Improving service delivery at the National University of Lesotho Library through knowledge sharing

摘要

Knowledge is now considered the most important organizational resource, surpassingother resources like land and capital. It has, therefore, been acknowledged thatknowledge can play an important role in ensuring an organization’s competitive edge.The purpose of this study was to investigate if knowledge sharing is being used toimprove service delivery at the National University of Lesotho’s Thomas Mofolo Library.The researcher held the view that Librarians at Thomas Mofolo Library have differentsets of skills which, if combined, could improve service delivery. By not sharing andretaining this existing wealth of knowledge, the researcher claimed that when librariansretire or resign from work, they will certainly take with them the knowledge they possessand the result of this knowledge loss is that the Library may be plagued by an inability tolearn from the past experiences, which leads to reinvented wheels, unlearned lessonsand the pattern of repeated mistakes.Both qualitative and quantitative methods were employed in the case study design inorder to allow for multiple methods of data collection. Data were collected by means ofquestionnaires and interviews. Questionnaires were administered to all librarians whowere available at the time and purposive sampling was used to determine interviewparticipants. Out of the 25 questionnaires administered, 15 were returned, providing aresponse rate of 60%. The data collected by means of questionnaires was processedusing Microsoft Access and analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Science(SPSS) software (Version 17). The results of analysis were exported into Microsoft Excel for visual presentation and reporting of the results. The data from the interview sessions was analyzed manually by content analysis, usingthe notes that were taken by the researcher from the respondents during the interviewsessions. The findings pointed to the fact that knowledge sharing does occur at TML, althoughmostly in an informal manner. This was largely due to a number of impediments such aslack of trust and the absence of motivations and rewards. The study concluded byrecommending a number of initiatives that could be implemented in order to retainknowledge within the Library. The recommendations included developing a knowledge management strategy and formalizing knowledge sharing by formulating the desiredpolicies.