INKM7322 Information and Knowledge Management Student Summary PDF

Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 INFORMATION AND KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT (INKM7322) THIS HANDOUT CONTAINS ADDITIONAL NOTES PER CHAPTER (where applicable). CHAPTER 2: THE NATURE OF KNOWLEDGE Relating Data, Information and...

Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 INFORMATION AND KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT (INKM7322) THIS HANDOUT CONTAINS ADDITIONAL NOTES PER CHAPTER (where applicable). CHAPTER 2: THE NATURE OF KNOWLEDGE Relating Data, Information and Knowledge to Events Role of knowledge within organizations. It divides knowledge into: Support knowledge, which relates to organizational infrastructure and facilitates day-to- day operations; Tactical knowledge, which pertains to short-term positioning of organization relative to its markets, competitors, and suppliers; and Strategic knowledge, which pertains to long-term positioning of organization in terms of its corporate vision and strategies for achieving that vision. Absorptive capacity FE 2024/1  Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 CHAPTER 5: ORGANIZATIONAL IMPACTS OF KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT How Knowledge Management Impacts People Economy of scale vs. economy of scope CHAPTER 6: KNOWLEDGE APPLICATION SYSTEMS – SYSTEMS THAT UTILIZE KNOWLEDGE Developing Knowledge Application Systems Case-Method Cycle is a methodology that describes an iterative approach to effectively develop CBR and knowledge application systems. The Case-Method Cycle describes the following six processes: 1. Systems development This process is based on standard software engineering approaches, and process its goal is to develop a knowledge application system that will store new cases and retrieve relevant cases. 2. Case library The goal of this process is to develop and maintain a large-scale case library development process that will adequately support the domain in question. 3. System operation This process is based on standard software engineering and relational process database management procedures. Its goal is to define the installation, deployment, and user support of the knowledge application system. 4. Database mining This process uses rule-inferencing techniques and statistical analysis to process analyze the case library. This step could help infer new relationships between the data, which could be articulated to enhance the knowledge application system. 5. Management process This process describes how the project task force will be formed and what organizational support will be provided to the project. FE 2024/2  Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 6. Knowledge transfer This process describes the incentive systems that will be implemented to process encourage user acceptance and support of the knowledge application system. This step will ensure that users will feel compelled to supplement the case library with new cases. Types of Knowledge Application Systems Implementation of help desk technologies to assist help desk employees track calls and resolve customer service problems. The system helps with fault diagnosis. JIT (Just in Time) enables organizations to order according to sales orders received. Expert systems (see RULE BASED SYSTEMS in original handout): CHAPTER 7: KNOWLEDGE CAPTURE SYSTEMS – SYSTEMS THAT PRESERVE AND FORMALIZE KNOWLEDGE Phoel’s Eight Steps to Successful Storytelling 1. Have a clear purpose. 5. Trim detail. 2. Identify an example of successful change. 6. Underscore the cost of failure. 3. Tell the truth. 7. End on a positive note. 4. Say who, what, when. 8. Invite your audience to dream. Four Kinds of Truth in each Effective Story 1. Truth to the teller - the storyteller must be congruent to her story. 2. Truth to the audience - the story must fulfil the listeners’ expectations by understanding what the listeners know, meeting their emotional needs, and telling the story in an interactive fashion. FE 2024/3 Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 3. Truth to the moment - since great storytellers prepare obsessively and never tell a story the same way twice. 4. Truth to the mission - since great storytellers are devoted to the cause, which is embodied in the story, capturing and expressing the values that she believes in and wants others to adopt as their own. Springboard Stories Springboard stories enable a leap in understanding by the audience in order to grasp how an organization may change by visualizing from a story in one context what is involved in large-scale organizational transformations. Springboard stories are told from the perspective of a protagonist who was in a predicament, which may resemble the predicament currently faced by the organization. Techniques for Organizing and Using Stories Narratives – told as a story. Anthropological explanation – use of naïve questions. Storytelling circles - formed by groups having a certain degree of coherence and identity such as a common experience in a project. Certain methods can be used for eliciting anecdotes such as: 1. Dit-spinning - fish tales - represents human tendencies to escalate or better the stories shared previously. 2. Alternative histories - are fictional anecdotes which could have different turning points, based for example on a particular project’s outcome. 3. Shifting character or context - are fictional anecdotes where the characters may be shifted to study the new perspective of the story. 4. Indirect stories - allow disclosing the story with respect to fictional characters, so that any character similarities with real-life character are considered to be pure coincidence. 5. Metaphor - provides a common reference to a story, cartoon or movie. Barriers to the Use of Knowledge Capture Systems Familiarization with the structure of knowledge (taken from the SME/ Subject Matter Expert) is a requirement, often a difficult proposition, in the sense that the interviewer must develop some idea of which paradigm would best represent knowledge at hand. Only if the interviewer is able to develop an idea of the type or nature of knowledge early in the process, will she be able to adequately represent it. Some people may be resistant to trying new things, and the proposition of interacting with a machine may be one that many experts may not necessarily look forward to. FE 2024/4  Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 CHAPTER 8: KNOWLEDGE SHARING SYSTEMS – SYSTEMS THAT ORGANIZE AND DISTRIBUTE KNOWLEDGE Designing the KM Sharing System - Critical Requirements for the Success of a Knowledge Sharing System 1. Collection and systematic Most organizational business processes require information and organization of information from data including CAD drawings, e-mails, electronic documents various sources. such as specifications, and even paper documents. 2. Minimization of up-front knowledge Knowledge sharing systems must take advantage of explicit engineering. organizational information and data such that these systems can be built quickly, and generate returns on investment. 3. Exploiting user feedback for Knowledge sharing systems should be designed maintenance and evolution to support user’s needs and their business process workflows. 4. Integration into existing environment Must integrate with the IT tools currently used to perform the business tasks. 5. Active presentation of relevant The goal of an active knowledge sharing system is to present its information users with the required information when/ wherever needed. CHAPTER 9: KNOWLEDGE DISCOVERY SYSTEMS – SYSTEMS THAT CREATE KNOWLEDGE Designing a Knowledge Discovery System - basic steps of data mining for knowledge discovery: 1. Business First requirement for knowledge discovery: understand the business problem. understanding To obtain the highest benefit from data mining, there must be a clear statement of the business objectives. 2. Data Knowing the data well can permit the designers to tailor the algorithm or tools understanding used for data mining to their specific problem. 3. Data Preparation Steps for the Data Preparation: 1. Selection. 2. Construction and Transformation of Variables. 3. Data Integration. 4. Data Formatting. FE 2024/5  Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 4. Model building Building an accurate model is a trial-and-error process. and validation 5. Evaluation and Once the model is determined, the validation data set is fed through model. Preparation 6. Deployment Implementing the “live” model within an organization to aid decision-making. Web Mining Techniques: Web mining techniques can be classified into four main layers: 1. Linguistic Analysis/ NLP Linguistic Analysis/ NLP is used to identify key concept descriptors (who, what, when, or where), which are embedded in the textual documents. 2. Statistical and Co-occurrence Analysis Link analysis is used to create conceptual associations for keyword concepts. 3. Statistical and Neural Networks Clustering and Categorization Statistical and neural networks clustering and categorization are used to group similar documents together into domain categories. 4. Visualization and Human Computer Interfaces Visualization and human computer interfaces (HCI) can reveal conceptual associations, which can be represented in various dimensions. Uses for Web Data Mining: There are three types of uses for Web data mining: 1. Web Structure Mining Mining the Web structure examines how Web documents are structured and attempts to discover the model underlying the link structures of the Web. Intra-page structure mining evaluates the arrangement of HTML tags within page. Web structure mining is useful to categorize web pages and generate relationships. 2. Web Usage Mining Web usage mining, also known as clickstream analysis, involves the identification of patterns in user navigation through Web pages in a domain, to discover knowledge about the Web surfer’s behaviours. Web usage mining includes three main tasks: pre-processing, pattern discovery, and pattern analysis. 3. Web Content Mining Web content mining is used to discover what a Web page is about and how to uncover new knowledge from it. Web content data include what is used to create the Web page including the text, images, audio, video, hyperlinks, and metadata. Barriers to the Use of Knowledge Discovery Systems Data tombs or data stores are DM systems that reside to simply ‘rest in peace’ –remain unused. FE 2024/6 Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 The following challenges emerge for DM: o Scaling analysis to large databases – databases are too large to work with. o Scaling to high-dimensional data and models – users lack understanding. o Automating the search can be challenging. o Finding patterns and models understandable to users can be challenging. CHAPTER 10: EMERGENT KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT PRACTICES IT Impact on Organizations IT can have different types of impacts in the organization - fall in three different categories: 1. Function IT - refers to IT that helps with the getting a specific task done. Function IT delivers productivity and optimization. It is not hard to implement; the manager’s main role is to create business processes that will maximize their utility. Some examples are spreadsheets and simulation software. 2. Network IT - refers to IT that supports interaction. This type of IT doesn’t require modifications to business processes, but these may evolve over time in order to gain additional advantages. Network IT delivers increased collaboration. Adoption is usually voluntary and their adoption isn’t difficult. Some examples are wikis and blogs. 3. Enterprise IT - refers to IT that specifies business processes and thus must be accompanied by the specification of new tasks and sequences. Enterprise IT delivers standardization and monitors work. It is hard for companies to adopt, and employees usually dislike them thus requiring forceful intervention of the IT leader. Some examples include ERP (e.g. SAP) and CRM. CHAPTER 11: FACTORS INFLUENCING KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT Contingency Factors and KM – The relationship between the two Contingency factors indirectly affect KM systems and the mechanisms and technologies enabling KM systems, as shown using arrows 2 and 3. KM infrastructure supports KM mechanisms and technologies (arrow 4), which in turn affect KM systems (arrow 5) and KM systems support KM processes (arrow 6). FE 2024/7 Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 Thus, the KM infrastructure indirectly affects KM processes (arrow 7). Several contingency factors influence the choice of KM processes. o They include characteristics of the tasks being performed, the knowledge being managed, the organization, and the organization’s environment. Effects of Task Characteristics on KM Processes The Effects of Knowledge Characteristics Three knowledge characteristics - explicit versus tacit, procedural versus declarative, and general versus specific - were examined in Chapter 2. The Effects of Organizational and Environmental Characteristics Two organizational characteristics - size and strategy - and one environmental characteristic – uncertainty - affect the suitability of knowledge management processes. FE 2024/8 Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 Size Organization size affects KM processes by influencing the choice between the two processes supporting knowledge application (direction, routines) and the two processes supporting knowledge sharing (socialization, exchange). For knowledge application, large and bureaucratic organizations would benefit from routines because of their greater use of standards and potential for reuse of routines. Small organizations, are usually not very bureaucratic and have less potential for reusing processes and procedures coded as routines. They would therefore benefit more from direction, which does not rely on standardization and rules. Large organizations are often globally distributed, therefore knowledge sharing across greater distances would be needed in large organizations; whereas knowledge is more likely to be shared across shorter distances in smaller co-located organizations. Business Strategy Organizations pursuing a low-cost strategy should focus on applying existing knowledge rather than creating new knowledge, whereas organizations following a differentiation strategy are more likely to innovate. Organizations pursuing low-cost or differentiation strategy would benefit from knowledge capture and sharing processes, as these processes can be used to capture or share knowledge on ways of reducing costs and innovating with products or services. Environmental Uncertainty Environmental uncertainty, which refers to the business context in which the firm operates, should not be confused with task uncertainty which refers to not having a priori knowledge of details involved in the steps required by a task. When the organization faces low levels of uncertainty, knowledge sharing and knowledge capture processes would be recommended because the captured and shared knowledge would be relevant for longer periods of time. On the other hand, under higher uncertainty, knowledge application and discovery would be recommended. CHAPTER 12: LEADERSHIP AND ASSESSMENT OF KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT Leadership of Knowledge Management The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and executive board have direct impact on how organization views KM. Leaders must endorse/ stress importance of KM. FE 2024/9 Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 The CEO designates leadership of knowledge management function to another senior executive who could be the Chief Knowledge Officer (CKO), Chief Learning Officer, and in some cases the Chief Information Officer. Some CEOs might consider adding that responsibility of leading KM to the role of the Chief Information Officer (CIO). The Chief Learning Officer (CLO) is the “business leader of corporate learning”. Critical success factors for CKOs to achieve goal of managing KM in organizations: Having high-level sponsorship that extends beyond the CEO support. Institutionalizing knowledge sharing incentives. Breaking knowledge bottlenecks that impede smooth knowledge flows. Embedding knowledge into the work practices and processes. Organizational slack time to think, dream, talk, and sell. Creating reference projects that demonstrate the value of KM. Documenting visible successes for their own performance. Several reasons demonstrate/ attest to the need for conducting a KM assessment: 1. A KM assessment helps identify the contributions being currently made by KM. It helps answer the question: Is KM improving the individual’s or organization’s ability to perform various tasks and enhancing efficiency, effectiveness, innovativeness? 2. A KM assessment enhances understanding of the quality of efforts being put into KM and intellectual capital produced through these efforts. It helps answer the questions: Are the KM solutions being employed adequate for the needs of the individual or the organization? 3. A KM assessment helps understand whether costs of KM efforts are justified by the benefits they produce. It helps answer the question: Do the direct and indirect benefits from KM together exceed or equal the various costs incurred? 4. A KM assessment helps recognize gaps that need to be addressed in KM efforts by individuals or the organization. Helps answer the question: What kind of potentially valuable KM solutions do the individual and the organization currently lack? 5. KM assessment can help in making a business case to senior executives for additional investments in KM. Business case can be built for development of solutions that address gaps. Some of the aspects that can be evaluated during a post-project assessment: Perceptions of improved KM in the area focused on by the project. Perceptions of greater availability of knowledge in area focused on by project. Some evidence of financial return (e.g., cost savings, increased returns, ROI, etc.), either for KM function itself or for the entire organization. Increased awareness of the importance of knowledge management. FE 2024/10 Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 Increased recognition of different areas of knowledge. Greater knowledge sharing throughout the organization. Greater comfort level throughout organization with concepts KM. Overall Approaches for KM Assessment 1. Benchmarking Comparing KM at an organization or subunit with other organizations or subunits. 2. Balanced Scorecard Examines goals, metrics, targets, and initiatives for four different perspectives: a. Customer Perspective: How should our customers perceive us? b. Financial Perspective: What is the face that we want to present to our shareholders? c. Internal Business Perspective: Are internal operations efficient and effective and performing at their best? d. Learning and Growth Perspective: How can we sustain competitive advantage over time? 3. Intangible Assets Monitor Framework Recognizes the importance of examining intangible knowledge assets. The Intangible Assets Monitor considers a firm’s market value to depend on tangible net book value and intangible assets which include: a. External structure (including relationships with customers and suppliers, brand names, trademarks, and image or reputation). b. Internal structure (including the patents, concepts, models, and systems); and the competence of the organization’s individual employees (including skills, education, experience, values, and social skills). c. The Intangible Assets Monitor Framework evaluates growth, renewal, efficiency, and stability for tangible assets (financial value), external structure (customer value), internal structure (organizational value), and individuals’ competence (individual value). 4. Skandia Navigator Method The past is examined with an emphasis on financial aspects, the present is examined by focusing on customers, people, and processes, and the future is examined in terms of renewal and development. 5. Real Options Approach Views KM initiatives as a portfolio of investments. Focuses on value-to-cost ratio. CHAPTER 13: THE FUTURE OF KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT Using KM as a Decision-Making Paradigm Wicked problems are unique and difficult to formulate. FE 2024/11  Information and Knowledge Management INKM7322 Their solutions are good or bad (rather than true or false) and generate waves of consequence over time. Solutions to wicked problems are accomplished in one-shot occurrences, so there is no opportunity to learn from prior mistakes and solutions cannot be undone. Solutions to wicked problems are not numerable, and many may have no solutions. Multiple Perspectives of Decision-Making consider the following: 1. Technical perspective: Analysing alternatives and implementing alternative. This perspective is relevant to existing decision support and KM systems. 2. Personal and individual perspective: Complex problems involve a multiplicity of actors. Each sees problem differently and generates a different perspective based on individual experiences, intuition, personality, and attitudes about risk. 3. Organizational and social perspective: Complex problems involve various organizations. Organizations each view problem in a different fashion/ perspective. 4. Ethics and aesthetics perspective: Complex problems involve business ethics and aesthetic issues that are so high they require involvement of key stakeholders - no simple solutions. Addressing Barriers to Knowledge Sharing and Creation Three main problems constrain individuals’ contributions to KM: a. Privacy Perceived threats to privacy may inhibit individuals from contributing knowledge within concerns organization and organizational boundaries. An individual may be less forthcoming with honest opinions if he believes that recommendations he is providing for a decision would be compiled and potentially viewed in future in the light of other comments he makes over time, within the organization or Internet. b. Concerns KM mechanisms and technologies that help capture and store employee’s knowledge related to reduce knowledge loss when expert employees leave the organization. ‘Knowledge May lead to employees, who are not nearing retirement and concerned about job security, as Power’ being concerned about sharing their knowledge with others in the organization. The perception that “knowledge is power” could lead to belief that by sharing one’s privately held knowledge, one might become dispensable or lose some influence within organization. c. Senior Individuals possessing knowledge might be reluctant to do so due to concerns about privacy executives’ and perceived loss of power. Senior executives need to play an important role. Reluctance Senior executives should make changes in organizational forums and own attitudes. to adapt Some of the important changes are: 1. Creation of flatter organizational structures. 2. Incorporation of diverse and multiple perspectives to facilitate knowledge creation. 3. Willingness to allow redundancy and slack resources for incorporation of diverse and multiple perspectives. 4. The willingness to let go of their power, as is needed for a true knowledge democracy. FE 2024/12