Improving Organization Performance through Knowledge Management Practices

Dr.M.Arul M.B.A.,Ph.D.,
Professor in Department of Business Administration Annamalai University, Annanmalai Nagar, Chidambaram- 608102

T.S.Kumar
Assistant Professor in Department of Business Administration Jawahar Science College, Neyveli - 607803

Abstract
This paper presents the need of building a knowledge society to meet out new realities and face the challenges of our growing economy. With the current global economic slowdown the times are no doubt tough. A liquidity crunch, falling consumer demand and erosion of investments have put organization under tremendous pressure to control their expenses and functions. It is the right time to convert this situation into opportunities by converting more with less. The increasing global presence of business and participation of multinational companies calls focus of managements attention to different HR practices to cope up with impact of global changes. It is observed that change is inevitable but it is important to recognize that managerial efficacy needs to keep a pace with such transformations. This paper posits the two variables of knowledge retention and its management. The human resource function can play a pivotal role in responding to challenges during the downturn and emerge it in a better shape. It is not the strongest species that survives, or the most intelligent, but most responsive of change said Charles Robert Darwin in 1859 in his book The Origin of Species. Knowledg e is the basis for and the driver of our post-industrial economy. Knowledge is the result of learning which provides the only sustainable competitive advantage. We need to be concerned with knowledge management as it can contribute to companys vitality, s uccess, performance and adaptation. To move towards a new century of growth and innovation, we need to understand that we need to be competitively progressing in all fronts. We need to create more opportunities for us by understanding the value goal reference knowledge.

Introduction Our unique demographic dividend with 600 million below age of 30, is tremendous potential human resource. As India marches towards an exciting new future of growth and progress, knowledge will play a pivotal role in crafting a sustained development agenda. The idea of creating a knowledge society is no longer a debatable luxury, its significance has been grasped by policy shapers worldwide. In India this idea has become even more critical while facing challenges of demography, disparity and development in our country.1-2 We need to understand that if we want to accelerate the course of development in our economy we need our organizations to understand the skill requirement of a growing economy. Knowledge Management succeeds fully when it is woven into the fabric of an organization and becomes intrinsic to an organizations processes. In many ways, the systemic approach is the logical culmination of Knowledge Management mechanics and Knowledge Management culture. Many Knowledge Management systems are however not yet robust enough:

1. Knowledge Management metrics (surveys, benchmarking, cost/benefit studies, service evaluation) are still an inexact science. 2. Knowledge workers are often Knowledge Management resistant (Knowledge Management is frequently considered an oxymoron). 3. Knowledge Management is both a discipline and an art. The HR Function in developing economy is a reflection of the maturity level of the country. Knowledge management can help us to restructure, focus and strengthen and sharpen the linkage to convert threats into opportunities.3 What is Knowledge? In simplest terms, knowledge is the ability of an actor to respond to a body of facts and principles accumulated over a period of time. One way to look at knowledge is as the apogee of the following continuum: data informationknowledge.4 Data=unit of fact; information=aggregation of data; knowledge=potential for action on information. Data and information have intrinsic properties; the quality of knowledge depends on the properties of the agent.

Why we need Knowledge Management It is important to manage knowledge assets because of the following reasons: Organizations compete increasingly on the base of knowledge. Most of our work is information based and often immersed in a computing environment. Our products, services and environment are more complex than ever before and workforces are increasingly unstable leading to escalating demands for knowledge replacement/acquisition. The purpose of knowledge management is to harness, develop and direct the expertise of the organization and to apply it effectively to achieve strategic objectives. Its purpose is also to encourage learning and innovation as sources of competitive advantage.10 History of Knowledge Management 1980s Knowledge began to be viewed as a competitive asset; around the same time that information explosion started becoming an issue. The trend was fueled by the develop-ment of Information Technology systems which made it simple to store, display and archive classified, indexed information. Seeds of Knowledge Management may also be found in business practices like Total Quality Management and Business Process Reengineering to which Knowledge Management is often compared. A number of management theorists have contributed to the evolution of knowledge management, among them such notables as Peter Drucker, Paul Strassmann and Peter Senge in the United States.6 Drucker and Strassmann5 have stressed the growing importance of information and explicit knowledge as organizational resources and Senge has focused on the "learning organization," a cultural dimension of managing knowledge.

Chris Argyris, Christoper Bartlett and Dorothy Leonard-Barton of Harvard Business School have examined various facets of managing knowledge. In fact, Leonard- Barton's well-known case study of Chaparral Steel, a company which has had an effective knowledge management strategy in place since the mid-1970s, inspired the research documented in her Wellsprings of Knowledge - Building and Sustaining Sources of Innovation. By 1990, a number of management consulting firms had begun in- house knowledge management programs and several well known U.S., European and Japanese firms had instituted focused knowledge management programs. By the mid-1990s, knowledge management initiatives were flourishing, thanks in part to the Internet.7 The International Knowledge Management Network (IKMN), begun in Europe in 1989, went online in 1994 and was soon joined by the U.S.-based Knowledge Management Forum and other Knowledge Management- related groups and publications. The number of knowledge management conferences and seminars is growing as organizations focus on managing and leveraging explicit and tacit knowledge resources to achieve competitive advantage. Sources of Knowledge Management Cognitive science: Insights from how we learn and know will certainly improve tools and techniques for gathering and transferring knowledge. Groupware, Artificial Intelligence, Knowledge based Management System: Artificial Intelligence and related technologies have acquired an undeserved reputation of having failed to meet their own and the marketplace's high expectations. In fact, these technologies continue to be applied widely and the lessons practitioners have learned are directly applicable to knowledge management.8 Knowledge Management Mechanics Information management may well be considered the first wave of Knowledge Management. Information management tries to make the right information available to the right person at the right time through a variety of database driven information applications. Information management tools try to capture the human experience of knowledge through the collecting, classifying, disseminating, searching, indexing and archival power of technology. There is a crying need to continuously subject knowledge to re-examination and modification. It is important to keep the human and social elements of organization involved in all stored knowledge. Knowledge Management succeeds fully when it is woven into the fabric of an organization and becomes intrinsic to an organizations processes. The reach of the new technology for knowledge sharing: Organizations now view knowledge into a different aspect due to different factors, but the pivotal development has been the dramatically extended reach of know-how through new information technology. Rapidly falling costs of communications, computing, the extraordinary growth and accessibility of the World Wide Web are presenting new opportunities for knowledge-based organizations, to share knowledge more widely and cheaply than ever before and grow their business within seconds. Thus organizations with operations and employees around the world are now able to mobilize their expertise from whatever origin to apply rapidly to new situations. As a result, clients are coming to expect from global organizations, not merely the know-how of the particular team that has been assigned to the task, but the very best that the organization

as a whole has to offer. Knowledge sharing is thus enabling and forcing organizations that are international in the scope of their operations, to become truly global in character by enabling knowledge transfer to occur across large distances within a very short time. How to introduce Knowledge Management Process in the Organizations A knowledge management program can be classified into four broad steps: 1. Getting an overview. 2. Selecting a pilot. 3. Implementing a pilot. 4. Roll out. Knowledge Map contributes in achieving overall business goals and strategies. In this process Knowledge Map must be introduced within first two process phase in order to clarify the relationships between possible knowledge management activities, to improve the communication to the practitioners and most importantly to help select concrete knowledge management activities to be introduced. In the later phases of implementation and roll-out, Knowledge Map serves as a road map for analyzing the return on investment measures. Knowledge Map consists of the following six major areas: Technology, Culture, Management Process, Business Goals, Learning and Business Process. Key dimensions of knowledge management programs 1. Whom to Share: In the first phase we need to decide with whom we need to share the knowledge sharing program. It can be broadly classified into two categories: Internal Sharing and External Sharing. Internal Sharing aims at improving Quality of the work, minimizing cost, updating and making the existing work pattern better, faster and quick in response. This not only helps the people to perform better but also the organization to response to their clients better than before.

2. What to Share: Organization-wide programs for sharing knowledge typically emerge when the organizations know-how is perceived as important to its mission, where the value of the organizations knowledge is high and where the enterprise is dispersed geographically. There are various type of contents aim at sharing know-how and best practices related to the core expertise of the organization.

3. How to Share: Knowledge Management programs have two phases, first the collecting and second the connecting. Organization need to maintain a balance between the two phases to those who need to know and those who do know. In collecting phase it relates to the capturing and disseminating of know-how through information and communication technologies aimed at codifying, storing and retrieving content, which in principle is continuously updated through computer networks.

How to get started with Knowledge Management? Millions are spent within the companies increasingly over Intranets. Unfortunately this money gets wasted if it cannot enable people to innovate, collaborate and make nest use of it. It now becomes organizations responsibility to make its processes, discipline, know how to high quality actions. There are certain stages to get started with: 1. Creating Awareness: Desktop computing, lotus notes, Group ware. 2. Infrastructure: Intranet, networking. 3. Organization Behaviour: Knowledge sharing, competency, sourcing. 4. Innovation: Insight, following the norms. Behavioristic Approaches to Knowledge Management Behavioristic approaches with substantial roots in process re-engineering and change management tend to view the Knowledge Problem as a managemen t issue. Organization Behaviour and culture need to be paid more attention to make information intensive environment. The role of management is very crucial and critical as nothing happens to change unless everyone tries to. There should be an holistic approach which is must to have effectiveness of knowledge management. As knowledge management becomes increasingly embedded in the culture of an organization, its people behaviour gets more quality oriented, they tend to respond to their clients much more faster than before, tend to accelerate learning and skill development of employees, cost saving and get new products and services deployed faster. This all together helps to grow revenue and market share and helps to achieve competitive advantage in the market. Knowledge Management Culture All knowledge has a social and evolutionary facet to it and there is a crying need to continuously subject knowledge to re-examination and modification. It is important to keep the human and social elements of organization involved in all stored knowledge. Communities of practice (or thematic groups) are a popular way of injecting Knowledge Management culture in an organization. Communities of practice where members share information and experiences, develop new insights, assimilate and transform knowledge, emphasize shared interests and work across locations and time zones Things to remember 1. Knowledge Management is costly: It requires a huge investment of money as we invest on any other assets. Knowledge is people, money, learning, flexibility and competitive advantage. But it becomes more expensive if we invest on employees who make poor decision with faulty knowledge or we bear the cost of not knowing.

2. Effective Management of Human Resource: It is true that machines or computers are substitute for human labour. But what humans are best at cannot be substituted by anything else. So managers have a critical role in handling its human resources to manage effectively the knowledge solutions. 3. Politics: We all know that knowledge is power but some times managers of knowledge cultivate politics and create back-room deals. It can create gap between those who want and those who have. So here managements attention is required to shape the governance of knowledge so that it can be better utilized across the organization. 4. Initiative by employees: A knowledge management function should inspire resentment and concern from all. As it is an integrated effort so knowledge managers should not project that they are more knowledgeable than others or reveal any type of supreme ego. 5. Encourage to share: It is a general tendency in human beings that we are resistant in sharing the knowledge we possess. We should motivate employees to share and use knowledge so that it enters into the system naturally. We must appraise the performance and compensation to employees who apply the information and knowledge in their decision making process. This strategy gives birth to innovation and high quality work efficiency. 6. An ongoing process: Gaining knowledge is an ongoing and never ending process. So knowledge managers should always have to pace up with effective and full utilization of knowledge. Their job is never ending as like human resource management. Tata Steel has been recognized as the overall (1st place) 2006 Indian Most Admired Knowledge Enterprises (MAKE) Winner compared to its 6th position for the last year (2005). There were 8 knowledge performance dimensions which are the basis of the MAKE award and Tata Steel performed as follows: - creating an enterprise knowledge-driven culture (1st place) developing knowledge workers through senior management leadership (2nd place) delivering knowledge-based products/solutions (3rd place) maximizing enterprise intellectual capital (3rd place) creating an environment for collaborative knowledge sharing (1st place) creating a learning organization (1st place) delivering value based on customer knowledge (1st place) transforming organizational knowledge into shareholder value (2nd place).

The role of HR in institutionalizing Knowledge Management in an organization Knowledge Management is essentially a people related discipline, with focus on strengthening collaborative team effort to leverage collective knowledge of the enterprise. HR has a pivotal role to play in the Knowledge management movement. Key HR processes - Corporate Education, Performance Management and nurturing (sharing, doing and caring) culture, have a very significant role in the development of the knowledge-based enterprise. Talent management and knowledge management are closely interrelated. While Talent Management focuses at individual level -recruitment, training, skill and competency development and career planning of an individual, knowledge management focuses on people

at collective level, how to leverage the collective knowledge of the enterprise, through mentoring and knowledge sharing and collaborative team working. HR has to be a key facilitator in implementing a companywide communication of value behaviors. Team excellence workshops and process improvement (speed, simplicity and excellence) workouts are among the key initiatives that will soon be launched by HR to support the culture change. These culture change initiatives will strongly support our efforts to become a stronger knowledge driven company, committed to business excellence. Conclusion There is a tremendous growth and need of knowledge economy. The new era is about deploying and obtaining maximum advantage from human and intellectual assets. They have to be treated more tactfully and in a way which is slightly different from conventional management. They need to be considered as strategic partner rather than considering as employees. People should realize that unless they do work better, they are not going to be doing it at all. They should understand the implication of changes in their work contexts. An HR Professional needs to take account of the dynamics of the employment relationship or psychological changes in enabling intervention and not only to ensure knowledge creation, transfer and retention but also to ensure well that system should be given certain flexibility to build slowly and steadily. References 1. Barclay R.O. and Murray P.C., What is knowledge Manage-ment, Knowledge Praxis, K M Associates (1997) 2. Barnes Stuart, Knowledge Management Systems-Theory and Practice, Thomson Learning (2002) 3. Cavaleri Steven and Seivert Sharon, Knowledge Leadership-The Art and Science of the Knowledge- based Organization, Elsevier Publication (2005) 4. DalkirKimiz, Knowledge Management in Theory and Practice, Elsevier Publication ( 2005) 5. Shukla M., Competiting through Knowledge: Building a learning organization, Response Books, New Delhi (1997) 6. Singh Kavita, Organization Change and Development, Excel Books (2005) 7. GogulaRatnaja, Knowledge Management A New Dawn, ICFAI University Press ( 2001) 8. Leonard-Barton D., Wellspring of Knowledge, Harvard Business School press ( 1995) 9. Newman B., An Open Discussion of Knowledge Management, Oxford University Press, New York (1995) 10. Wiig K., Knowledge Management Foundations, Schema Press ( 1993) 11. www.steptwo.com.au/papers/kmc_kmcstrategy/. 12. www.sveiby.com/articles/knowledgemanagement.html. 13. www.knowledgebusiness.com.