as a ¡§form of play¡¨, and only little lived experience is shared in these places. Most of lived experience sharing and learning happen in ¡§the space between you and me¡¨. Research findings indicate that the constrains frame these teachers in speaking out of their lived experience are¡Gthe norms of teacher society, busyness, and loneness. These teachers show their desires in looking for ¡§others¡¨ as the learning and sharing partners in SCTNet. Yet, they show different participation phenomena while they present themselves in the virtual space and these phenomena outline two forums for interaction in SCTNet. One of them is ¡§Smart¡¨ platform and another is ¡§Outside¡¨. On the ¡§Smart¡¨ platform, teachers perceive themselves as smart teachers and show strong group identity to this platform, share their lived experience actively, and always give support while partners need. They defense against outsiders while others criticize their platform. However, the members and their behaviors in sharing on ¡§Smart¡¨ platform are through the security check and guaranteed the sharings are safe. The phenomena in ¡§Outside¡¨ show that most of the participants keep quiet or with few interactions to hide themselves from the ¡¨others¡¨ on SCTNet. In this area, a lot of teaching materials are stored and used by the novices or the travelers on the virtual space. Sometimes, ¡§Outside¡¨ serves as the communication channel of the educational administration for transfering the documentations. Yet, with the administration intervention, participants are encouraged to submit or post some materials upon the ¡§quantity¡¨ request. This makes the SCTNet under the risk of becoming an information junkyard (McDermot 1994). Research findings also indicate the factors which serve as obstructs, exits, and projections that teachers tour around the physical and virtual space. At the end, several reflections are proposed from the perspectives of educational contexts, teachers, and information technologies for constructing the knowledge management systems.

In the age of knowledge-based economy, knowledge has been replacing land, labor, capital and equipment and becoming one of the most important production factor. Facing the global, violent competition and management environments like rapid technology improvement, fast speedy, service and customer orientation, employee dispersion and high levels of manpower flow, and close corporation relation, enterprises which can create, accumulate, manage and use knowledge efficiently will develop forever. This is why more and more enterprises implement knowledge management to transfer employees¡¦ experiences and knowledge into organizational knowledge. Enterprises use knowledge management as the foundation of organizational development and innovation to shorten learning curve, promote firms¡¦ productivities and to innovate economy value. Knowledge management has become the mainly management strategy. Enterprise¡¦s installation of knowledge management system is the important part of knowledge management, and it is inevitable to enhance the efficiency of knowledge management. The expenses are high for knowledge management system in software, hardware, installation and training, while the profits depend on employees¡¦ acceptance and actual use. This study uses the ¡§Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology/ UTAUT¡¨ as the basis, and considers the characters of knowledge management system and users to determine the structure. So enterprises can use it for reference in planning, installing and valuing knowledge management system. After analyzing the data, the main results of this study are as follows: 1. Influencing employees¡¦ acceptance factors on system are job performance, ease of use, corporation support and facilitating conditions. 2. Significant positive correlations are identified among job performance, ease of use, corporation support, facilitating conditions, intension to use and actual use. 3. The factors of influencing on system¡¦s intension to use are job performance and ease of use. And the factors influencing system¡¦s actual use are job performance and facilitating conditions. Intension to use influences actual use directly. 4. Employees with different characters have different degrees of attention on different factors. 5. Job performance is the mainly influencing factor for employees on the degree of system acceptance.

This study explores the challenge faced when an organization utilizes innovative knowledge management system to transfer internal best practice. The objective of this study is to explore what model should be employed by an organization to promote continual emergence of practical knowledge for knowledge workers as this kind of knowledge is deeply affected by situated factors when high tech engineers have high level of personalized knowledge and are embedded in practice. By qualitative case study methodology, this study adopts theoretical views of the nature of knowledge embeddedness and situated learning to explore the process of two semiconductor companies implementing management models to help engineers transfer their knowledge and experiences. Of these two companies, the ChipMaker is a supplier of semiconductor equipment. It inputs a set of system based knowledge model to transfer best maintenance practices of engineers by this system. While the other ChipTest company operates community oriented knowledge management model. After strict instructions, engineers regularly gather to share their experience and problems they faced. After theoretical and qualitative data analysis, this thesis study has three major study findings. First, the nature of situated knowledge is shown from the maintenance jobs of engineers. This kind of knowledge is personalized cognition and is embedded in work situation. Diversified deciphering situations are developed via irritation of work situations. The situated knowledge can only be emerged from social network based on situation development and impromptu dialog and action accompanying problem exploration. Second, many existing literatures and practical applications do not clarify the nature of knowledge embeddedness, but adopt "system based knowledge management model", which assumes that an organization can directly manage "knowledge" and acts of "knowledge workers". However, this study finds that the system can only manage "knowledge object" and is only applicable to problems of steady and simple situations. Furthermore, the system inclines to misleading engineers exchange superficial knowledge documents. In other words, "situated knowledge" most needed by engineers is the process of continual reproduction and potential transfer through social interaction, not a linear manner of direct transfer. Therefore, only situated learning can effectively share knowledge of embedded nature. Third, this study finds that an organization is not likely to manage "situated knowledge" that is emerged only from specific situation, but manages "social structure" to nourish knowing in practice . This dialog structures must have the following four features: 1. situated stimuli, 2. multidimensional situation link, 3. group identities, 4. collectively implied memories. Only with these features, members can be attracted to continually input activity energy to keep vitality of community interaction. Finally, from two cases of knowledge managements this study develops two kinds of knowledge management models ¡V "object style", i.e. big K and small m [Km], and "jigsaw style", i.e. small k and big M (kM) ¡V and suggests their theoretical and practical implications