Radu-Mihai OANȚĂ,
PhD. Student, National Defense University “Carol I”,
oanta.radu@myunap.net
Toma PLEȘANU,
Colonel (ret.), Professor, Engineer, Ph.D, National Defence University “Carol I”,
tomaplesanu@yahoo.uk
Abstract: In today’s society, knowledge represents a critical organizational resource which gives a long-lasting competitive advantage in a dynamic and perpetually transforming society. Organizations should more efficiently make use of cognitive resources, focusing on the way in which acquired experience and knowledge are shared from seniors to juniors. As a knowledge-oriented activity, knowledge sharing is an important means through which employees can contribute to the competitive advantage of the organization.
In the given article, we will be presenting issues related to understanding the concept of „knowledge sharing” from several theoretical perspectives, going through the existing literature in the field of knowledge sharing. The starting discussion has been on individual, interpersonal and team characteristics, diversity, organizational culture, motivational factors, rewards and recognition, benefits and expenditure, social networking and individual attitudes towards knowledge sharing.
Knowledge sharing could be the first step towards building up knowledge bank. In this context, we have taken over the World Bank revolutionary concept of knowledge bank and applied to achieving a knowledge bank for defense, public order and national security in the CAROL I National Defense University. Such a project is aimed at collecting, storing, processing and disseminating knowledge in the academic environment by means of descriptive coding which gives meta-structured data in a digital library, so that employing knowledge should be more simply and rapidly done.
Key words: knowledge, information, knowledge sharing, knowledge bank
Introduction
In time, organizations have invested in knowledge, as the latter is essential in the organizational development, while concepts such as knowledge management (KM) and knowledge management systems (KMS) have been launched. Knowledge management belongs to discrete knowledge managing, which presupposes storing explicit knowledge of individuals or teams within organizations, gathering latent knowledge and sharing knowledge through various means to all members of the organization, with the aim of making use of such knowledge.
The role of the information technology within the organization knowledge management is actually the Knowledge Management System (KMS) which has loads of positive effects on knowledge sharing among employees. This process entails six phases: knowledge creating, collecting, perfecting, storing, updating and sharing[1].
The most frequently used support technologies and tools for knowledge management are groupware, email tools, forums, blogs, artificial intelligence means and knowledge and information portals.
The knowledge bank is actually a complex knowledge management system that employs IT technologies for document and work influx management, and which manages Data Warehouse and Data Mining, with the aim of collecting, organizing, filtering, storing and sharing of any type at the level of the organization.
Nonaka considers that information is merely message influxes, while knowledge is based on information and are justified by others’ beliefs.[2] The knowledge present in an organization is of two types – explicit and tacit knowledge. Nonaka and Takeuci (1995) define the classical model of converting tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge in four main phases, namely socializing, externalizing, combining and internalizing[3].
Other researchers in the field consider that all information is knowledge, while knowledge is made up of information and know-how. Moreover, in some approaches knowledge is regarded as information processed by individuals with the aim of getting individual performance.
Summing up, Wang and Noe (2010) identify about 76 qualitative and quantitative case studies published between 1999 and 2008 and three studies published before 1999 in the field of knowledge sharing[4].
Asrar-ul-Haq and Anwar (2016) identified about 64 qualitative and quantitative case studies published between 2010 and 2015 on knowledge management and sharing[5].
Research in the field of knowledge sharing has been conducted on the basis of several theories, out of which the most frequently used are:
- The motivated action theory, which builds up on the attitude towards the communication behavior of the received knowledge;
- The social capital theory analyzed in the context of practice communities;
- The social exchange theory that is employed with the aim of investigating expenditures involved in the process of knowledge sharing;
- The social network theory by whose means connections among individuals belonging to virtual communities are analyzed; such connections can facilitate knowledge sharing and can increase the quality of the knowledge shared.
Next, we will be briefly presenting the research advancement, in line with what is presented in the above mentioned papers.
Knowledge sharing
Knowledge sharing refers to information and know-how sharing related to tasks delivered in collaboration with other members of the organization, with the aim of solving identified problems[6].
Knowledge sharing differs from knowledge transfer and knowledge exchange. Knowledge transfer describes moving knowledge from the knowledge source to the beneficiary with the aim of its learning and acquiring, the main purpose being describing transferring knowledge towards organizations. The knowledge exchange involves both the process of knowledge sharing, generated by individuals who disseminate knowledge to a second party, and the process of knowledge searching, generated by individuals who look for knowledge in a second party.
In the motivated action theory, knowledge sharing among employees influence the complexity of the knowledge at the level of the team and, consequently, at the level of the organization. Highly qualified and more experienced employees have a positive attitude towards knowledge sharing. An important factor in knowledge sharing belongs to the human resource policy of the organization through personnel training systems, upon which the former employs transferring knowledge and expertise from senior to junior employees.
The team component research has proven the fact that employing team members belonging to organizations in the knowledge sharing process positively influences team and implicitly organization performances. The more the team has been informed and the more professional they are, the more they will share acquired knowledge.
Researchers have shown that knowledge sharing can be facilitated through building up a less centralized structure, where an appropriate working environment among employees can be generated, such as open space offices, job rotation, better and more intense communication among departments and participating in informal meetings.
At the organizational level, knowledge sharing is closely connected with business development. Improving the process of knowledge sharing entails reduction of the production costs and implicitly increasing the income from new products and services. Following studies carried out in companies, it has been proven that because of the lack of knowledge sharing huge losses have been witnessed (over 31,5 billion dollars per year for the Fortune 500 companies)[7].
Swang et all have also concluded that female personnel belonging to mixed teams of large organizations are more willing to share knowledge than male personnel[8].
Chow & all have studied the process of knowledge sharing in multinational organizations, in international branches, where multicultural background individuals work[9]. The result was that Chinese employees have had the tendency of sharing knowledge at the level of the organization, even though such a process is detrimental to the individual. On the other hand, American employees are more willing to share knowledge with individuals who do not belong to the team.
Based on a qualitative study carried out in 50 companies, De Long & Fahey have examined the effect of organizational culture on knowledge sharing, drawing the conclusion that, out of all cultural dimensions identified, trust mostly influences the knowledge sharing phenomenon[10].
According to the social capital theory, employees can either or not share knowledge because of various reasons. Employees can share knowledge due to reciprocity or whether they need somebody else’s help. Employees can choose to share knowledge as a means of building up personal relations with colleagues. New employees can be more willing than senior employees to share knowledge with the purpose of creating good impression, which can lead to create opportunities of stepping up the career ladder. Employees who are high in the organizational hierarchy can refrain from sharing knowledge because of the risk of losing position.
At the level of practice communities which are made up of people with mutual interests or problems and who learn from each other through various interactions, the relation between reciprocity principle and the knowledge sharing process has been analyzed. Chiu noticed that reciprocity is positively associated with knowledge sharing within practice communities[11].
The social exchange theory implies the fact that individuals do not value benefits and costs. In accordance with this theory, research shows that benefits have a positive influence on the knowledge sharing process, while costs have a negative influence.
Lack of rewards has been identified as a major barrier in the knowledge sharing process. Organizational rewards, such as promotion in the position, various bonuses and excellence remuneration have been pointed as helpful in knowledge sharing.
Research has shown that managers’ attitude towards stimulating knowledge sharing has been positively linked with employees’ behaviors related to knowledge sharing. Professional satisfaction and organizational attitude promote knowledge sharing.
Kim & Lee have noticed that the emphasis given by the organization’s senior managers to excellence remuneration has successfully contributed to the good process of knowledge sharing[12].
The social network theory has emphasized the role of the advancement of the information society, of the tools and of the platforms the latter generates. Within virtual communities, on the Internet, knowledge is disseminated with the help of the most popular Web 2.0 tools: wikis, blogs and microblogs, social networks, Photo Sharing, Audio/Video Sharing. The connection among active individuals on social networks has proven to positively influence the amount of knowledge sharing. Those who want to consolidate their position in an online professional community practice knowledge sharing.
Irrespective of the more or less sophisticated information technologies they use, organizations have always been conditioned by knowing and implicitly by knowledge, at least at the level of the individual conduct of its members.
Knowledge bank
The concept of knowledge bank appeared in the mid 90s. Starting with the idea that the World Bank has always sold ideas, not just loans, in 1996, the World Bank president, James Wolfensohn, introduced the concept of “knowledge bank” in the business field. In Wolfensohn’s view, knowledge acquired by the World Bank needed to be collected, disseminated and shared through the knowledge bank. The World Bank states that “Our mission is to fight poverty with passion and professionalism for lasting results and to help people help themselves and their environment by providing resources, sharing knowledge, building capacity and forging partnerships in the public and private sectors”[13].
The view of the World Bank has been to wrap and share existing knowledge, not to invent new one, and next such knowledge could be used by those interested in creating development policies[14]. Starting with 1998, in order to begin the knowledge transfer to the knowledge bank, the World Bank offices all over the world were interconnected in a global knowledge sharing system.
Wolfensohn stated the fact that knowledge stored through the World Bank is vital for development projects all over the world, as it is more valuable than its financial resources (intellectual capital is more important than the financial one). If the idea of a knowledge bank was revolutionary, its creation proved to have been more than an evolution[15]. The concept appeared to be a major discontinuity as opposed to what had been achieved previously.
Given the above mentioned context, we try to apply the concept of the knowledge bank advanced by the World Bank into “A knowledge bank in the field of defense, public order and national security”, within CAROL I National Defense University in Bucharest.
The knowledge bank in the field of defense, public order and national security is meant to collect knowledge in the academic (scientific) field and in the non-academic field, to promote, disseminate and its storing through a “Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard” (METS). The METS standard offers metadata in a digital library so that the access were very quick.
Structural metadata describe logical or physical relations among the parts of a compound object (a book, for example, is made up of bunches which contain several pages). The process of digitization generates a large amount of separate digital resources which, by means of a relation, need be interpreted as a compound object. The METS standard offers a coding format for descriptive, administrative and structural metadata, and it is designed to support managing digital objects, delivering and exchanging digital objects among systems.
Types of documents to be included in the Knowledge bank will be the following: graduate license papers, MA final papers, doctoral theses, scientific papers published in national and international conference proceedings, research reports, course books, both scanned hard-copy documents, and soft-copy documents, existing library resources and multimedia resources.
Aiming towards an increased reliability of the knowledge bank, a safety backup for all digital and metadata resources on two types of storing media will be intended. At least one copy of the backup will be kept in a different place than the main site in order to ensure the former is safe from calamities and disasters. Storing media need be refreshed (which actually means recopied) at regular intervals of time during the entire life span of the storing medium.
Digitized knowledge will be clearly and uniquely identified and directly accessed on the browser of any web user. It is important for the end user, for instance, the fact that the former has the ability to directly quote an individual resource rather than making reference to the web site of a whole project, using Open URL, digital objects identifiers or any other digital object identifiers based on an identification system.
Services which need be provided by the CAROL I National Defense University Knowledge bank are sharing, crediting, exchanging, storing and transferring knowledge. For starters, the Knowledge bank will be working locally, being connected to the National Defense University intranet, and, consequently, it will be connected via the intranet with other educational establishments belonging to the National Defense, Public Order and National Security System (The Military Technical Academy, “Nicolae Bălcescu” Land Forces Academy, “Henri Coandă” Air Forces Academy, “Mircea Cel Bătrân” Navy Forces Academy, “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” Police Academy, “Mihai Viteazul” National Intelligence Academy) and via a VPN tunnel to the internet with other higher education institutions in Romania and abroad with which the university runs partnerships.
The Knowledge bank users (clients) can be both the teaching staff, students, MA students and PhD students enrolled in universities belonging to the national defense, public order and national security system, and the individuals pertaining to this system and owning personal accounts.
Depositors of the Knowledge bank will be teaching staff, students, MA students and PhD students enrolled in universities belonging to the national defense, public order and national security system, and the individuals pertaining to this system and owning personal accounts as well.
The basic policy of such a bank will be user oriented, identifying their needs and requirements, meeting the latter and providing the expected amounts and quality of the services as efficiently and operationally as possible. The user identifies potential knowledge sources to be accessed, sorted by title, key words, language, country, publishing year, localizes and accesses selected knowledge resources; the user probably analyzes whether the knowledge is of interest and extracts it; they analyze each piece of knowledge and the context as a whole; they become aware of the importance of employing and communicating knowledge as a social product; they decide the usage of the knowledge in function of the purpose entailed; they integrate the knowledge in their own knowledge system; they obey the ethical rules and the legal framework of utilizing and communicating knowledge.
Conclusions and future research directions
The Knowledge bank is an entity organized on sets of valid, relevant and sufficient knowledge, in function of their applicability domain. The advantages of storing in a knowledge bank are offering to all users direct and rapid access to scientific communication, increasing visibility, accessing the outcome and efficiency of research activity, the long term storing of initial knowledge without having the responsibility of administering, keeping the copy right, gathering and making use of knowledge at the level of the university, facilitating exchanges with national and international partners of knowledge banks.
Sharing knowledge among employees of the organization leads to the development of the organization and to the creation of innovative knowledge. Trust, reciprocity, organizational rewards, the professional level of the team members most influence the knowledge sharing phenomenon.
Within organizations, encouraging the knowledge sharing process by managers entails improving the employees’ perception of knowledge sharing.
An extremely important measure in the knowledge sharing process is transforming tacit knowledge into explicit one as much as possible with the aim of sharing it.
In the case when the proportion between benefits and costs is subunitary, the efficiency of knowledge sharing in the organization is not met. In order to facilitate the knowledge sharing process, organizations should implement a personnel reward system which might motivate the individual and collective surge towards sharing.
A fundamental role in encouraging participation in the knowledge sharing process plays the development of informal relations, which are helpful in both disseminating and assimilating knowledge by employees.
Moreover, at least as important is successfully using web 2.0 IT tools in the knowledge sharing process.
In our opinion, future research should be guided towards the following aspects:
- Knowledge sharing as social exchange;
- Understanding the way in which positive attitude towards knowledge sharing should be accomplished;
- Employees’ conduct related to the knowledge sharing process through participating in professional training sessions;
- Mechanisms by whose means social networking influences knowledge sharing;
- Should certain cultural idiosyncrasies facilitate/refrain taking part in the knowledge sharing process;
- Identifying management behavior in terms of knowledge sharing;
- Future research should investigate differences between benefits and costs necessary in the knowledge sharing process in the case when individuals share knowledge by means of an electronic knowledge management system (KMS).
BIBLIOGRAPHY
- Asrar-ul-Haq, H., Anwar, S., A systematic review of knowledge management and knowledge sharing: Trends, issues, and challenges, Cogent Business & Management Vol.3, Issue 1, 2016
- Babcock, P., Shedding light on knowledge management, HR Magazine, 49(5), 2004
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- Chow, C. W., Deng, F. J., Ho, J. L., The openness of knowledge sharing within organizations: A comparative study of the United States and the People’s Republic of China, Journal of Management Accounting Research, 12, 2000
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[1] Efraim Turban., Jay E. Aronson, Decision Support Systems and Intelligent Systems, Prentice Hall, New Jersey, 2001, p.33
[2] Ikujiro Nonaka, A dynamic theory of organizational knowledge creation, Organization Science, 5(1), 1994, p.14−37
[3] Ikujiro Nonaka, Hirotaka Takeuchi, The Knowledge – Creating Company: How Japanese Companies Create the Dynamics of Innovation, New York, Oxford University Press, 1995, p.71
[4] Sheng Wang, Raymond A. Noe, Knowledge sharing: A review and directions for future research, Human Resource Management Review 20, 2010, p. 115–131
[5] Muhammad Asrar-ul-Haq, H., Sadia Anwar, A systematic review of knowledge management and knowledge sharing: Trends, issues, and challenges, Cogent Business & Management Vol.3, Issue 1, 2016,p. 10-14
[6] Jonathon N. Cummings, Work groups, structural diversity, and knowledge sharing in a global organization, Management Science, 50(3), 2004, 352−364
[7] Pamela Babcock, Shedding light on knowledge management, HR Magazine, 49(5), 2004, p.46−50
[8] Yeong Wha Sawng, Seung Ho Kim, Hyun-Soo Han, R&D group characteristics and knowledge management activities: A comparison between ventures and large firms, International Journal of Technology Management, 35(1–4), 2006, p.241−261
[9] Chee W. Chow, F. Johnny Deng, Joanna L. Ho, The openness of knowledge sharing within organizations: A comparative study of the United States and the People’s Republic of China, Journal of Management Accounting Research, 12, 2000, p. 65−95.
[10] David De Long, Liam Fahey, Diagnosing cultural barriers to knowledge management, Academy of Management Executive, 14(4), 2000, p.113−127
[11] Chao-Min Chiu, Meng-Hsiang Hsu, Eric T.G. Wang, Understanding knowledge sharing in virtual communities: An integration of social capital and social cognitive theories, Decision Support Systems, 42(3), 2006, p.1872−1888.
[12] Soonhee Kim, Hyangsoo Lee, The impact of organizational context and information technology on employee knowledge-sharing capabilities, Public Administration Review, 66(3), 2006, p.370−385
[13] World Bank. (2010). About us, accessed January 23, 2018, on http://go.worldbank.org/3QT2P1GNH0
[14] World Bank. (1998/1999). Knowledge for development. World Development Report 1998/1999, accessed January 23, 2018, on here.
[15] Don Cohen, Bruno Laporte, The Evolution of the Knowledge Bank, KM Magazine, March 2004, p.1-2
