The Concept of Knowledge in KM: A Knowledge Domain Process Model Applied to Inter-Professional Care

Grounded in a social construction view of knowledge and based on the work of Haridimos Tsoukas and Max Boisot, this paper attempts to extend Colin Reilly’s knowledge domain model using a process modeling approach. The objective of this paper is to construct a more comprehensive meta-understanding of knowledge domains that considers the influence of organizational context, of a community or group (social construction of knowledge), the presence of events and knowledge artifacts, temporal cycles, and individual knowledge processes. The authors begin by synthesizing the existing literature review to construct the proposed Knowledge Domain Process (KDP) model. Following the construction of the model, the authors develop and use a composite case (from a number of cases experienced by one of the authors as a practitioner) to illustrate the application of the model. The proposed model is then applied to an Inter-Professional Care (IPC) setting within health care, to illustrate how knowledge is constructed, exchanged, and used across numerous health care communities, in an effort to improve coordination and care. The KDP model attempts to provide researchers and practitioners with a more structured, detailed, and analytical way of looking at the processes involved in knowledge construction and dissemination. This model is viewed as a work-in-progress and is still under development. Use by others is encouraged and will help validate or refute the model in part or in whole. Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

[1]  D. Leonard,et al.  The Role of Tacit Knowledge in Group Innovation , 1998 .

[2]  Etienne Wenger,et al.  Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity , 1998 .

[3]  Dorothy E. Leidner,et al.  Review: Knowledge Management and Knowledge Management Systems: Conceptual Foundations and Research Issues , 2001, MIS Q..

[4]  Brian Detlor,et al.  Web Work: Information Seeking and Knowledge Work on the World Wide Web , 2000 .

[5]  Chun Wei Choo.  Working with knowledge : how information professionals help organisations manage what they know , 2000 .

[6]  Stephen Toulmin.  Perspectives on activity theory: Knowledge as shared procedures , 1999 .

[7]  M. Boisot.  Knowledge Assets: Securing Competitive Advantage in the Information Economy , 1998 .

[8]  Kimiz Dalkir,et al.  Knowledge Management in Theory and Practice , 2005 .

[9]  G. Huber.  Organizational Learning: The Contributing Processes and the Literatures , 1991 .

[10]  Janis R. Evink.  Information Ecology: Mastering the Information and Knowledge Environment , 1997 .

[11]  Peter J. van Baalen,et al.  An activity theory approach for studying the situatedness of knowledge sharing , 2002, Proceedings of the 35th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences.

[12]  A. V. D. Ven,et al.  Knowledge for Theory and Practice , 2006 .

[13]  J. Spender.  Making knowledge the basis of a dynamic theory of the firm , 1996 .

[14]  M. Malone,et al.  Intellectual Capital: Realizing Your Company's True Value by Finding Its Hidden Brainpower , 1997 .

[15]  Haridimos Tsoukas,et al.  Do we really understand tacit knowledge , 2002 .

[16]  Jean Lave,et al.  Situating learning in communities of practice , 1991, Perspectives on socially shared cognition.

[17]  R. Grant.  The Knowledge-Based View of the Firm , 2006 .

[18]  M. Polanyi.  Chapter 7 – The Tacit Dimension , 1997 .

[19]  J. Brown,et al.  Organizing Knowledge , 1998 .

[20]  H. Tsoukas.  Complex Knowledge: Studies in Organizational Epistemology , 2004 .

[21]  A. N. Leont’ev,et al.  Activity, consciousness, and personality , 1978 .

[22]  J. Brown,et al.  Organizational Learning and Communities-of-Practice: Toward a Unified View of Working, Learning, and Innovation , 1991 .

[23]  Paul Duguid,et al.  “The Art of Knowing”: Social and Tacit Dimensions of Knowledge and the Limits of the Community of Practice , 2005, Inf. Soc..

[24]  Liam Fahey,et al.  Diagnosing cultural barriers to knowledge management , 2000 .

[25]  D. Bell.  The Coming of Post-Industrial Society, a venture in Social Forecasting , 1974 .

[26]  D. Bamber.  The Coming of Post-Industrial Society — A Venture in Social Forecasting , 1980 .

[27]  F. Blackler.  Knowledge, Knowledge Work and Organizations: An Overview and Interpretation , 1995 .

[28]  J.-C. Spender,et al.  Knowing, Managing and Learning , 1994 .

[29]  H. Tsoukas,et al.  What is Organizational Knowledge , 2001 .

[30]  E. Wenger.  Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity , 1998 .

[31]  S. Gherardi.  From Organizational Learning to Practice-Based Knowing , 2001 .

[32]  I. Nonaka.  A Dynamic Theory of Organizational Knowledge Creation , 1994 .

[33]  野中 郁次郎,et al.  The Knowledge-Creating Company: How , 1995 .

[34]  M. Thompson,et al.  Placing Knowledge Management in Context , 2004 .

[35]  Thomas H. Davenport,et al.  Book review:Working knowledge: How organizations manage what they know. Thomas H. Davenport and Laurence Prusak. Harvard Business School Press, 1998. $29.95US. ISBN 0‐87584‐655‐6 , 1998 .

[36]  Frank Blackler,et al.  Organizing Processes in Complex Activity Networks , 2000 .

[37]  K. Sweeney.  Personal knowledge , 2006, BMJ : British Medical Journal.

[38]  Michael J. Earl,et al.  Knowledge Management Strategies: Toward a Taxonomy , 2001, J. Manag. Inf. Syst..

[39]  Colin Reilly,et al.  The Concept of Knowledge in KM: a Relational Model , 2009 .

[40]  J. Spender.  Organizational knowledge, learning and memory: three concepts in search of a theory , 1996 .

[41]  A. Lin.  Knowledge Assets: Securing Competitive Advantage in the Information Economy , 2001 .