Learning and Knowledge Substitution: Two Approaches to Knowledge Acquisition in Geographically Distributed Organizations

摘要

The process of knowledge acquisition is especially demanding for employees which work distant from their organization (dispersed workers). Two approaches to knowledge acquisition are possible: learning and knowledge substitution. Learning is the process through which an individual develops the knowledge needed to solve working problems himself. In the case of knowledge substitution, instead, when a working problem arises, an individual asks a superior or a colleague who possesses the needed knowledge.rnThrough the analysis of two case studies, this paper explores the hypothesis that knowledge substitution is more common for distant workers than for collocated ones and develops a model of knowledge acquisition for dispersed workers.