Technical competencies in knowledge management: implications for training

Noordin, Siti Arpah Binti (2008) Technical competencies in knowledge management: implications for training. Doctoral thesis, Northumbria University.

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Abstract

Many organizations have started to adopt knowledge management as one of their strategic initiatives that is to create, retain, share and use the valuable knowledge assets to achieve the organisational objectives. Although knowledge management (KM) is mainly adopted by the private sectors, the Knowledge-based Economy Master Plan, which was launched in 2002 by the government of Malaysia, has encouraged the public and government sectors to value and exploit their knowledge assets. While knowledge comprises both explicit and tacit, many organisations have created knowledge management teams with various KM designations/positions, led by Chief Knowledge Officers (CKOs) to manage the organization knowledge assets. As KM is considered a new, multifaceted and an evolving discipline, frameworks pertaining to KM activities are still lacking. Regardless of which approach an organisation embarks on, there must be a 'shared understanding' of the organisation KM direction so knowledge assets could be capitalized at every level in the organisation. It is crucial for KM team members being able to introduce and promote the organisation's KM direction; therefore, those who are responsible for managing the initiatives should have adequate skills and knowledge to perform their KM tasks. Besides having some managerial and generic competencies, KM team members must also have some essential technical skills (KM-related skills). The research highlighted two research questions - how do KM managers interpret the essential KM-related competencies needed in supporting their KM tasks? and how do these required KM competencies influence KM managers' attitudes towards KM-related training needs to improve their KM understanding and implementation? From the social constructionist philosophical stance, this interpretive study uses the qualitative research approach to explore and investigate the essential KM-related competencies required by KM managers in performing their KM tasks and how they influence the attitudes for KM related training. Adopting a qualitative case study approach, the researcher made a study of KM managers of XYZ; an organisation that adopted a strategic KM approach. An E-focus group was conducted for the pilot study and face-to-face interviews were used to understand the phenomenon based on the experience of KM managers. Findings suggested that six essential KM-related competencies are needed by KM managers; KM overview, Corporate Taxonomy, Communities of Practice (CoPs), KM Tools, Knowledge Measurement and Information Management. This is to make sure that KM could be easily justified in the terms of the benefits to the management and employees, especially relating it to the economic gains. Those competencies were also suggested based on their difficulties in delivering some KM activities such as measuring knowledge, developing taxonomies and establishing appropriate KM tools and CoPs. Indeed as KM managers' suggestions and views on KM competencies come from their KM involvements, KM managers also admitted that those competencies had influenced their preferences towards KM-related training. KM managers prefer some advanced KM-related courses and also certified KM training. The findings have implications for HR/KM personnel and researchers at XYZ as well as others in general. Hence, the major contributions of this research include the following: a. KM competencies framework for KM professions which contributes to b. Demonstrates the implications of the required KM competencies on training preferences c. Presents the design and development of an alternative way of data collection method in conducting e-focus group using blog

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