Organizational knowledge generation: lessons from online communities

Abstract

Purpose – Knowledge capturing and sharing within an organization have been extensively studied in the literature. In this stream of work, an influential focus is on the process of encoding and managing knowledge to enable effective reuse within the organization. With the advancement of internet and web technologies, there is an increased interest in the study of knowledge flows in online communities. The authors highlight in this paper the fact that the boundaries between internal and external organizational knowledge are disappearing, mainly due to the extensive use of online-based platforms to support organizational operations. The authors believe that this will affect the activities of knowledge management in today’s businesses. The purpose of this paper is to provide guidelines for organizations on how to bridge their internal and external knowledge using an integrated semantic approach. Design/methodology/approach – In this paper the authors review two classes of approaches, those that target internal organizational knowledge, and those that target online knowledge flow processes. Then the authors identify the challenges involved in today’s knowledge environments. To address those challenges, the authors propose a framework to bridge and integrate internal and external organizational knowledge. The authors map the activities handled in the framework to the existing knowledge management activities identified from the literature, and highlight how emerging technologies are used to support such activities along the knowledge management process. The authors apply the approach in the context of an organization’s process that heavily depends on the appropriate alignment of internal and external knowledge. The authors focus on the use of emerging technologies that support collaboration and the generation of explicit and reusable semantics. Findings – Interaction points within organizations can be used to define the scope of knowledge exchanged. Following a methodology around the proposed framework, it is feasible to create conceptual connections around internal and external knowledge through explicit semantics. Such connections that are created to support online communities’ knowledge exchange can be applied to internal organizational knowledge, and used as a bridge to external knowledge sources. Originality/value – The paper provides a roadmap for organizations on how to manage organizational knowledge processes in a coherent and collaborative semantic platform, with a view to what is available outside the boundaries of an organization.

Supply chain flexibility in dynamic environments

“…This provides greater understanding of the capabilities that are needed to align the SC with the environment and of the weight or relative importance of each capability. It therefore guides managers in determining what capabilities, tools, and routines they should develop for knowledge management (Zablith et al , 2016).…”

“…In other words, by modelling the indirect effects of environmental dynamism on SCF, we can theorise about how these capabilities help the firm to "convert" or "transmit" changes in the environment into the development of a flexible SC. We can expect OAC to be a better alignment mechanism than OL because: (i) the knowledge resulting from OAC enables greater functional integration (Ellegaard and Koch, 2012) due to its closer proximity to the operating system; and, (ii) OAC enables the creation of effective value for the firm from the stimuli it has found outside itself, generating results based on solution building (Zablith et al, 2016). In contrast, the transmission of dynamism in the environment to the development of a flexible SC via OL must be softer, as the greater distance between functions (Toon et al, 2016)i.e.…”

The Impact of Using Social Networking Sites at Work on Organizational Knowledge

“…Hence, organizational knowledge is is informally generated through socialization, where knowledge moves from the individual, to the team, institution and inter-organizational level (Nonaka, 1994). Employees involved in social interaction contribute their knowledge with the purpose to achieve specific goals of the organization (Zablith et al, 2016) . Moreover, knowledge contribution will often unlock innovation and generate new ideas, resulting in fulfilling specific objectives of the organization.…”

“…Moreover, knowledge contribution will often unlock innovation and generate new ideas, resulting in fulfilling specific objectives of the organization. Traditional social interactions are now being replaced by computer-mediated tools (such as the Internet and SNSs), enabling organizational stakeholders to seek knowledge beyond the boundaries of the organization by easily collaborating between the organization and online communities (Zablith et al, 2016)…”

Making user-friendly experiences that leverage online collaboration

“…Because of this, there is an increase of interest in the study of knowledge flows in online communities. The authors Zablith, Faraj, and Azad (2016) highlight in the journal article Organizational knowledge generation: lessons from online communities that the boundaries between internal and external organizational knowledge are disappearing mainly due to the extensive use of online-based platforms to support organizational operations. They also believe that this will affect the activities of knowledge management in today's businesses.…”