Adding knowledge cafés to the repertoire of knowledge sharing techniques

Overview of existing knowledge sharing techniques.Knowledge cafes positioned within current knowledge sharing techniques.Delphi technique used to expand limited scholarly literature on knowledge cafes.Guidelines, advantages, pre-conditions, obstacles, successes of knowledge cafes. Knowledge cafes, a fairly new technique used to facilitate knowledge sharing, offer individuals within organisations the opportunity to interact on a face to face level with topics that are relevant to a particular organisation, and enhances knowledge transfer. One of the major impediments of knowledge cafes is that, to date, there is limited literature concerning this knowledge sharing technique. For this reason data was gathered through a Delphi study to investigate and discuss various aspects of knowledge cafes as used for the purpose of knowledge sharing. The results of the study provide guidelines, advantages, disadvantages and similar techniques to knowledge cafes. The core differences between knowledge cafes and world cafes are also highlighted. Essentially it is the aim of this article to add knowledge cafes to the existing repertoire of knowledge sharing techniques by firstly reviewing literature on the existing techniques used for knowledge sharing and then elaborating on the value of knowledge cafes as a knowledge sharing application.