Supporting complex problems: an examination of Churchman's inquirers as a knowledge management foundation

Abstract

Public reporting burden tor this collection ot intormation is estimated to average 1 hour per response, including the time tor reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining the data needed, and completing and reviewing the collection of information. Churchman's inquiring systems. These inquiring systems are ideal foundations from which to view knowledge management and its associated research because knowledge creation and organizational learning are critical elements of knowledge management. Churchman proposed that organizations should support knowledge creation and learning through emphasis on problem structure and appropriate inquiring strategies. This paper discusses the characteristics of Churchman's inquirers, the problem structure for which they are most appropriate, and presents examples of each. Then, examples of previous research that share characteristics of the most complex inquirers are discussed. Organizational benefits from the inquiring system approach and guidelines for future research are suggested.

Designing insightful inquiring systems for sustainable organizational foresight

“…It is regularly revisited and commented upon (e.g. [30]), yet often misunderstood because this monograph of Churchman's expects of his readers an understanding of the main lines of the history of philosophy of science.…”

Knowledge Promotes Quality Management: A Case Study of Quality Problem-Solving in Two Automotive Plants

“…Traditional models of problem-solving assume that a structured process of problem definition, problems analysis, and root causes identification, generation, and selection of solutions, testing, and evaluation of solutions (Macduffie, 1997;, while this process mainly relies on human experience and overlooks the importance of data, as well as organisational knowledge (Linderman, Schroeder, Zaheer, Liedtke, & Choo, 2004;Berends, 2005). Because of staff mobility and inexperienced new employees, problem-solving is often a time consuming and cost-intensive process, which makes the organisational knowledge play a key role in problem-solving (Postrel, 2002;Peachey & Hall, 2006).…”