Playing the dilemma: dilemmas as an instrument in system development and use

Any tool intended to support social acts, in this case a knowledge management system, is hard to design and implement, since it generally introduces new social work patterns and new communication protocols and media. In this paper we present a case where dilemmas are found and attempted used as a tool in system development and in the crucial and often simultaneous change process towards use of the designed system. The company exposed in this paper is a consultancy company, with their major expertise in ICT consultancy. The system designed is an internally developed intra (and extra) net application, and one in a number of support systems in the company. Through work in focus groups dilemmas prevailing in today's organization and practice and those of the future were found. In the paper we explore the main dilemmas the company identified; in time of need versus in need of time, living knowledge versus encoded/embrained knowledge, cost versus investments, and model versus reality. The company exposed in this paper had a set of initial unbreakable conditions for the design and use of the system. To an extent some of the dilemmas can be viewed as reflections of these unbreakable conditions. We nevertheless find the dilemmas of generic interest, since these conditions as well as the dilemmas are common in similar companies. Drawing on experience from a research portfolio, we expose how these dilemmas are generic features of developing KM technologies and activities. In addition we reflect over these dilemmas' role as dilemmas for the R&D department.

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