Knowledge Management

摘要

When the initial ARIST chapter on knowledge management was written (MacMorrow, 2001) the field was still very much at the developmental stage. In the succeeding six years, considerable progress has been made toward raising the general level of understanding of knowledge management-its principles and components, underlying theories, and key areas of research and practice. This is not to say that all the contradictions (terminological, jurisdictional, and operational) have been resolved. The concept continues to suffer from image problems, which result from the combination of its overselling by vendors and consultants in the 1990s and the fallout from Enron and similar corporate scandals linked to untraditional accounting methods (Ekbia, 2004). The term knowledge management seems to have gained acceptance more by default than anything else. More significantly, although some aspects of knowledge-such as culture, organizational structure, communication processes, and information-can be managed, knowledge itself, arguably, cannot (Kakabadse, Kakabadse, & Kouzmin, 2003).