Product Description
In many parts of the world, knowledge is being put to work to accelerate and deepen the development process, promoting innovation and helping to generate wealth and jobs. This book discusses advanced development strategies that take into account education, information and communication technology, infrastructure, innovation, and the prerequisite economic and institutional regimes. ... Read more

Book Description
`Knowledge management can work to support developing economies! Thisimportant book should be read by anyone who seeks interesting and highlyrelevant insights on how this can be accomplished.'
- Georg von Krogh, University of St Gallen, Switzerland

This important book brings together a set of original key contributions toknowledge management in developing economies. It encompasses a wide rangeof countries throughout Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America aswell as the transition economies of the former socialist countries inEastern Europe.

These carefully selected country case studies represent a broad range ofissues in managing knowledge. They consider the way in which knowledgemanagement processes and practices are influenced by local culture andinstitutions as well as by interaction with the broader internationalcommunity. The need for an aggregated analytical approach in untangling theincreasingly complex process through which knowledge processes are created,transferred and deployed is also highlighted. The book provides a strongnexus between theory and practice by offering solutions to problems suchas: minimising knowledge leakage, creating knowledge-sharing cultures andpromoting management learning.

Presenting the latest research on intercultural knowledge management, thisbook will be warmly welcomed by researchers, students and lecturers with aninterest in international management and knowledge management. Its strongfocus on practitioner implications will provide international managers withinvaluable suggestions on how to maximise knowledge sharing ininternational joint ventures and subsidiary operations. ... Read more

Book Description
Knowledge management (KM) - or the practice of using information and collaboration technologies and processes to capture organizational learning and thereby improve business performance - is becoming one of the key disciplines in management, especially in large companies. Many books, magazines, conferences, vendors, consultancies, Web sites, online communities and email lists have been formed around this concept.

This practical book focuses on the vast offerings of KM solutionstechnology, content, and services. The focus is not on technology details, but on how KM and IT practitioners actually use KM tools and techniques. Over twenty case studies describe the real story of choosingand implementing various KM tools and techniques, and experts analyse the trends in the evolution of these technologies and tools,along with opportunities and challenges facing companies harnessing them. Lessons from successes and failures are drawn, along with roadmaps for companies beginning or expanding their KM practice.

The introductory chapter presents a taxonomy of KM tools, identifies IT implications of KM practices, highlights lessons learned, and provides tips and recommendations for companies using these tools. Relevant literature on KM practices and key findings of market research groups and industry consortia such as IDC, Gartner and APQC, are presented.

The majority of the book is devoted to case studies, featuring clients and vendors along the entire spectrum of solutions: hardware (e.g. handheld/wearable devices), software (e.g. analytics, collaboration, document management) and content (e.g. newsfeeds, market research).

Each chapter is structured along the "8Cs" framework developed by the author: connectivity, content, community, commerce, community, capacity, culture, cooperation and capital. In other words, each chapter addresses how appropriate KM tools and technologies help a company on specific fronts such as fostering adequate employee access to knowledge bodies, user-friendly work-oriented content, communities of practice, a culture of knowledge, learning capacity, a spirit of cooperation, commercial and other incentives, and carefully measured capital investments and returns. Vendor history, product/service offerings, implementation details, client testimonials, ROI reports, and future trends are highlighted.

Experts in the field then provide third-party analysis on trends in KM tools and technique areas, and recommendations for KM practitioners.

* The only book in which practitioners evaluate various KM solutions
* Case studies describe how real companies use KM tools and technologies
* Provides clear lessons from real successes and failuresDownload Description
This practical book focuses on the vast offerings of KM solutions-technology, content, and services. The focus is not on technology details, but on how KM and IT practitioners actually use KM tools and techniques. Over twenty case studies describe the real story of choosing and implementing various KM tools and techniques, and experts analyse the trends in the evolution of these technologies and tools, along with opportunities and challenges facing companies harnessing them. Lessons from successes and failures are drawn, along with roadmaps for companies beginning or expanding their KM practice. ... Read more

Book Description
The Encyclopedia of Knowledge Management is the most comprehensive source of coverage related to the past, present, and emerging directions of knowledge management. The Encyclopedia of Knowledge Management provides a broad basis for understanding the issues, technologies, theories, applications, opportunities, and challenges being faced by researchers and organizations today in their quest for knowledge management. Over 170 contributors from 23 countries have conferred their expertise to this publication, and with 940 definitions and more than 3,600 references, this encyclopedia is the single source for reliable and modern-day research in the field of knowledge management. ... Read more

Book Description
This book provides an introduction to the field of knowledge management. Taking a learning-centric rather than information-centric approach, it emphasizes the continuous acquisition and application of knowledge. The book is organized into three sections, each opening with a classic work from a leader in the field. The first section, Strategy, discusses the motivation for knowledge management and how to structure a knowledge management program. The second section, Process, discusses the use of knowledge management to make existing practices more effective, the speeding up of organizational learning, and effective methods for implementing knowledge management. The third section, Metrics, discusses how to measure the impact of knowledge management on an organization. In addition to the classic essays, each section contains unpublished works that further develop the foundational concepts and strategies. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

The learning-centric alternative for knowledge management
At the start of each episode of the mysterious, brain-twisting 1960s spy/science fiction series, The Prisoner, Patrick McGoohan would declare: "I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or numbered!" This could well be the rallying cry for the perspective on knowledge management taken by the contributors to this 451-page volume. The 18 pieces are gathered into three groups covering strategy, process, and metrics. Although the volume can certainly serve well as a general introduction to knowledge management, the editors make no bones about their distinctly learning-centric (as distinct from information-centric) perspective that they take.

The information-centric approach, which has been dominant in the field until recently (and still is among consultants with IT systems to sell), emphasizes knowledge as explicit, and as susceptible of being captured, stored, and processed. The contributors to this book instead emphasize the continuous generation, acquisition and application of knowledge in its human and cultural context. This perspective permeates each of the essays and all three of the sections. Those sections begin with a classic work then move onto more contemporary thinking along compatible lines.

The "Strategy" section, which begins with two pieces by Peter Senge, examines the motivation for knowledge management and explores how to structure a knowledge management program. Takeuchi and Nonaka's classic paper, "Theory of Organizational Knowledge Creation" opens the "Process" section, which looks at how managers can implement knowledge management effectively, applying it to help make existing practices more effective and to speed up organizational learning. The final section on Metrics covers the use of the Balanced Scorecard, the measurement of intangibles, and metrics for knowledge sharing.

Busy executives need not be deterred by the length of this book. They can read the opening classic pieces, then look only at those following pieces with the most relevance to their concerns and circumstances. Margaret Wheatley's introduction, "Can Knowledge Management Succeed Where Other Efforts Have Failed?", is well worth reading for her concise and lucid account of the common beliefs in organizations that have caused problems for KM. These include beliefs that organizations are machines, only material things are real, that only numbers are real, that you can only manage what you can measure, and that technology is the savior.

Not the best KM book out there
There are certainly a few nuggets to be extracted from this volume but it is not a very compelling read.The MIT slant is obvious due to the multiple inclusions of Peter Senge.Yes there is a reprint of the seminal Balanced Scorecard article from the HBR included in this compilation but I really considered most of the papers included in this collection to be extremely uninteresting.Many of the articles provide nothing other than a state of affairs for knowledge management and while they are well researched they are totally dated.Anyone who has read a relatively recent book on the subject of KM will be familiar with the content contained within this volume.Furthermore many of these articles can be found free of charge on the internet as they were published far and wide at their inception.Sure it touches on the major components of knowledge mangement but in my opinion I found the case work to be so general that any *term of the moment* could be substituted for knowledge management.Spend your cash elsewhere.

Packed with Knowledge!
This book offers a learning-centered introduction to the field of knowledge management. Each of the three sections (Strategy, Process, Metrics) sets the tone with an opening essay by a well known authority in the field. Several previously unpublished essays that develop the chapter follow each opening piece. This convenient plan makes it possible for time-pressed readers to get the gist of the matter by reading only three or four essays in the area that most concerns them. It also allows readers with a consuming interest in the subject to get all of the details they could possibly desire. Some of the essays are accessible; some are quite heavy going, laden with jargon and dense academic prose that only a specialist could decipher. Thus, we are grateful that the editors have made it so easy for readers to find what they need to know in this well-organized, thorough study of the field of knowledge management.

List of included works
I am the editor for this book and I thought it would be helpful to include an overview of the target audience and highlights of the included works in the collection.

This collection is a targetted at leaders in government, industry, or academia who are interested in starting or evaluating a knowledge management program, are currently implementing a knowledge management program, or are simply interested in expanding their understanding of knowledge management.

Featured works include:

Introduction by Margaret Wheatley on, "Can Knowledge Management Succeed Where Other Efforts Have Failed?"

A reflection by Peter Senge on what has been learned since his seminal, "The Leader's New Work: Building Learning Organizations"

Dr. David J. Skyrme on "Developing a Knowledge Strategy: From Management to Leadership"

An introduction by Bipin Junnarkar, CKO of Gateway, on "Sharing and Building Context"

A reflection by Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka on what has been learned since their seminal work, "The Knowledge Creating Company"

Dorothy Leonard on "Tacit Knowledge, Unarticulated Needs and Empathic Design in New Product Development"

Dr. Karl-Erik Sveiby on "Measuring Intangibles and Intellectual Capital"

Dr. Nick Bontis on "Managing Organizational Knowledge by Diagnosing Intellectual Capital"

List of included works
I am the editor for this book and I thought it would be helpful to include an overview of the target audience and highlights of the included works in the collection.

This collection is a targetted at leaders in government, industry, or academia who are interested in starting or evaluating a knowledge management program, are currently implementing a knowledge management program, or are simply interested in expanding their understanding of knowledge management.

Featured works include:

Introduction by Margaret Wheatley on, "Can Knowledge Management Succeed Where Other Efforts Have Failed?"

A reflection by Peter Senge on what has been learned since his seminal, "The Leader's New Work: Building Learning Organizations"

Dr. David J. Skyrme on "Developing a Knowledge Strategy: From Management to Leadership"

An introduction by Bipin Junnarkar, CKO of Gateway, on "Sharing and Building Context"

A reflection by Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka on what has been learned since their seminal work, "The Knowledge Creating Company"

Dorothy Leonard on "Tacit Knowledge, Unarticulated Needs and Empathic Design in New Product Development"

Dr. Karl-Erik Sveiby on "Measuring Intangibles and Intellectual Capital"

Dr. Nick Bontis on "Managing Organizational Knowledge by Diagnosing Intellectual Capital" ... Read more

Amazon.com
Every year, companies spend billions of dollars on training programs and management consultants, searching for ways to improve. But it's mostly all talk and no action, according to Jeffrey Pfeffer and Robert I. Sutton, authors of The Knowing-Doing Gap. "Did you ever wonder why so much education and training, management consultation, organizational research and so many books and articles produce so few changes in actual management practice?" ask Stanford University professors Pfeffer and Sutton. "We wondered, too, and so we embarked on a quest to explore one of the great mysteries in organizational management: why knowledge of what needs to be done frequently fails to result in action or behavior consistent with that knowledge." The authors describe the most common obstacles to action---such as fear and inertia---and profile successful companies that overcome them.

Among the companies that Pfeffer and Sutton say do it right: General Electric, the Men's Wearhouse, SAS Institute, Southwest Airlines, Toyota, and British Petroleum. The book, based on four years of research, is broken into chapters with titles such as "When Talk Substitutes for Action," "When Fear Prevents Acting on Knowledge," "When Internal Competition Turns Friends into Enemies," and "Turning Knowledge into Action." Each chapter contains tips on what to do and what to avoid, and provides examples of how a lethargic company culture can be transformed. The Knowing-Doing Gap is a useful how-to guide for managers looking to make changes. Yet, as Pfeffer and Sutton point out, it takes more than reading their book or discussing their recommendations. It takes action. --Dan RingBook Description
The market for business knowledge is booming, as companies looking to improve their performance pour billions of dollars into training programs, consultants, and executive education.Why, then, are there so many gaps between what firms know they should do and what they actually do?Why do so many companies fail to implement the experience and insight they've worked so hard to acquire? The Knowing-Doing Gap is the first book to confront the challenge of turning knowledge about how to improve performance into actions that produce measurable results.

Jeffrey Pfeffer and Robert Sutton, well-known authors and teachers, identify the causes of the knowing-doing gap and explain how to close it.The message is clear-firms that turn knowledge into action avoid the "smart talk trap."Executives must use plans, analysis, meetings, and presentations to inspire deeds, not as substitutes for action.Companies that act on their knowledge also eliminate fear, abolish destructive internal competition, measure what matters, and promote leaders who understand the work people do in their firms.The authors use examples from dozens of firms that show how some overcome the knowing-doing gap, why others try but fail, and how still others avoid the gap in the first place.

The Knowing-Doing Gap is sure to resonate with executives everywhere who struggle daily to make their firms both know and do what they know.It is a refreshingly candid, useful, and realistic guide for improving performance in today's business.Download Description
Why are there so many gaps between what firms know they should do and what they actually do? Why do so many companies fail to implement the experience and insight they've worked so hard to acquire? The Knowing-Doing Gap is the first book to confront the challenge of turning knowledge about how to improve performance into actions that produce measurable results. Jeffrey Pfeffer and Robert Sutton, well-known authors and teachers, identify the causes of the knowing-doing gap and explain how to close it. The message is clear--firms that turn knowledge into action avoid the "smart talk trap." Executives must use plans, analysis, meetings, and presentations to inspire deeds, not as substitutes for action. Companies that act on their knowledge also eliminate fear, abolish destructive internal competition, measure what matters, and promote leaders who understand the work people do in their firms. The authors use examples from dozens of firms that show how some overcome the knowing-doing gap, why others try but fail, and how still others avoid the gap in the first place. The Knowing-Doing Gap is sure to resonate with executives everywhere who struggle daily to make their firms both know and do what they know. It is a refreshingly candid, useful, and realistic guide for improving performance in today's business. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (31)

Still the Best Book on Execution and Implementation
There have been a lot of books published on what it takes to "execute" strategy or to "implement" organizational change since Pfeffer & Sutton first published this book in 1999. I still think it is the best, as it shows why gaps between knowledge and organizational happen, and offers detailed suggestions about how to overcome problems like the smart-talk trap, dysfunctional competition, and overly complex measurement systems.

The book has a knowing-doing gap
I bought the book with much expectation, as the idea (knowing-doing gap) was quite fascinating. The book does a good job of sensitizing readers to the issue of the knowing-doing gap which is a pervasive problem in a variety of walks of life. However, in the end, the authors suffer from the same problem that they are describing - they do a good job of "knowing what the problem is", but fail to provide concrete guidance on how to close this gap.

This book Is The Best of The Best!
This book hits the nail on the head.It's straight forward, easy to read format makes it a must read for every business leader who wants to get out from under knowing what to do and move to DOING the things that need to be done to move their organization forward!

Effectiveness, honesty, simplicity
Certainly in modern hi-tech work people need to be skilled, and know how to do their work well. But with all that knowledge, and people and systems concerned with knowledge management (and management in general), one may wonder at times why more work doesn't get done sooner. The authors of The Knowing-Doing Gap address this question. If you see parts of yourself or your work environment in these examples, it may be time to discuss it with others so you can get more work done with what you know already.

Overcoming Inertia - Uniting New Knowledge with Action
Two stellar professors use their experience and research to address the problem of organizational inertia in spite of our wide-spread and prevailing knowledge.

The premise is that a gap exists between our knowledge and the application of that knowledge in business... and that it can be closed.It cites that every year 1,700 business books are published, 60 billion dollars spent on training, 443 billion dollars spent on consulting and 80,000 new MBAs hit the business landscape... and still businesses are failing to apply the latest well-known and most viable principles and practices.

The authors break down the causes of this gap into five main reasons.After backing-up each reason with facts and examples, direct solutions are given to its remedy.Eight guidelines for action are then presented to fix this problem in your company.Case studies of business that have made huge turn-arounds using this appoach really amplify the authors' message.

This book is a great guide and loaded with ideas to getting the ball rolling in your business, non-profit organization... and dare I stretch to say your personal affairs. Knowing what to do, by itself is not enough... in businesses, churches or homes.

Application of this book's guidelines will make all of your other books, training, consulting, and manpower pay off.The tendency to just 'intellectualize' this information will be offset by your exposure to the real reasons knowledge hasn't lead to action in your experience.At least, that is the goal!

Five Stars ... Read more

Book Description
The Construction Extension to A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide) - 2000 Edition supplements, modifies, reinforces and expands the profession's de facto global standard in an easy-to-use format for practitioners in the construction industry. This highly-anticipated Extension is complete with the knowledge and skills specific to construction project management practitioners around the globe, in a format that mirrors the PMBOK® Guide. With a world of construction projects squeezed onto one CD-ROM, this reference manual may be used easily at the office or on the road.

Project management practitioners in the construction arena know there is a right way, a wrong way and a construction way to do everything. Thanks to the Construction Extension to the PMBOK® Guide, all practitioners, no matter their level of experience, have their best shot at doing it the construction way.

To swiftly meet the needs of the construction industry, this extension will only be available on CD-ROM in PDF file format, as it is considered provisional (not subject to an Exposure Draft or Beta Testing). An updated version is expected to be available in print format in 2005 upon the release of the PMBOK® Guide Third Edition in 2004. ... Read more

Book Description

This book examines the capabilities needed to transform a globally distributed organization into a virtual organization (an organization that exists and operates across time and distance with the support of global communications technologies such as the Internet). It introduces techniques for definition of goals for virtualization, for monitoring progress toward virtualization and for studying the impact of virtualization on social uncertainty, knowledge sharing and knowledge transfer, organizational memory, transactive memory, communities of practice and organizational commitment, power and control.

Product Description

Information and knowledge have profoundly transformed businesses, organizations and society. Knowledge management promises concepts and instruments that help organizations to provide an environment supportive of knowledge creation, sharing and application. Information and communication technologies are often regarded as the enabler for the effective and especially efficient implementation of knowledge management. The book presents an almost encyclopedic treatise of the many important facets, concepts and theories that have influenced knowledge management and integrates them into a framework consisting of strategy, organization, systems and economics guiding the design of successful initiatives. The third edition particularly extends coverage of the two pillars of implementing knowledge management initiatives, i.e. organization and systems

Book Description

Medical Informatics and biomedical computing have grown in quantum measure over the past decade. An abundance of advances have come to the foreground in this field with the vast amounts of biomedical and genomic data, the Internet, and the wide application of computer use in all aspects of medical, biological, and health care research and practice.MEDICAL INFORMATICS: Knowledge Management and Data Mining in Biomedicine covers the basic foundations of the area while extending the foundational material to include the recent leading-edge research in the field. The newer concepts, techniques, and practices of biomedical knowledge management and data mining are introduced and examined in detail. It is the research and applications in these areas that are raising the technical horizons and expanding the utility of informatics to an increasing number of biomedical professionals and researchers.

Customer Reviews (1)

Excellent Introduction to Medical Informatics
This book focuses on the current software in use today and its application(s) in Biomedical Informatics. It is by far the best introductory overview and reference for this purpose that I have seen to date. ... Read more

Book Description
Chock-full of valuable tips, techniques, illustrative real-world examples, exhibits, and best practices, this handy and concise paperback will help you stay up to date on the newest thinking, strategies, developments and technologies in knowledge management.

Order your copy today! ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Excellent overview of KM!
This is a very reader-friendly survey of Knowledge Management.KM is a business optimization strategy that identifies, selects, organizes, distills, and packages information essential to the business of a company. This book provides best practices in knowledge management, examines enabling technologies and discusses implementation issues.Highly recommended! ... Read more

Book Description
This book provides a perspective on knowledge management at Siemens - an internationally recognised benchmark - by presenting the reader with the best of the corporation's practical applications and experiences. Tom Davenport and Gilbert Probst bring together instructive case studies from different areas that reflect the rich insights gained from years of experience in practising knowledge management.
Most of the cases have been updated for the second edition. New cases have been added.
The Knowledge Management Case Book provides a comprehensive account of how organisational knowledge assets can be managed effectively. Specific emphasis is given to the development of generic lessons that can be learned from Siemens' experience. The book also offers a roadmap to building a "mature knowledge enterprise", thereby enhancing our understanding of the steps that need to be taken in order to sustain competitive dominance in the knowledge economy.
Presenting applications from very different areas, this practice-orientated book is really outstanding in the broad field of KM literature.

"Perhaps the most revealing - and interesting - part of the cases in this book is not the analysis of the various knowledge management tools and processes, but the description of their development, of how they come about, of how commitment was gained, of how implementation was led."

Yves Doz, The Timken Chaired Professor of Global Technology and Innovation at INSEAD, Fontainebleau


"This case book brings insights how our most valuable resource makes those tools happen. I found this book exciting reading, because it is, to my knowledge, the only book where a single company with a wide variety of knowledge management approaches accumulates years of experiences and lessons learned. Edited by two of the leading thinkers in the field of knowledge management, this book will show the way you practise knowledge management in your company."

Heinz Fischer, Global Head of HR, Deutsche Bank AG


"This book is a rare and valuable description of a single company's knowledge management journey. Siemens has made impressive advances in becoming a knowledge-driven firm, and this volume details many of its directions and waystations."

Laurence Prusak, Executive Director, IBM Institute for Knowledge Management


"Though there are many books on Knowledge Management, this is a unique one on a sense that it provides practical application of KM rather than the jargon."

Sushil, Modi Foundation Chair Professor and Group Chair, Department of Management Studies, Indian Institute of Technology, New Delhi ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

A comprehensive insight into KM in a global firm
This knowledge management casebook is one of the best documented case studies of knowledge transformation at work in a global business powerhouse. Siemens has been rated as one of the top ten KM-driven companies worldwide according to an international benchmarking exercise (MAKE ý most admired knowledge enterprise), thanks to its comprehensive efforts at fostering, promoting and optimizing knowledge utilization.

The 19 chapters covering Siemenýs KM journey have been compiled by a team of 44 writers, including business executives, managers, interns, professors and graduate students. The material is divided into 7 sections, covering overall KM strategy, transfer techniques, communities of practice, e-learning, and organisational change.

With a diverse group of companies and almost half a million employees globally, Siemens is one of the worldýs oldest and most successful corporations ý which successfully adapted to the chaotic world of the Information Age to re-structure itself around its most valuable assets: its knowledge base and people.

ýCompanies today live in knowledge ecologies where one company feeds knowledge into another. What counts is a networked approach to KM, involving internal as well as external parties. The logic behind this is as simple as it is compelling: if you cut off the outflow of knowledge, you will also cut off the inflow. We believe, therefore, that the firmýs openness to external experts and the sharing of ideas within a broad network will be a key driver for maintaining competitive success at Siemens,ý begin the editors Thomas Davenport (KM expert) and Gilbert Probst (professor at the University of Geneva).

ýIncreasingly, information is either a part of, or an important facilitator of, Siemensý diverse businesses. Since KM is greatly enhanced by the effective use of IT, itýs not surprising that Siemens was a relatively early and enthusiastic adopter of KM. The IT-driven nature of the companyýs businesses also provides a strong motivation to manage knowledge effectively. One attribute of these technologies is that they change very rapidly; keeping up with various computing and communications technologies is much easier when a company has a system for rapidly circulating new knowledge,ý according to the editors.

But KM is more than technology, and Siemens has also focused on a culture of sharing, synergy, and customer focus, especially in markets and fast-moving technology areas where the customer needs are more for total business solutions and sector intelligence than mere technology components.

KM at Siemens began in a bottom-up manner via various mid-level initiatives in communities of practice and bodies of knowledge. Managers of these initiatives themselves formed a semi-official community of practice. This was then followed by a corporate knowledge function which officially supported and coordinated these various initiatives, via the creation of the Corporate KM (CKM) office in 1999.

The Corporate KM (CKM) office held an international meeting in Munich in May 2000, drawing over 200 managers and KM practitioners to formally reflect on the companyýs KM strategy via the CKM Council and CKM TaskForce. Moving beyond a loose association of KM followers, the company now has formal support, constancy, transparency and a joint approach for KM practices.

The vision statement, goals and roles at the company now formally emphasise the role of knowledge and sharing. CKM has initiated over a hundred KM projects divided across lines of geography, industry, and functions. It has received numerous awards across Europe and the US, such as APQC, MACILS, KVD and Teleos.

KM capacity building at Siemens is promoted by yet another initiative, the Knowledge Community Support (KCS) project, founded in 1999 with support from units like Corporate Technology, Siemens Business Services, and Siemens Qualification and Training. It promotes the use of knowledge communities within Siemens, via coaching, hotlines, resources, newsletters, and its own Web site. It maintains an employee portal and a directory of all knowledge communities in the company, Communities@Siemens. KCS expects that in future, community management will be as common as project management.

Yet another area of KM focus at Siemens is the use of e-business methodology. It formed the Centre for e-Excellence in May 2000 to analyse business transformation via the Internet. A quarter of the sales of Siemens itself is expected to be eventually transacted via the Internet ý 50 per cent or more of its consumer products.

Challenges faced by Siemens on the KM front include balancing energies, resources and rewards for local versus global KM initiatives on a daily basis, managing the knowledge-sharing tension between different business units, and nourishing KM during hard economic times.

Each of the chapters in the book ends with useful discussion questions and key propositions from each case study. It would be suitable to end this book review with a sampling of these propositions.

ýThe economic value of knowledge does not lie in possessing it, but in using it. Pilot projects for KM must have clearly defined, measurable objectives that can be achieved in less than six months. However, the changeover to a knowledge-based company involves a change process that can span several years,ý according to the authors.

Knowledge management and learning management are two complementary disciplines that are continuously growing closer and support an innovative and agile enterprise.

Knowledge sharing should not be reduced to appendices to everyday practice, but must become intertwined with practice. Casewriting about this sharing is a useful learning tool, teaching method, and knowledge recap mechanism via its ability to tease out details and provoke or inspire further action. Such methods are already used by other companies like British Petroleum (Post-Project Appraisal) and Xerox (pre-thought and after-thought cases on KM tools). An interplay between writers from the outside and inside helps elicit crucial details in the case stories.

ýWhen established procedures are not conducive to the sharing of knowledge, the company must be ready to restructure itself into an organization more amenable to knowledge sharing. Over time, the intrinsic benefits of sharing knowledge should become apparent and the system then becomes self-perpetuating, thereby rendering incentive systems obsolete,ý the authors recommend.

>>>>>>>>>

Madanmohan Rao is the author of ýThe Asia-Pacific Internet Handbooký and can be reached at madan@inomy.com

Concrete case-based ideas on how to optimize knowledge
The Knowledge Management Case Book clearly illustrates how knowledge sharing can begin either as a bottom-upor as a top down activity.This book was developed through collective efforts of Siemens employees working together with external "case coaches" who acted as'devil's advocates' in conceptualizing and writing cases.This book offers concrete case-based ideas on how Siemens is promoting and optimizing knowledge utilization on a worldwide basis.It is written in a very understandable, narrative style, and organized into fivesections that flow well together. These sections offer case studies of knowledge transfer, communities of practice, added-value of knowledge management, measuring KM, and an epilogue written by Gilbert Probst. As Gilbert Probst states in his epilogue, this book is a kind of knowledge toolitself and has offers the reader many practical examples of KM in practice.

Part I of the book offers the reader cases addressing the fundamental issues of knowledge transfer, critical success factors, underlying principles, descriptions ofknow-how exchange, lowering knowledge-sharing barriers, KM strategies, and it addresses the need to weave best practices into the day-to-day work that everyone does.Part IIis focused on communities of practice -- one of the majordriving forces of KM.Its cases explain the challenges of set-up, implementation, coordination and the support required for managers and teams to systematize KM practices.Part III illustrates the added value of KM in innovative arenas such as neurological-disease centers, knowledge intensive medical solutions and services, mergers and acquisitions, or corporate learning programs.Part IV examines quantifiable measures of KM as a critical basis for developing incentives for stimulating knowledge sharing and networking.It suggests ways in which results can be promoted, and discusses the intersection of KM and e-business, incorporating knowledge from outside corporate boundaries with organizational knowledge.

Gilbert Probst proposesthat the very process of case writing is instrumental in managing knowledge and reflecting on the process. Thus, according to Probst, the case method used in this book offers an excellent example of a knowledge-sharing tool.Each case is presented as an independent study.They can be read in any order. The consistent emphasis throughout the book is placed on an ongoing balance of identifying what knowledge is most relevant to the interests of managers, and illustrating how to transfer it.I really enjoyed reading this this book.I consider it a treasure trove of ideas on how to use an organization's best knowledge practices.

Full Scale Knowledge Management
This is a premier book on knowledge management--a definite must read.Although it's a bit pricey and not in main stream distribution, please note that Tom Davenport is the co-editor.The book provides an inside perspective on how Siemens, a 400,000 person global company has scaled KM to be both part of their business practices and their business model.Since they operate in over 190 countries, it's easy to see why the communities of practice concept would be so appealing to them.Given the limited amount of available literature related to communities of practice, the how-to chapter about communities in this book makes it worth buying the book.As you read about the KM work at Siemens you can get a good sense of how KM will eventually reside permanently in the main stream of management practice. I have collected quite a bit of the KM literature and would place this in a top ten read list.

Full Scale Knowledge Management
This is a premier book on knowledge management--a definite must read.Although it's a bit pricey and not in main stream distribution, please note that Tom Davenport is the co-editor.The book provides an inside perspective on how Siemens, a 400,000 person global company has scaled KM to be both part of their business practices and their business model.Since they operate in over 190 countries, it's easy to see why the communities of practice concept would be so appealing to them.Given the limited amount of available literature related to communities of practice, the how-to chapter about communities in this book by itself makes the book a must read.As you read about the KM work at Siemens you can get a good sense of how KM will eventually reside permanently in the main stream of management practice. I have collected quite a bit of the KM literature and would place this in a top ten read list. ... Read more

Book Description
The PMBOK® Guide 2000 Edition is an American National Standard for Project Management and in fact the project management standard of the world. Unique in its content, Brainstorming the PMBOK® Guide is a book that will help you:

• Understand the PMBOK® Guide.

• Apply the PMBOK® Guide.

• Prepare for the PMP® Certification Exam.

To make this possible, Brainstorming the PMBOK® Guide:

• Relates all of the PMBOK® Guide's processes in terms of their inputs and outputs.

• Chronologically orders the PMBOK® Guide's outputs/inputs.

• Provides a variety of templates for managing real-life projects.

Now, more than ever, successful project managers turn to the project management standard. Brainstorming the PMBOK® Guide explains what the PMBOK® Guide says and what it means. This book will help you reduce the gap between project management theory and practice, allowing you to spend a minimal amount of time and effort on understanding how to turn the PMBOK® Guide into a powerful application engine. ... Read more

Book Description
Executives today recognize that their firms face a wave of retirements over the next decade as the baby boomers hit retirement age. At the other end of the talent pipeline, the younger workforce is developing a different set of values and expectations, which creates new recruiting and employee retention issues. The evolution from an older, traditional, highly-experienced workforce to a younger, more mobile, employee base poses significant challenges, particularly when considered in the context of the long-term orientation towards downsizing and cost cutting.This is a solution-oriented book to address one of the most pressing management problems of the coming years: How do organizations transfer the critical expertise and experience of their employees before that knowledge walks out the door? It begins by outlining the broad issues and providing tools for developing a knowledge-retention strategy and function. It then goes on to outline best practices for retaining knowledge, including knowledge transfer practices, using technology to enable knowledge retention, retaining older workers and retirees, and outsourcing lost capabilities. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Worth Considering as a Future Career Choice
I'm not much of a fan of management consultant books as I generally find them quite faddish.They usually state that there is a problem, enter a few amusing anecdotes that illustrate what they mean and follow up with some suggested solutions.In that sense this book is no different, but far closer to the Tom Peters academic style than the "One Minute Manager"

However the problem that it discusses struck a resonant chord in me.Years ago I viewed a tape from Texas Instruments that talked about capturing the knowledge of a distillation column engineer for Campbell's soup in a expert system.The gentleman was retiring soon, and the company didn't know what he knew and felt the best approach was to build a system that modelled his expertise.What I never found out was how successful the approach was in the end.(This story is not in the book.)

The basic problem is that through retirement and attrition key knowlege in many organizations disappears.No one knows who knows what nor the value of that knowledge before it is gone.The problem is exascerbated by the huge lump of the baby boomers when they retire.The anecdotes include NASA no longer knowing how to get to the moon any more using Saturn V technology (the plans are lost),Sandia labs needing to retain the knowledge of how to build, test and dismantle nuclear weapons, given that they haven't built or tested a weapon in years,the cost rediscovering wiring and conduits in building that we no longer have the blueprints of. The solution lies in identification, sharing, managing and storytelling. Various success stories are brought out to support the points.Strategies such as Communities of Practice and the U.S. Army's AAR (After Action Review): 1) What was supposed to happen 2) What actually happened 3) Why were there differences 4) What can we learn for next time) are covered.

What de Long doesn't deal with is the cost of collecting this knowledge vs the value received on a per item basis. Localized cost for globalizedbenefit usually plays poorly in most organizations.

Still the book is well written and enjoyable. I've always been one to define my own job functions.It suggests to me that there is a potential role in any organization as a professional liason between groups and generations of expertise - a possible career choice.The book emphasises the value that is contributed by individuals in the workplace and gets you thinking about the need to transmit the legacy not only of things done well but of things done poorly.

A book that inspires that kind of introspection is worth picking up and reading.

Protecting the Eroding Treasure of Knowledge
The generation of workers that is moving into retirement now-the Traditionalists, followed by the huge (76.4 million) Baby Boomer cohort-has experienced an unprecedented era of change and growth. Workers in this period have typically stayed with one employer for many years, accumulating experience, continuity, and a wealth of knowledge that is principally captured within the individual. Now, as these workers retire, they're taking that invaluable knowledge with them; it's not being captured effectively to be used by successors. This loss is potentially a tremendous risk and cost for employers and for society.

The book, written by a a research fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Age Lab, is organized into three sections. The opening chapters explain the high cost of losing intellectual capital. The author provides an abundance of delicious examples of how the departure of workers with unique, uncaptured knowledge and experience will wreak havoc in practically every environment. He certainly makes his case, and maybe even overdoes it. I felt, at times, that I was getting bogged down in an almost repetitious litany of exposure to the problem.

Part two takes us into evaluating knowledge retention practices. Readers will gain insights into developing the infrastructure and the process of preserving what people have absorbed, but not recorded or passed along to others. Again, DeLong presents a large volume of information, examples, and case studies-so much material that it seems to get in the way of the message. The small type size and book design make the book even more difficult to read. The content is strong, but the presentation was not holding my attention. I found my eyes glazing over on a number of occasions as I drifted, then pulled myself back to the message.

The final section of the book moves us into implementation, again with example after example of what various companies are doing to protect their intellectual and operational knowledge. There is unquestionably a tremendous amount of value in these pages; it's just a bit difficult to draw it out without some serious concentration.

The book concludes with a strong section of notes and a comprehensive index.

Lost Knowledge--A must read
Lost Knowledge-a review


I enjoyed Lost Knowledge immensely. I am not a corporate manager,
but I found the book's insights and suggestions interesting, amusing and valuable. It's also incredibly readable. The anecdotes and stories are clever and compelling. The chapter dealing with the transfer of "explicit knowledge" got me thinking again about a woman I had known, the assistant to the head of an important organization, who had worked with him for several decades. She knew everything about anything. One day she was suddenly hit by a bus and killed and all her knowledge went with her. It took three people to replace her and even then...

The chapter on transferring "tacit" knowledge was also right on target. I didn't realize, until I turned my business over to colleagues, just how much of what I did (dealing with vendors, clients, buyers, employees) was either instinctual or learned and nowhere written down. This book also made me reexamine the current spate of industrial mishaps and accidents. I wonder how much of what happens (train derailments, chemical spills, etc) are a result of what DeLong suggests is departed experience.

The author identifies many hidden traps and challenges of lost knowledge and explains them clearly. Like the knowledge it so earnestly beseeches us to protect, this book should be kept and revisited as questions and challenges arise. If I were running a business again, I would consider this required reading.

Fascinating and Usefull
This book deals with a fascinating and complex issue facing organizations today. It's full of compelling examples that show how losing knowledge can seriously hurt organizational performance. DeLong provides a comprehensive approach to the challenges posed by boomer retirements, and the solutions he describes will be very helpful to managers looking for a way to attack this growing problem.

Excellent Suggestions for Better Knowledge Management
Around the developed countries of the world, knowledge workers will be retiring at a fast clip in the next five to ten years.In some companies and organizations that have done poor succession planning or have been wracked by layoffs, this impact will come sooner.Professor DeLong has done a number of helpful case studies to document the harm that these retirements can cause, and describes the questions that organizations must ask themselves if they are to avoid dangerous and expensive knowledge gaps.

The bulk of the book is a detailed look at the effectiveness of knowledge management techniques in a variety of companies rather than a focus on the retirement problem.I was most impressed with the parts of the book that began with chapter 10 and continued to the end.If you have experience with the subject of knowledge management, you can skip the parts of the book that precede chapter 10.If you are new to the subject, you will find those parts helpful . . . but slowly developed.Stick with it.The material after chapter 9 is worth the wait.

The central reality of knowledge management is that few executives are very interested in it, many retiring workers don't really want to share what they know and many new workers don't feel like they have much to learn from older workers.I was delighted to see that Professor DeLong was familiar with those problems and makes a number of helpful suggestions for overcoming those psychological stalls to maintaining and improving knowledge.

Lest you think that the subject really isn't very important, you will be chilled to learn that there's a substantial risk of organizations forgetting how to disarm nuclear devices built in the 1970s and how to repair nuclear reactors built in the 1960s.In many other situations, life and death are at risk.

Pass it along! ... Read more

Book Description
Regional Development in the Knowledge Economy examines the concept "Knowledge Economy" in the context of "Regional Development" and proposes to see the interaction between these two forces being worked out as processes and policies.

The international contributions examine a number of theoretical approaches that aim to explain contemporary regional development processes from a knowledge perspective. It draws on empirical material where relevant. Narratives are illustrated as appropriate by data or "stylised" accounts.

The conceptual basis for this book was worked out in Cooke's Knowledge Economies Routledge, (2002) and rests on the idea of value creation from the interaction of knowledge upon knowledge. This applies clearly in science-based or creative industries but also in established industry that applies more scientific or creative knowledge as a matter of course, but with frequent barriers among "communities of practice."Otherwise termed "epistemic communities" these are professional and practitioner groups that must reduce cognitive dissonance to build up interactive innovation capabilities and it is being discovered that this is less intractable at regional level where social capital may be high, thus firm inter-domain professional networks form. Policies both to build and take advantage of these capabilities will be discussed and assessed. ... Read more

Book Description
Education policies and systems in all OECD countries are coming under increasing pressure to show greater accountability and effectiveness and it is crucial that educational policy decisions are made based on the best evidence possible. This book brings t ... Read more

Book Description
Ontologies provide a common vocabulary of an area and define - with different levels of formality - the meaning of the terms and the relationships between them. Ontologies may be reused and shared across applications and groups Concepts in the ontology are usually organized in taxonomies and relations between concepts, properties of concepts, and axioms are typically used for representing the knowledge contained in ontologies. With the growth of information available, e.g. on the WWW, they are popularly applied in knowledge management, semantic web, natural language generation, enterprise modelling, knowledge-based systems, ontology-based brokers, e-commerce platforms and interoperability between systems. This book looks at questions such as: * What is an ontology? * What are the uses of ontologies? * What types of ontologies exist? What are the most well-known ones? * How do I select the best ontology for my application? * What are the principles for building an ontology? * What methodologies should I use to build my own ontology? Which techniques are appropriate for each step? * How do software tools support the process of building and using ontologies? * What language can I use to implement ontologies? * How can I integrate ontologies in a given language? The book presents the theoretical foundations of ontological engineering and covers the practical aspects of selecting and applying methodologies, tools and languages for building ontologies. The applications of ontologies are also illustrated with case studies taken from the areas of knowledge management, e-commerce and the semantic web. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

Complicated, Boring, and Irrelevant
The subject matter is much too complex, does not follow a logical order, is a slow and arduous read, and is not practical.

This book was the subject of a book club where I and a small group of software engineers wanted to learn more about ontologies. Most of the members of the group had some experience with ontology languages. In each one-hour lunch session, we were not able to discuss more than 10 pages at a time due to the complexity of the writing and the subject matter. We finally gave up and none of us has finished the book. Although we read over half of the book before giving up, we gained no practical knowledge from it whatsoever.

how to automatically extract an ontology?
The book shows progress in how ontologies are defined from various data sets. The subject is a natural field of artificial intelligence, in attempting to automated this filling of an ontology. Various example ontologies are presented, along with the markup languages like RDF and OWL in which these are expressed. The progress is visible, inasmuch as just a few years ago, these languages were devised. Now we see non-trivial ontology constructions using them. Good.

A large portion of the book describes the acute problem of somehow extracting meaning in a programmatic manner from data. Because the manual making of an ontology simply does not seem to scale, given the realities of gigabyte databases. We see that there is a natural decomposition of the problem into a linguistic step and a conceptual step. The former is tied to a particular human language. The latter is the nut of the problem. Current methods look promising, but are certainly not the last word.

Excellent survey book on Ontology
The book is well organized in introducing the subject in a coherent manner and weaving in all important criteria of ontology together. I especially like to read the comparison of different languagees in light of knowlege represenation and knowlege reasoing.The book is great in terms of getting a broad view (survey) and is also great as a reference.In many pages, there is so much information packed in each sentences.Great book.

A good literature review of current developments
The word `ontology' is usually associated with philosophical speculation on the reality of things, and if one checks the literature on philosophy one will find a diverse number of opinions on this reality. Engineers and scientists typically view philosophical musings on any topic as being impractical, and indulging oneself in these musings will cause one to lose sight of the topic or problem at hand. Rather than simplify the problem and make it understandable, philosophy tends in most cases to complicate it by endless debate on definitions and the use of sophisticated rhetoric that seems to have no bearing on the problem at hand. The conceptual spaces generated by these debates can become gigantic and therefore unwieldy, thus making the problem appear more complex than it actually is.

In the information age however, ontology has become a word that has taken on enormous practical significance. Business and scientific research are both areas that have increasingly relied on information technology not only to organize information but also to analyze data and make accurate predictions. In addition, financial constraints have forced many businesses to automate most of their internal processes, and this automation has brought about its own unique challenges. This push to automation usually involves being able to differentiate one thing from another, or one collection of data from another, or one concept from another. Thus one needs to think about questions of ontology, and this (very practical) need has brought about the rise of the field of `ontological engineering', which is the topic of this book.

The authors have given a good general overview of the different approaches to the creation of ontologies. There are many of them, some of which seem "natural", while others seem more esoteric. The reader though will obtain an objective discussion of the ontologies that the authors chose to include in the book. Discussions of the ones that are not included can readily be found on the Internet.

Given the plethora of ontologies that have been invented, it would be of interest to the ontological engineer to find common ground between them. The re-use of a particular ontology may be stymied by the different ontological commitments it is adhering to or it's actual content. In order to use it, it must therefore be "re-engineered". The authors discuss this prospect in the book, and define `ontological re-engineering' as the process where a conceptual model of an implemented ontology is transformed into one that is more suitable. The code in which the ontology is written is first reverse engineered, and then the conceptual model is reorganized into the new one. The new conceptual model is then implemented.

Also discussed in the book, and of enormous practical interest, is the automation of the ontology building process. Called `ontology learning' by the authors, they discuss a few of the ways in which this could take place. One of these methods concerns ontology learning using a `corpus of texts', and involves being able to distinguish between the `linguistic' and `conceptual' levels. Knowledge at the linguistic level is described in linguistic terms, while at the conceptual level in terms of concepts and the relations between them. Ontology learning is thus dependent on how the linguistic structures are exemplified in the conceptual level. Relations at the conceptual level for example could be extracted from sequences of words in the text that conform to a certain pattern. Another method comes from data mining and involves the use of association rules to find relations between concepts. The authors discuss two well-known methods for ontology learning from texts. Both of these methods are interesting in that they can apparently learn in contexts or environments that are not domain-specific. Being able to learn over different domains is very important from the standpoint of the artificial intelligence community and these methods are a step in that direction. The processes of `alignment', `merging', and `cooperative construction' of ontologies that are discussed in the book are also of great interest in artificial intelligence, since they too will be of assistance in the attempt to design a machine that can reason over multiple domains.

The ontologies that are actually built are of course not unique. This results in a kind of semantic or cognitive relativism between the environments that might be built on different ontologies, even in the same domain. Merging and alignment both address this relativism, along with other techniques that are discussed in the book. The selection of the actual language that is used to create an ontology is also somewhat arbitrary. The authors devote a fair amount of space in the book to the different languages that have been used to build ontologies. Through an elementary example, they discuss eleven different languages, namely KIF, Ontolingua, LOOM, OCML, Flogic, SHOE, XOL, RDF(S), OIL, DAML+OIL, and OWL. The choice of a language is dictated by what one is seeking in terms of `expressiveness' and what kind of reasoning patterns are to be deployed when using the ontology. The authors point to a tradeoff between the expressive power of the language and the reasoning patterns that are attached to the language. The expressiveness of a language is directly proportional to the complexity of the reasoning patterns that are used.

Ontological engineering as it presently exists is still carried out by a human engineer. To create an ontology every time from scratch would be tedious, and so it is no surprise that tools were invented to make ontology creation more straightforward. Some of these tools are discussed in the book, such as KAON, OilEd, Ontolingua, OntoSaurus, Protege-2000, WebODE, and WebOnto, along with assessments as to their utility. The discussion is helpful for newcomers to ontological engineering who need guidance as to what direction to take. The automation of ontology building would of course be a major advance.To accomplish this however would require that the machine be able to simultaneously and recursively construct the knowledge base and reason over it effectively. This is a formidable challenge indeed.

Good overview for beginners
The subject of this book is incredibly relevant to today's world of information management. The chapters are presented in a logical and informative way, though some of the book only skims the surface or barely touches on significant developments, tools, and problems. Overall, I found the text too theoretical, with insufficient ties to messy real-world issues. ... Read more

Book Description
New insights from the country's leading library administrators

Digital Information and Knowledge Management examines how academiclibrarianscan use knowledge management to provide an increasing amount ofelectronic informationto an expanding user base. Several of the country's leading libraryadministratorsanalyze these vital issues from the perspectives of both informationprovidersand library users, exploring the challenges of selecting and managingelectronicinformation and resources, making the most of knowledge management, andimprovingdigital access to their users.

Book Description
Provides a balanced treatmentof the organizational and architectural components of knowledgemanagement. Includes more than 70 illustrations and covers the full rangeof national, military, business, and competitive intelligence. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Magnum Opus for Organizational Decision-Making
Ed Waltz has produced a book that is far more useful and important than its title or intended audience suggest.It is perhaps the single finest soup-to-nuts how-to manual on how an organization can design its decision-making processes to maximize utility, whether this takes the form of nat