Knowlegde in Organisation
Hoorcollege 1 = Perspectives in KiO
How to manage knowledge?
What is the relevant of knowledge?
Forsime Digitalization Surveillance captitalism
Growing important on knowledge
Everything we do is translated into data
Future almost captured by organisation who predict and steer what we do
Data is seen as the new resource than the manuable
How does this relate to knowledge in organisation
- 80/90’s Knowledge = competitive advantage. Capture in respositories; explicit
knowledge, digital storage
Neo-functionalist persepctive : Lecture 2/3
- 00/10’s Knowledge = experimental, captured in doing, tacit knowledge.
Hidden knowledge & imbedded in what we do. Locators of expertise, learning
before/during/after.
Social-constructivist : Lecture 4/5/6
Learning in organisation / dialogical pers. / rol in power ; Lecture 7/8/9 = both on
these first 2
- 10/20’s = Collective knowledge, created by ICT facilitated conversation and
combining and creating based on big data.
Knowledge more explicit again (Zoom) and based on that combine with big data.
Dus een combi 80/90’s en 00/10’s , relying on ICT
Critical perspective / rol ICT = Lecture 11/12
Guest lecture 10
Course Objectives
At knowledge level:
- Describing and recognizing differences in ‘knowledge in organizations’ related
discourses;
Discourse = how people talk about something. Different ideas/norms/values about
knowledge (= something)
- Reproducing and understanding how certain organizational conditions affect
knowledge in organizations (from different perspectives).
,The application level:
- diagnosing practical problems from a knowledge perspective in stylized situations;
- switching between perspectives and discourses while diagnosing knowledge
(management) related problems in organizations;
understand,recognize, apply from different discourse, comes to different
solutions.
- providing possible solutions for these problems.
The central goal of this course is that you create an understanding of knowledge in
organizations, so that you can:
- Participatein (academic) debats(recognizedifferent perspectives) regarding
organizational knowledge, organizational learning, knowledgein organizations and
knowledge management
- Contribute to practice by being able to analyze and solve knowledge and/or learning
related problems in organizations
Structure Course (3!)
1. 12 lectures recorded on Brightspace Monday 08:30
2. 5 Online workgroup Monday 10:30 (work in these workgroup on the asignment,
which need tob e sufficient)
pre-recorded explanantion of assignment woensdag 09:00
3. 7 Q&A sessions Friday 13:30 LIVE (content, course, assignment related questions)
Exam is online
3 open book questions
Lectures, Chapters, Article
What is ‘knowledge’? (implicit-explicit)
3 PROBLEMS WITH CONCEPT OF ‘KNOWLEDGE’
1) Ontologically/epistemologically incoherent (it is either this or that, but also both at the
same time)
2) Vague: ‘knowledge is everything and everthing is knowledge’
3) Not neutral, not even always functional
issues relate to different discourses
,KNOWLEDGE ‘MANAGEMENT’... ?
What is ‘management’?
• Bit ‘common sense’ ? of what management is about:
• = Designing, coordination,controling of work processes
• = Normative control, ‘community’ (shared values/norms/ideas), protocols, manuals; access
to information, data repositories?
also not a clear definition / vague and not coherent
Paradox Knowledge Management (daarom ‘knowledge in organisation’)
“THE MORE EMPHASIZE ON ‘MANAGEMENT’, THE LESS IT IS ABOUT ‘KNOWLEDGE’...
(more about explicit, but is it than knowledge or more information/data)
THE MORE EMPHASIZE ON ‘KNOWLEDGE’, THE LESS MANAGEMENT MATTERS”
Epistemologiesof Knowledge in KM literature (Hislop, Ch2&3; Schultze & Stabell, 2004)
Four discourses on Knowledge Management (Schultze & Stabell, 2004)
Discourses focus on knowledge in organisation in particular way
, Epistemology dimension
- How knowledge is defined is a matter of epistemology:
Epistemology = philosophy addressing the nature of knowledge. ‘knowledge about
knowledge’. How do we define what is true? What is regarded as valid knowledge and why?
Dualism – what is knowledge?
Objective, frozen-in-time, either/or; subjective/objective; self/other; macro-micro; binaries,
mutually exclusive opposites, uni-directional, an object has separate identity
dichotomie (either this or that)
“knowledge is this or that”. Table is a table
Duality – when is knowledge?
Both/and/as well as, no clear cut distinction, one does not exist without the other,
pragmatism, theories of practice (knowledge is in the doing, associated with emergence,
cyclical causality, object is continuously shaped by context/situated practice.
(as this as that)
“One cant be understood without the other”
takes time in consideration; something emerges, so it’s on going. Table is not just a table
can also be a box you can stand on
Driver how things in society work
Social order dimension
Social order = continuum bounded by:
a) Sociology of regulation – society tends towards ideal state of integration, equilibrium and
order CONSENSUS (things to be integrated)
Trust – common interest – science/knowledge is neutral
b) Sociology of radical change – forces of coercion, conflict and change are continuously
challenging the established social order (‘true’ is only temporary) DISSENSUS
Suspicion – conflict of interest – science/knowledge is political
Continously challenge