Interconnection: reasons to study & goals

A great thanks need to be highlighted here to Wikipedia as a free online encyclopedia & google (of course) for really practising Knowledge Management (KM) in managing their sites.

Today I got all the reasons and interconnection between my currently-passioned field of study (KM) and the benefit for the organisation I work if I gain the expertise.

Now let me share to you all the overall ideas.

Knowledge Management (KM) principles recognize that it is important for organizations to "know what they know." All institutions inherently store, access, and deliver knowledge in some manner. The question is what value is added to the products and services they deliver by the effective use of that knowledge capital.

"Almost any institution in this country will make reference to the capturing of knowledge, the sharing of knowledge and the delivery of knowledge from faculty to students," explains Stevenson. However, KM involves much more, going beyond the inherent knowledge industry of colleges and universities. In the EDUCAUSE Leadership Strategies volume entitled Information Alchemy: The Art and Science of Knowledge Management, Bernbom explains that KM involves the "discovery and capture of knowledge, the filtering and arrangement of this knowledge, and the value derived from sharing and using this knowledge throughout the organization" (2001, p. xiv). It is this "organized complexity" of collaborative work to share and use information across all aspects of an institution which marks the effective use of knowledge.

Higher education institutions have "significant opportunities to apply knowledge management practices to support every part of their mission," explains Kidwell et al (2001, p. 24). "Knowledge management should not strike higher education institutions as a radically new idea; rather it is a new spin on their raison d'etre" (p. 24). The problem is that it is such a "wide open area of study that it is difficult to understand the implications of knowledge management for an educational setting" (Thorn, 2001, p. 25). This digest offers a basic introduction to the potential of KM for higher education.

REASONS TO ADOPT KM
Two universities with identical numbers of faculty, degree programs, expenditures, and enrollment may vary widely in how successful they are in rankings such as those conducted by U.S. News and World Report. The difference is often intangible value that is added by effective knowledge management. Organizations that reward collaboration and information sharing are "outperforming companies that discourage these practices..." (Microsoft, 2000, p. 1).

The 2001 survey by Knowledge Management and IDC found that of those companies that adopt KM, the top reasons are to:

--Retain expertise of personnel (51.9%)

--Increase customer satisfaction (43.1%)

--Improve profits, grow revenues (37.5%)

--Support e-business initiatives (24.7%)

--Shorten product development cycles (23.0%)

--Provide project workspace (11.7%)

As public, private, and for profit higher education institutions alike respond to the phenomenal growth of online courses, cyber colleges, and virtual universities, these same reasons to adopt KM apply. It is with KM that colleges will be better able to increase student retention and graduation rates; retain a technology workforce in the face of severe employee shortages; expand new web based offerings; work to analyze the cost effective use of technology to meet more enrollment; transform existing transaction-based systems to provide information, not just data, for management; and compete in an environment where institutions cross state and national borders to meet student needs anytime/anywhere.

CHALLENGES TO IMPLEMENTING KM
There are obvious challenges to the implementation of KM. The Knowledge Management magazine/IDC survey (Dyer and McDonough, 2001) documents the following:

--Employees have no time for KM (41.0%)

--Current culture does not encourage sharing (36.6%)

--Lack of understanding of KM and benefits (29.5%)

--Inability to measure financial benefits of KM (24.5%)

--Lack of skill in KM techniques (22.7%)

--Organization's processes are not designed for KM (22.2%)

--Lack of funding for KM (21.8%)

--Lack of incentives, rewards to share (19.9%)

--Have not yet begun implementing KM (18.7%)

--Lack of appropriate technology (17.4%)

--Lack of commitment from senior management (13.9%)

--No challenges encountered (4.3%)

Can you now tell what I would like to do and why is it beneficial for the organisations?

Sources:
Millam, John H., Jr. (2001). Knowledge Management For Higher Education,ERIC DIGEST. Retrieved at February 2nd, 2006 from http://www.ericdigests.org/2003-1/higher.htm