The move from an industrially-based economy to a knowledge or information-based one in the 21st Century demands a top-notch knowledge management system to secure a competitive edge and a capacity for learning.
For several decades the world's best-known forecasters of societal change have predicted the emergence of a new economy in which brainpower, not machine power, is the critical resource. But the future has already turned into the present, and the era of knowledge has arrived.
--"The Learning Organization," Economist Intelligence Unit
Knowledge is intangible, dynamic, and difficult to measure, but without it no organization can survive.
Tacit: or unarticulated knowledge is more personal, experiential, context specific, and hard to formalize; is difficult to communicate or share with others; and is generally in the heads of individuals and teams.
Explicit: explicit knowledge can easily be written down and codified.
To create a climate in which employees volunteer their creativity and expertise, managers need to look beyond the traditional tools at their disposal: finding ways to build trust and develop fair process.
That means getting the gatekeepers to facilitate the flow of information rather than hoard it.
Generating organizational knowledge invariably means converting the tacit knowledge of the individual into explicit knowledge accessible by all. Information technology is most effective when it enables this social process.
Companies must think through their technological systems.
Technology such as Intranets and advanced collaborative software have made Knowledge Management possible.