The following is an excerpt from a knowledge brief by Aberdeen Group: the brief discusses the role that technology plays in the knowledge creation process and the ways in which Learning 3.0 concepts can help accelerate the “spiral” of knowledge creation in your organization.One of the defining competitive advantages an organization has is the knowledge that its people have and how that knowledge is captured, stored, and made retrievable for others.
Learning 3.0
Learning 3.0 refers to learning that comes about through sharing rather than from being taught or where the product of learning is defined by experts. In a Learning 3.0 world, the primary focus is no longer on the individual learner, but rather toward the community and the people around you.
In our existing knowledge economy, fixed, tangible assets are no longer a source of sustainable competitive advantage. Instead, knowledge, an intangible resource, offers a competitive advantage because it lies within the people in an organization and is not easily replicated.
To address this problem, knowledge management strategies need to be developed to allow an organization to capture, store, and retrieve knowledge. Knowledge is a resource that can impact the effectiveness of a business, and the management of that knowledge is crucial in organizations looking to set themselves apart from their competitors.
There are roughly five knowledge management activities that most organizations need to be concerned about. These include the creation, storage, sharing, integration, and deployment of knowledge. The first component of knowledge management, knowledge creation, occurs in an organizational setting through a conversion process commonly referred to as the “dynamic theory of organizational knowledge creation.” In this process, organizational knowledge is created through a continuous dialogue between tacit and explicit knowledge via four patterns of interactions, socialization, combination, internalization, and externalization (SECI).
