KNOWLEDGE ERA IN HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT WHAT IS KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT?

Knowledge management is the name of a concept in which an enterprise consciously and comprehensively gathers, organizes, shares, and analyzes its knowledge in terms of resources, documents, and people skills. In early 1998, it was believed that few enterprises actually had a comprehensive knowledge management practice (by any name) in operation. Advances in technology and the way we access and share information has changed that; many enterprises now have some kind of knowledge management framework in place. Unfortunately, there's no universal definition of knowledge management (KM), just as there's no agreement as to what constitutes knowledge in the first place. For this reason, it's best to think of KM in the broadest context. Succinctly put, KM is the process through which organizations generate value from their intellectual and knowledge-based assets. Most often, generating value from such assets involves codifying what employees, partners and customers know, and sharing that information among employees, departments and even with other companies in an effort to devise best practices. It's important to note that the definition says nothing about technology; while KM is often facilitated by IT, technology by itself is not KM. There are several different, and sometimes quite confusing statements that claim to be a definition of Knowledge Management' and there are different perspectives on what Knowledge Management is. For example: "Most activities or tasks are not one-time events. Whether its drilling a well or conducting a transaction at a service station, we do the same things repeatedly. Our philosophy is fairly simple: every time we do something again, we should do it better than the last time". Sir John Steely Browne, BP, Harvard Business Review, 1997. "The capabilities by which communities within an organization capture the knowledge that is critical to them, constantly improve it and make it available in the most effective manner to those who need it, so that they can exploit it creatively to add value as a normal part of their work" GlaxoSmithKline

. KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT ARCHITECTURE 1

The knowledge lifecycle hinges on the distinction between tactic knowledge and explicit knowledge. Explicit knowledge is formal knowledge that can be packaged as information. It can be found in the documents of an organizationreports, articles and manuals, patents, pictures, video images, sound, software, etc. Tactic knowledge is personal knowledge embedded in individual experience and is shared and exchanged through direct, face-toface contact. Tactic knowledge can be communicated in direct and effective way. By contrast, the acquisition of explicit knowledge is indirect; it must he decoded and recorded into ones mental models, where it is then internalized as tactic knowledge. In reality, these types of knowledge are like two sides of the same coin and bear equal weight in the overall knowledge of an organization. Tactic knowledge is practical knowledge that is key to getting things done, but has been sadly neglected in the past very often falling victim to the latest management craze. For instance, the recent spate of business process-regarding engineering initiatives where cost reduction was generally identified with the laying off of peoplethe real and only repositories of tactic knowledge has damaged the tactic knowledge of many organizations. Explicit knowledge defines the identity, the competences in1 the intellectual assets of an organization independently of its employees; thus, it is organizational knowledge par excellence, but it can grow and sustain itself only through a rich background of tactic knowledge.

KNOWLEDGE CONVERSION The knowledge management goes beyond the purely social characterization of the environment given by Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) and tackles issues directly related to the management on the Information Technology infrastructure. Indeed, in todays information-driven society, much of the environment of an organization is given by its Information Technology infrastructure. What kind of information technology can contribute to make knowledge flow supporting its conversion from explicit and from tactic to explicit? What kind Information Technology can best support the explicit knowledge that an organization has about itself? What kind of software is needed to support the exchange of tactic knowledge in organizations of knowledge workers? 3

 How can we manage through Information Technology the bulk of explicit knowledge contained in the collections of documents of an organization? The four components- of knowledge management architecture can answer these questions and the overall way they interact is an attempt to give a full answer to the high level questions from which the more specific questions originate. In the literature on knowledge management, four basic knowledge processes are distinguished, which we will now briefly describe (Wiig, 1993b, Nonaka and Takeuchi, 1995, Van der Spek and Spijkewet, 1996). DEVELOPING NEW KNOWLEDGE: Companies survive by the continuous development of new knowledge based on creative ideas, the analysis of failures, daily experiences and work in R&D departments. Corporate memories can support these processes by, for instance, recording failures and successes. SECURING NEW AND EXISTIING KNOWLEDGE: Individual knowledge must he made accessible to others who need that knowledge. This knowledge must be available at the right time and place. Knowledge stored in corporate memories becomes persistent overtime and if properly indexed, retrieved easily.

DISTRIBUTING NEW KNOWLEDGE: Knowledge must be actively distributed to those who can make use of it. The turn-around speed of knowledge is becoming crucial for the competitiveness of companies. To support this process, corporate memories need a facility for deciding who should be informed about a particular new piece of knowledge. COMBINING AVAILABLE KNOWLEDGE:

A company can only perform at its best if all available knowledge areas are combined in its new products. Products and services are increasingly being developed by multi-disciplinary teams. Corporate memories may facilitate this by making it easier to access knowledge developed in other parts of the organization. It is argued that good knowledge management involves the continuous streani1iiJi these processes to improve the learning capacity of the organization. Therefore, a corporate memory must be organized in such a way that it maximally supports each of them. However, it is not enough to give a corporate memory that supports each of these processes individually. In real organizations, the processes interact in complex ways and the nature of these interactions should be taken into accounts.

CURRENT KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT DEFICITS:

Highly paid workers spend much of their time looking for needed information. This ubiquitous fact is in stack contrast with the considerable efforts
which have been made in enhancing productivity of lower paid production workers by replacing every tools and part they need within the reach of their hand. Essential know-how is available only in the head of a few employees. This lack of documentation is becoming even more serious with changing work reduce the availability of individual know-how and impede communication between employee. Valuable information is buried in piles of documents and data. Even when relevant knowledge is explicitly documented, its identification is becoming more and more difficult due to the continuously growing flood of most irrelevant information. Costly error due to desire of previous experience this is mostly a direct consequence of the fore-mentioned deficit. It is mentioned here explicitly since it highlights the cost of insufficient knowledge management and offers a tangible goal for improvement. Delay and sub-optical product quality results from insufficient flow of informationthis is how lack of knowledge management shows at the bottom line since the rapid development of new products with high quality and low cost is becoming more and more successful for a companys successful competition in the global market place.

Knowledge Management Process:

Knowledge management is considered an important part of the strategy to use expertise to create a sustainable competitive advantages I tomorrows business environment. Backmans has proposed a comprehensive eight stage process for knowledge management.

08. Sell

01. Identify

07. Create

02. Collect

06. Apply

03. Select

05. Share

04. Store

Fig: knowledge management Process. 1. IDENTIFYING PROCESS: The identify stage determine which competences are critical to success. For example, every organization needs rebuts knowledge about its customer needs and expectation, products and services, finances, processes, management, employees and other organization and environmental aspects. Then the related strategic and knowledge dominos are identified. Knowledge domain and specialized subject matter areas where recognized experts can demonstrate superior performance. Next the existing levels of expertise in the workforce are assessed for each knowledge domain. Once the gaps between existing and needed expertise are dominated, the domain, expars together with training and information technology professional can begin constructing education programmers and performance support system to improve expertise level.

2. COLLECT STAGE: The collect stage deals with acquiring existing knowledge, skills, theories and experience needed to create the selected core competence and knowledge domain. In order to useful knowledge, expertise and experience must be formalized by making it explicit. In edition practitioners should know where and how to purchase the needed knowledge an expertise in the form of database and expert system. In order to acquire expertise, valid knowledge should be identifying. 3. SELECT STAGE: The select stage takes the continuous stream of collected and formalized knowledge and assesses its value.

* Is their insight within the acquired information? * Is this piece of knowledge already in the organizational memory? * Is the acquired knowledge a new plausible domain theory that needs to be added to the knowledge repository?
Clearly, domain experts must assess and select the knowledge to be added to the organizational memory. Without a strong filtering mechanism, the corporate memory will be nothing more than a tour of sable. Where the valuable nuggets of knowledge are lost in a sea of informational data. However it is important that a diversity of viewpoints from multiple domain experts is represented where appropriate. Initially, one framework should be selected as the basis for organization and classified knowledge to be stored in the knowledge repository. 04. STORE STAGE: The store stage takes the nuggets of knowledge and classified them and adds them to the organizational memory. This corporate memory resides in different forms in human minds on paper and electronically. Knowledge in human mind needs to be made explicit and formalized in order to be useful. Knowledge must be organized and represented into different knowledge structure within a knowledge repository just as the data and information are organized and represented in differing types of database. Much of this knowledge can be represented in electronic form as expert system.

05. SHARE STAGE: The share stage retrieves knowledge from the corporate memory and makes it accessible to uses. The workforce makes their needs and personal interest known to the corporate

memory which then automatically distribute any incoming new knowledge to its subscriber either electronically or on paper. In addition, individual, groups and departments often shares ideas, opinion, gossip, knowledge and expertise in meetings. It is crucial that the potentially valuable portion of these communication, discussion, arguments and collaboration are made available to the capture stage of knowledge management process. For example- differing points of view and their ratio should be captured as part of any decision-making as well as the method used to reach the final decision. 6. APPLY STAGE: The apply stage retrieves and uses the needed knowledge in performing tasks, solving problems, making decision, researching ideas and learning. In order to easily access, retrieve and apply the right pieces of knowledge at the right times in the right form, more than query language is needed. Integrated performance support system (IPSS) Uliuslow and Branmer are beginning used by leading organization to greatly increase the performance and capabilities of knowledge workers. First to ease the access, natural classification system need to be built for browsing or retrieving knowledge. 7. CREATE STAGE: The create stage uncover the new knowledge through many avenues. Such as observing customers, customers feed back and analysis, casual analysis, bench marking and best practices, lesson learnt from business re-inquiring and process improvement project, research, experimentation, creative thinking and automated knowledge discovery and data mining. This stage also covers how to elicit nonverbal, unconscious knowledge from domain experts and turn it into documented formal knowledge. 8. THE SELL STAGE: An eighth stage may be added, that is, the sell stage in which new products and service are created from the intellectual capital that can be marked external to the enterprise. Before this stage is possible, considerable maturity should be attained in the other seven stages.

VIRTUAL ORGANIZATION
WHAT IS VIRTUAL ORGANIZATION?

The term virtual organization is used to describe a network of independent firms that join together, often temporarily, to produce a service or product. Virtual organization is often associated with such terms as virtual office, virtual teams, and virtual leadership. The ultimate goal of the virtual organization is to provide innovative, high-quality products or services instantaneously in response to customer demands. The term virtual in this sense has its roots in the computer industry. When a computer appears to have more storage capacity than it really possesses it is referred to as virtual memory. Likewise, when an organization assembles resources from a variety of firms, a virtual organization seems to have more capabilities than it actually possesses. The virtual corporation is more permeable than traditional organizational forms. Interfaces in a virtual organization between company, supplier, and customers continuously change, resulting in a blurring of traditional functions. Inside the office, work groups and job responsibilities may shift regularly. The virtual organization may not have a central office or an organizational chart. Suppliers, customers, and even competitors may spend time alongside one another in the virtual organization.

CHARACTERISTICS OF VIRTUAL ORGANIZATION Power flexibility Informal communication Flan organization, multidisciplinary teams Coal orientation Dynamics Homework Customer orientation Organizational boundaries are vague Sharing of information The driving, force in, a virtual organization-is basically the virtual team. Every organization requires a team to carry over its activities in an orderly fashion, and such a

team also exists in a virtual organization. In a virtual team, members' primary interaction is through some combination of electronic, communication system to tie up with dispersed members who never or rarely come face to face. Here people communicate online using links like WAN, video conferencing or e-mail. The concept of virtual teams has gained considerable attention in recent years. Within global organizations, the virtual team involves collaboration and teamwork between geographically and temporarily separated workforces (Hammier & Champy, 1993; Lipnec & Stamps, 1997). Such collaboration may also extend beyond the organizational boundary, linking partners in joint ventures and contractors who are in various locations. Emergency information and communication technologies such as groupware, Internet and desktop video conferencing systems are seen-by, global organizations as facilitating such collaboration to enable the workforce to share knowledge and expertise. Virtual team working is potentially necessary for global organizations. It requires trust relationship. Research findings suggest that personalized trust relationships are essential for continuous virtual- team working. Such personalized trust relationships are normally established through face-to-face interaction and socialization. The use of information, and communication technologies appears to be inadequate for establishing, reproducing such trust relationships owing to: their; inability, to provide access to the basic stage of participants activities (Nandhakumar, i999).

PRIMARY FACTORS OF VIRTUAL ORGANIZATION:

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The three primary factors that differentiate virtual teams from face-to-face teams are: 1. Absence of preverbal and nonverbal cues. 2. Limited social context. 3. Ability to overcome time and space constraints.

THE ADVANTAGES PROVIDES BY VIRTUAL TERMS: 1. It saves time, travel expenses and eliminates lack of access to experts. . 2. Teams can be organized whether or not members are in reasonable proximity to each other. 3. Firms can use consultants from-outside without incurring expenses for travel, lodging and downtime. 4. Virtual teams allow firms-to expand their potential labor markets enabling, them to hire and retain the best people regardless of their physical locations. . 5. Employees can accommodate both personal and professional lives. 6. Dynamic team membership allows people to move from one project to another. 7. Employees can be assigned to multiple, concurrent teams. 8. Team' communications and work reports 'are, available -online to facilitate swift responses to the demands of a global market. DISADVANTAGES OF VIRTUAL TERMS: The disadvantages of virtual teams are: The lack of physical interaction with its associated verbal and nonverbal causes and the synergies that often accompany face-to-face communication. In preverbal and nonverbal cues we use voice, eye movement, facial expressions, body, language which, help in better communication but are not available in online interactions. Virtual teams are able to work even if they are miles apart allowing people to work in teams' who never get a chance to meet each other face-to-face. Despite these drawbacks, virtual teams are

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growing in popularity. 'GroupWare', computer-based systems explicitly designed to support groups of people' working together, enables virtual interactions.

FEATURES OF VIRTUAL ORGANIZATION Without information and knowledge, workers in virtual workplaces become, emasculated and ineffective. Fortunately technology and enlightened management practices can ensure that this does not happen. The technology that keeps the organization going is a 'seamless' web electronic communication media. 1. TECHNOLOGY 2. E-MAIL INTREGRATION 3. OFFICE SYSTEM INTEGRATION 4. VOICE MAIL ALART 5. MOBILE DATA

TECHNOLOGY: New technology has transformed the traditional ways of working. In particular the worlds of computing and telephony are coming together to open up a whole new range of possibilities. Computer Telephony Integration (CTI) will bring a new revolution to the desktop. CTI has traditionally been used in all call centre application. E-MAIL INTEGRATION: Integrating SMS (Short Message Service) into the existing e-mail infrastructure allows the whole organization to take advantage of SMS products such as Express Way.

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OFFICE SYSTEM INTEGRATION: SMS technology' can greatly enhance the existing or new office systems, e.g., phone messages can be sent via SMS rather than returning it in a message book. VOICE MAIL ALERTS: SMS technology added to the existing voice mail system builds an effective method of receiving voice mail alerts. MOBILE DATA: This enables a laptop to retrieve information' anywhere through the mobile phone network. Mobile data communications revolutionize where and how work is done. In the past corporate information has been inaccessible from many places where it is needed. The ability to link your laptop to your mobile phone means that you can remain" connected to your own virtual office from anywhere:

TYPES OF VIRTUAL ORGANIZATION There are three types of virtual organization characterized by varying degrees of virtuality (Table 20.1). The telecommuting companies are at one extreme where the employees work from their homes. They interact with the workplace via personal computer connected with a modem to the phone lines. Examples of companies using some form of telecommuting are Dow Chemical, Xerox, Coherent Technologies Inc. The second type represents those that are characterized, by the outsourcing of most/all core competences. Outsourced areas include marketing and sales, human resources, finance, research and development, engineering, manufacturing, information systems, etc. "Virtual Corporation Spectrum of Virtuality

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Types Telecommuters Employees With virtual office

Least virtual Core Corp with virtual outsourcing Combination of employees Virtual employees, outsourcing, (virtual office, virtual production)

Most Virtual Complete Virtual Virtual employees and/or Participants in a completely virtual organization

does one or two things but does them extremely well." Nike considers product design and marketing to be its core competences. Nike relies on information technology as a means for maintaining inter-organizational ordination with outsourcers. The third type is completely virtual. It has metaphorically been described as a company without walls that is tightly linked to a large network of suppliers, distributors, retailers and customers as well as to strategic and joint venture' partners. Examples of completely virtual organizations are the Atlanta Committee for -the-Olympic Games (AGOG) in 1996 and arguably the development effort of the PC by IBM. VIRTUAL LEADERS Greiner and Metes discuss the new leadership skills required to lead in the virtual environment, including the ability to manage a network of interdependent firms, to design virtual operations, to create and sustain virtual relationships with internal as well as external constituents, to support virtual teams, and to keep virtual teams focused. The leader of a virtual organization demands a new set of skills unlike the skills required in a traditional hierarchy. VIRTUAL LEARNING Another critical element to the success of the virtual organization is the ability of the organization to create world-class learning systems. These learning systems help leaders sustain or create world-class competencies. Effective learning systems can create pathways throughout the organization, in network fashion, enhancing the innovative

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capabilities of the organizational members. An organization's ability to sustain a leadership position in the world economy demands that organizations be on the cutting edge to develop rapid and elegant solutions to emerging consumer demands. EXAMPLES OF VIRTUAL ORGANIZATIONS An industry that is known for its use of partners and alliances is the entertainment industry, which has partnered with the computing, communications, consumer electronics, and publishing industries to convert movies, textbooks, and other software into digital formats. Increasing numbers of firms are moving to these new organizational forms. Corning, the glass and ceramics maker, is one such firm known for making partnerships work to their advantage. Corning has partnered with such firms as Siemens, Germany's electronics conglomeration, and Vitro, Mexico's largest glassmaker. Alliances are so important to Corning's business strategy that the corporation has defined itself as a network of organizations. Computer organizations that have successfully implemented forms of this new structure include Apple Computer and Sun Microsystems. When Apple Computer linked its easyto-use software with Sony's manufacturing skills in miniaturization, Apple was able to get its product to market quickly and gain a market share in the notebook segment of the PC industry. Sun Microsystems has been considered another highly decentralized organization comprised of independently operating companies. Sun positions information systems as a top priority, trying to achieve faster and better communication. With numerous "SunTeams," members operate across time, space, and organizations to address critical business issues. Sun managers identify key customer issues and then form teams with the critical skills and knowledge needed to address the issue. This team might include sales people, marketing personnel, finance, and operations from various places around the globe; customers and suppliers may become episodic members as necessary. Weekly meetings may take place via conference calls. Critical to the team's success is the

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selection of talent from the organization, defining a clear purpose for the team's efforts, and establishing communication links among the team members. Sun has been working on further development of technologies such as EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) and RFID (Radio Frequency Identification technology). Both EDI and RFID will impact information exchange globally and across numerous industries. SHARING INFORMATION Sharing of information plays a vital role in the successful running of an organization. This gives the working people a sense of belonging and mutual trust. Information is also required to assess the future trends and performance modules. This normally occurs in real organizations, where meetings of members and feedback from junior level employees keep up the flow of information giving an insight to day-to-day functions. They can interact personally to make amendments. In a virtual organization, on the other hand, the major problem lies, in the way of communication. All information is shared by a computer network and may at times cause blockage of some important_ information. So, workers in a virtual organization should not rely too much on e-mails, instead should conduct effective audio meeting, balance email, voice mail, holding conferences and periodically having face-to-face communications. SELECTION PROCESS Selection is an important factor that relates to discovering the applicant's potential for the desired responsibility he has to undertake in the organization. It is more crucial in the case of virtual organization the s reason being that they have to work in a virtual setup. It may be better S to select people on their ability to develop their skills and to motivate themselves. In delineating employee competencies associated with effective performance, virtual work arrangements are not recommended for new employees or those who are new to their positions. Certain requirements a for working in a virtual organizations are:

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Familiarity and comfort ability with the job Self motivation; Non-requirement of high structure and detailed Instructions in order to work effectively An effective communication, both orally and in writing Adaptability Knowledge about organizational procedures Technical self-sufficiency Result-orientation

It is essential to assess these qualities while recruiting a person to work in a virtual organization. Moreover, it is desirable to select people whose values are already consonant with the organization culture: When there is a close knit between an employee value and the organizational' culture, there is a greater chance that the worker will be satisfied with his/her job and committed to the organization. In the virtual organization, opting to maximize the person-organization' fit, there are a few opportunities to socialize employees where organizations are short lived and the culture itself less pronounced. In such circumstances the basic value-fit becomes important. Home-based tele-work characterized by low intra extra-organizational Communication might -be more suitable for introverts, but mobile tele-works characterized- by a high degree -cif extra-organizational communication might be more suitable-for extroverts and people who score high on measures of openness to experience. DEMAND AND DRIVERS: We should expect the virtual organization to have an impact on -a wide range of an occupational behavior role demand like recruiting has found attention. Traditional selection techniques rely on matching the skills and knowledge, of the person with the demands and requirements of the job. People only figure in virtual organizations. On the person, side, the shift is towards a different set of competencies and personality, factors, whilst on the environment side, the shift is towards organizational values/climate fit and a broad role analysis. 17

The shift towards a virtual organization triggers two ongoing debates within the HRM field. The shift from person-job-fit to person-role is the guiding paradigm for resourcing decisions. There arises marry questions such as: will virtual organizations, became self-selecting groups of entrepreneurs, where' everybody .becomes their own HRM manager. Such a radical shift in the agreed must of course be signaled as a possible endpoint. It is clear that research and practice in the area of virtual organizations face a number of challenges. Creating a clear conceptualization and taxonomy of the organizations and supporting work practices such as tele-work should help further the development of the' new theory. There can be endless debates on the pros and cons of a virtual organization. In a world of increasing competition and differentiation it is impossible for anyone company to have all the skills that are needed to do the job. The-virtual organization takes these ideas and makes the final leap. That is where the reality of virtual organization lies.

CHALLENGES OF VIRTUAL ORGANIZATION: Virtual organizations can be very complex and problematic; they fail as often as they succeed. Among the many challenges of the virtual organization are strategic planning dilemmas, boundary blurring, a loss of control, and a need for new managerial skills. Strategic planning poses new challenges as virtual firms determine effective combinations of core competencies. Common vision among partners is quintessential to cooperating firms. Focused on a common goal, firms develop close interdependencies that may make it difficult to determine where one company ends and another begins. The boundary-blurring demands that these boundaries be managed effectively. Coordinating mechanisms are critical elements for supporting these loose collections of firms. Virtual structures create a loss of control over some operations. This loss of control requires communication, coordination, and trust among the various partners, as well as a new set of managerial skills. Employees are exposed to increased ambiguity about organizational membership, job roles and responsibilities, career paths, and superiorsubordinate relationships. This ambiguity requires management to rethink rewards,

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benefits, employee development, staffing and other employee-related issues. Developing leaders who are able to create and sustain these organizational forms is critical. Les Pang offers a list of best practices, based on a review of successful implementations of virtual organizations. 1. Foster cooperation, trust and empowerment. 2. Ensure each partner contributes and identifiable strength or asset. 3. Ensure skills and competencies are complementary, not overlapping. 4. Ensure partners are adaptable. 5. Ensure contractual agreements are clear and specific on roles and deliverables. 6. If possible, do not replace face-to-face interaction entirely. 7. Provide training that is critical to team success. 8. Recognize that it takes time to develop the team. 9. Ensure that technology is compatible and reliable. 10. Provide technical assistance that is competent and available.

CAREER DYNAMICS The rise of project-based careers and the creation of temporary organizations for such work go hand in, hand. Therefore, we need to consider work on career behavior in a variety of settings that contain elements of virtual organization. From the organizational behavior perspectives the issues of loyalty, commitment, socialization and trust become important. In virtual organizations, corporate governance becomes critical in managing variable employment. The number, of team members may grow exponentially within a 'few weeks and fall off within a; similar period Physical assets like office space are also temporary and outsourced. The strategic vision of enterprise is inherited by participants rather than by traditional mission statements.

LEARNING ORGANIZATION WHAT IS LEARNING ORGANIZATION?

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A learning organization can be defined as an organization that practices organizational learning. Conversely, organization learning is the distinctive organizational behavior that is practiced in a learning organization. Thus, the two terms are effectively synonymous but there are differences in the nuance that should be pointed out. Learning organization is an entity while organizational learning is a process, a set of actions. Organizational learning is something that it is. Denton, jone (1998) has developed a model of the creation of a learning organization (Fig. 21.1). It shows the role of six antecedents in creating first the opportunity and then the desire for organizational learning. A couple of definitions of the learning organization: Learning organizations where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning to see the whole together. (Peter Senge 1990) The Learning organization is a vision of what might be possible. It is not brought about simply by training individuals; it can only happen as a result of learning at the whole organization level. Learning Company is an organization that facilitates the learning of all its members and continuously transforms itself. (Pedler et. al. 1991: 1) A learning organization therefore is an organization whose people are in a continuous search for new and better ways to adapt to change and enhance performance. Inherent in a learning organization is an environment that values learning and where inquisitiveness and creativity are a way of organizational life. There is an optimistic view of change and thinking about new possibilities is the norm. They are also organizations where a degree of risk taking and experimentation is encouraged and some failure is expected.

WHY LEARNING ORGANIZATION:

According to Art Kleiner (who orchestrated the writing of Fifth Discipline Fieldbook) they had originally planned a lengthy section on the same question, framed with the title

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"Why Bother?" Graciously Art has contributed this outline. Organizing ideas of the "Why Bother?" section were to have been: 01 .Because we want superior performance and competitive advantage 02. for customer relations 03. To avoid decline 04. To improve quality 05. To understand risks and diversity more deeply 06. for innovation 07. for our personal and spiritual well being 08. To increase our ability to manage change 09. for understanding 10. For energized committed work force 11. To expand boundaries 12. To engage in community 13. for independence and liberty 14. for awareness of the critical nature of interdependence 15. Because the times demand it

LEADERSHIP AND LEARNING ORGANIZATIONS

The role of a leader in a learning organization is very important. The leader who wishes to create a learning organization will need to adopt a n approach of change. This will allow 21

him/h r to cultivate a environment of constant questioning and risk-taking, and frequent reinvention of business practices and products. Senge (1990) gives three leadership rules that are critical for the building of learning organizations. They are the leader as designer; the leader as steward, and the leader as teacher. Senge believes that many managers have neglected the 'designing'" role of the leader. He argues that it is fruitless to be the leader in an organization that is poorly designed. The cause of the neglect of design as an important leadership role is probably its background, behind the scenes nature. Organization design, however, should not- be seen as merely moving boxes and lines on the organizational chart. The overriding, overarching ideas of the organization should be seen, as a key part of the organization design. The creation of these ideas-the vision, purpose and the values of the organization is 'key to the creation of learning organization. Author has a different opinion, which contradicts Senge's views on leadership. The role of the leader 'is equally important and challenging in the poorly designed organization to restructure in order to make it a learning organization. Several
-

Indian corporations have gone through this process proving the effectiveness of the Indian

leaders. One of the, leader's 'key roles is, thus, designing or, creating an environment in % which learning can flourish which includes both structure and culture. Marquardt (1996) suggests six, new leadership roles required of managers in a learning organization. The six roles are as-instructor, coach, mentor, knowledge manager, colearner and model for learning: architect and designer, coordinator and advocate and champions for learning processes and projects. He sees the role of instructor, coach and mentor as three distinct aspects of the leader's job. This is acknowledgement of the fact that 'different learning situation and different learners require different styles of help from the teacher. In the role f co-learner and model for learning, leaders will be expected to perform as those who demonstrate a love of learning. The leader realizes that it is insufficient merely to tell employees' what to learn. Success experiments of these leadership roles will encourage, motivate and help workers to improve their learning skills. The leader architect and designer needs to design new techniques, structures and process and also to integrate these into a system that will be successful in the organization's competitive environments. Marquardt links the role o coordinator to that of the

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coordinator of an orchestra, who enables al] the musicians to play their instruments to the best of their ability. The role of advocate and champion for learning seems to be an extension of the co-learner role. A robust organization's learning process requires more than one advocate or champion if it wants to succeed (Marquardt, 1000). There is a strong relationship between the models of Senge, Marquardt and pattanayak's 'Models on Leadership' (Fig. 21:2). There are two key skills which leaders will require if they are to build and -sustain a learning organization (a) building a shared vision and commitment and (b) creating a team based organization (Denton, 1998). Marquardt (1996) suggests that leaders. Should attempt to blend - extrinsic and intrinsic visions, communicate their own vision and ask for .support, encourage personnel visions from` which emerge shared vision, and engender visioning as an ongoing process.

Learning organizations can be distinguished from other organizations in terms of the following specific factors:
(a) People feel that they are doing something that matters to them properly

and to society at large.

(b) Every individual in the organization is constantly learning and

stretching himself/herself, thereby enhancing his/her capacity to create.

(c) People are more intelligent together in a group rather than they are alone

they believe in synergy.

(d) Ongoing activities in the 'organization are shared with the employees,

so that they can understand how their actions influence others, transparency is extremely important.
(e) People feel free to enquire about each other and their feelings,

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assumptions and biases.

(f) People treat each other as colleagues. There is a mutual trust and respect in

the way they talk to each other and work together, no matter what their positions may be.
(g) People feel free to experiment, take risks, and openly assess the result.

CONCLUSION:
On the basis of above discussion about the knowledge era in HR management we can get the detailed overview of the knowledge management, virtual organization and learning organization. This new era of Human Resource management is open the door of easy communication and the knowledge creation for the new and newer form of business organization. Knowledge management can helps to gather the quantity information and the knowledge for the organization and learning organization enabale the organization to evaluate the better opportunity through the knowledge management. And the term virtual organization gives the opportunity to communicate and distribute the information across the organization.

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APPENDIX:

01. www.leopard-learning.com 02. learning-org@world.std.com

03. The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of The Learning Organization by Peter M. Senge (Mar 21, 2006)

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