Developing a Knowledge-Based Organizational Performance Model for Discontinuous Participatory Enterprises

Our research seeks to understand how to extend established organization theory and emerging knowledge-flow theory to inform the design of organizations with discontinuous participation. Because knowledge flows enable workflows, and work determines performance, theory suggests the organization of knowledge-particularly tacit knowledge-is critical for competitive advantage. However, tacit knowledge does not flow well through the enterprise, and it attenuates particularly quickly in organizations that experience discontinuous participation. In this paper we build upon an ethnographic study and computational organization theory (COT) to model and analyze discontinuous participation in the domain of facility development. We find organizational design characteristics such as task interdependency affect flows of tacit knowledge and hence work performance in the enterprise. Computational and analytical results suggest how we can extend organization theory to address the dynamics of knowledge flows when designing organizations with discontinuous participation.

[1]  A LevinthalDaniel.  Organizational Adaptation and Environmental Selection-Interrelated Processes of Change , 1991 .

[2]  Meliha Handzic,et al.  Knowledge management research & practice: visions and directions , 2003 .

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

[4]  R. Grant.  Toward a Knowledge-Based Theory of the Firm,” Strategic Management Journal (17), pp. , 1996 .

[5]  J. Ruiz Moreno.  [Organizational learning]. , 2001, Revista de enfermeria.

[6]  M. Shubik,et al.  A Behavioral Theory of the Firm. , 1964 .

[7]  AlaviMaryam,et al.  Review: Knowledge management and knowledge management systems , 2001 .

[8]  Jay R. Galbraith.  Organization Design: An Information Processing View , 1974 .

[9]  A. Hollingshead.  Retrieval processes in transactive memory systems , 1998 .

[10]  Daniel A. Levinthal,et al.  ABSORPTIVE CAPACITY: A NEW PERSPECTIVE ON LEARNING AND INNOVATION , 1990 .

[11]  C. P. Goodman,et al.  The Tacit Dimension , 2003 .

[12]  Kathleen M. Carley,et al.  A Theoretical Study of Organizational Performance Under Information Distortion , 1997 .

[13]  M. H. Lambert,et al.  Transactive memory and exception handling in high-performance project teams , 2002, IEEE International Engineering Management Conference.

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

[15]  Raymond E. Levitt,et al.  Agent-based modeling of knowledge flows: illustration from the domain of information systems design , 2004, 37th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, 2004. Proceedings of the.

[16]  Raymond E. Levitt,et al.  The Virtual Design Team: An Object-Oriented Model of Information Sharing in Project Design Teams , 1991 .

[17]  Henry Mintzberg,et al.  Cycles of organizational change , 1992 .

[18]  Mark E. Nissen,et al.  An Extended Model of Knowledge-Flow Dynamics , 2002, Commun. Assoc. Inf. Syst..

[19]  A. Lewin,et al.  Prolegomena on Coevolution: a Framework for Research on Strategy and New Organizational Forms , 1999 .

[20]  Daniel A. Levinthal.  Organizational Adaptation and Environmental Selection-Interrelated Processes of Change , 1991 .

[21]  E. Johnsen.  Richard M. Cyert & James G. March, A Behavioral Theory of The Firm, Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1963, 332 s. , 1964 .

[22]  R. Yin.  Case Study Research: Design and Methods , 1984 .

[23]  P. Lawrence,et al.  Organization and Environment: Managing Differentiation and Integration , 1967 .

[24]  Paul R. Carlile,et al.  Into the black box: the knowledge transformation cycle , 2003, IEEE Engineering Management Review.

[25]  高橋 進.  サイアート, マーチの「A Behavioral Theory of the Firm」 , 1995 .

[26]  S. Fagerhaugh,et al.  Participant Observation , 1979 .

[27]  L. Porter.  Forty Years of Organization Studies: Reflections from a Micro Perspective , 1996 .

[28]  B. Kogut,et al.  Knowledge of the Firm, Combinative Capabilities, and the Replication of Technology , 1992 .

[29]  Raymond E. Levitt,et al.  The virtual design team , 1998, CACM.

[30]  Rahinah Ibrahim,et al.  Emerging Technology to Model Dynamic Knowledge Creation and Flow among Construction Industry Stakeholders during the Critical Feasibility-Entitlements Phase , 2003 .

[31]  Clifford Nass,et al.  A Trajectory for Validating Computational Emulation Models of Organizations , 1999, Comput. Math. Organ. Theory.

[32]  D. Wegner.  Transactive Memory: A Contemporary Analysis of the Group Mind , 1987 .

[33]  Yan Jin,et al.  The Virtual Design Team: A Computational Simulation Model of Project Organizations1 , 1998 .

[34]  YAN JIN,et al.  The virtual design team: A computational model of project organizations , 1996, Comput. Math. Organ. Theory.

[35]  Børge Obel,et al.  Strategic organizational diagnosis and design : developing theory for application , 1995 .