Enabling knowledge creation and sharing in transnational projects

Abstract

In this study, we link the discussion of knowledge management enablers to research on transnational projects. A transnational project is a cross-border organizational unit composed of members of different nationalities, working in dispersed business units and functions, thereby possessing knowledge for solving strategic tasks in the MNC. Understanding of knowledge creation and sharing processes is essential; hence the purpose of this article is to investigate how different enablers support these processes within transnational projects. Using case-study data to explore the theoretical arguments, interesting implications emerge. First, organizational culture is the most prominent enabler, and is encouraged by the composition of project members. Secondly, impact and importance of enablers vary over time. Thirdly, the enablers are interrelated.

Expanding the concept of Ba: managing enabling contexts in knowledge organizations

“…This group of enabling condition also considered businesses processes where the concept of ba was actually applied in different researches. Here is a summary of our findings that can be useful guidelines for the management of enabling contexts in knowledge organizations: organizational culture: a critical issue to facilitate knowledge creation, a central issue to be shaped in a firm's ability to manage its knowledge more effectively and the most prominent enabler (Inkpen, 1996;Perez Bustamante, 1999;Gold et al, 2001;Lee and Choi, 2002;Roth, 2003;Alvarenga Neto, 2005;Adenfelt andLagerstrom, 2006 von Krogh et al, 2008;); organizational structure: involves organizational structure that foster solid relationships and effective collaboration, such as project teams, cross-divisional units and empowered divisions, among others (von Krogh et al, 2000;Lee and Choi, 2003); systems-based approach, hypertext organization (Gold et al, 2001, Nonaka et al, 2006; autonomous and self-organizing teams (Peltokorpi et al, 2007); organizational and inter-organizational processes: involves the application or studies/research of the concept of ba into business processes such as the management of salesforces (Bennet, 2001), ex ante project risk (Cuellar and Gallivan, 2005), supply-chain (Wu, 2008), inter-organizational healthcare communities (von Krogh et al, 2008), firms in networks (Lechner and Dowling, 2003), transnational projects (Adenfelt and Lagerstrom, 2006), family business context (Brannback,et al, 2008), industrial districts (Corno et al, 1999) and collaborative inter-organizational R&D projects (Johnson, 2000); Human Resources Management and organizational learning initiatives/projects: regards reward systems linked to knowledge-sharing (von Krogh et al, 2008) and the existence of flexible learning objectives (Inkpen, 1996); the cultivation of care through incentive systems, mentoring and training programs in care based behavior, project debriefing and other forms of learning-oriented conversations …”

Knowledge-Sharing Within the Project-Based Organizsation: A Knowledge-Pull Framework

“…They supported the need for a disciplined KM culture in the organisation, which is also promoted by other authors [10,19,39].…”

“…Knowledge articulation and codification are more evolved learning processes, as understanding the causation between the action and resulting performance is required. In addition, the codification process requires an understanding of the process within its context, together with a consideration of future actions [1,18,19]. KM processes are used to transfer the lessons learned from the project into knowledge that can be shared and disseminated.…”

“…The organisational structure, culture, and governance process have an impact on the success of KM [10,19,28]. The governance processes should not restrict the flow of knowledge.…”

Strategic and Organizational Evolutions of High-Tech SME on Global Market

“…A firm can gather new knowledge by spreading out its activities to foreign locations (Adenfelt & Lagerstrom, 2006b). Offshore decentralization of knowledge creation activities is opposed to the centralized approach (Mendez, 2003), which is in conformity with the product life-cycle theory of Vernon (1966).…”