People-focused knowledge management

New Management
and Operations Practices
- Distributed Decision-Making -
- JIT -
- etc. -
New
Commercial
Practices and
Systems
Effective
World-Wide
Logistics
Sophisticated
Customers
More
Knowledgeable
People
Demanding
Stakeholders
World-Wide
Communication
- Internet/www -
- etc. -
Sophisticated
Competitors
Sophisticated
Suppliers
Globalization
Figure 1-1
Many knowledge-related, people-focused factors influence globalization
opportunities and challenges — and the enterprise ability to succeed and
individual people’s ability to thrive. Copyright © 2001 Knowledge Research
Institute, Inc. Reproduced with permission.
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further complicate work. Work expands to exploit new knowledge
capabilities.
The World Requires Us to Change
The world has changed in its features and its relationships and,
perhaps more importantly, in the speed by which new changes and
requirements are introduced. In the new millennium we have been
awakened to different driving forces in local and international
economies. Earlier, enterprises could exist comfortably within narrow
geographical and market boundaries. Now most, even small enter-
prises,
1
are forced onto the globalized competitive playing field and
are subjected to rules that often are quite different. Customers every-
where are more sophisticated and demand individualized products
and services to a degree not thought possible a few years ago. Sup-
pliers have access to well-trained and efficient workers in most parts
of the world — some at very low costs — making it attractive to seek
new alliances. New competitive products, technologies, and service
capabilities are introduced into the market overnight. New business
practices such as business-to-business (B2B), including supplier
bidding systems, are emerging everywhere and are utilizing new vehi-
cles like the World Wide Web. Crafts people, professionals, man-
agers, and whole organizations must act differently to maintain their
accustomed lifestyles by delivering work that requires greater 
personal knowledge. Employee and customer loyalties are changing
and are often reduced sharply.
To survive and prosper, most enterprises find that they need to
tailor their activities to unique situations. They need to act effectively
and “intelligently” in order to provide customized goods and services
and otherwise adapt to new contexts. Viability, success, and progress
no longer depend extensively on exploitation of depletable resources.
Instead, innovation and pursuit of knowledge-based practices and
opportunities are new drivers, not only for new-type businesses, but
also for traditional industries. In particular, enterprises realize that
they must continually build and apply high-quality and competitive
knowledge. They must make available and leverage competitive per-
sonal and structural — tacit and explicit — intellectual capital (IC) to
facilitate the intelligent-acting individual and group behaviors needed
to survive. As the economist Paul Romer states: “Knowledge-based
innovation can provide almost unlimited potentials for success and
economic growth” (Kelly 1996; Romer 1993).
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People-Focused Knowledge Management
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