Airlangga Summer Program 2015-Indonesia

Airlangga Summer Program 2015-Indonesia
Airlangga Summer Program 2015-Indonesia

Thursday, May 22, 2014

Information and Communication Technologies (ICT’s) and knowledge Management



In this modern era, there is a stiff competition in the business market. Organizations need to manage and develop their knowledge frequently if they want to be sustainable in the long run. It is vital for every business to know how to create and disseminate knowledge, and what factors facilitate these processes. Knowledge is an invisible force that helps firms to gain a competitive advantage over its competitors. Organizations usually utilize technology in order to help in the knowledge management processes. Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is an enabler that supports knowledge management within the organizations. Jawadekar has defined ICT as a set of technologies and tools used to communicate, and to create, disseminate, store, and manage information and knowledge (Jawadekar, 2011). Besides supporting the knowledge management processes, ICT also change the structure and how the organizations operate in order to achieve efficiency. For example, ICT allows an employee of Philips to use the internet to adjust a television assembly line process in the Flextronics factory in Guadalajara (Reinert, 2012). The invention of the internet has made it faster to produce televisions in Philips firm. In this essay, I would like to discuss how ICT supports the knowledge management processes and how it affects the organizational management.  
To begin with, ICT has helped a lot in knowledge management which composed of three main processes: knowledge generation, knowledge transfer/sharing, and knowledge codification and storage (Susana Perez et al). Knowledge generation can be defined as the process by which the firms obtain information from either outside or inside the company (Lee and Hong 2002; McCann and Buckner, 2004). The purpose of knowledge generation is to create new contents, replace, validate, and update the firm’s knowledge (Alavi and Leidner, 2001; Bhatt, 2001). A lot of new information has been created as a result of the development of ICT. For example, an information system helps the company to gather all the data and processes related to its customers in order to create customer knowledge. Nowadays, Individuals and firms can easily get access to both external and information through the use of technology. People can learn and create new knowledge by accessing to new information. Knowledge transfer is the process of moving knowledge to needy locations, individuals, groups, teams and inter-organization, and intra-organizations (Jawadekar, 2011). Transfer of knowledge usually supports by a number of technologies like Intranet, Groupware, Web portals, and Video conferencing. ICT transfers knowledge into a data bank and to an employee or a group of employees. ICT seems doess not help much in sharing tacit knowledge as in sharing explicit knowledge. In this way, the more tacit the knowledge, the harder it is to capture and transfer. Even though ICT does not help much in sharing tacit knowledge, it still plays an important role in assisting the disseminating of tacit knowledge. As a result, ICT has helped a lot in the process of sharing knowledge between individuals. ICT has been utilizing as the main tool in coding and storing explicit knowledge. Software engineers have developed a variety of programs in order to code knowledge and store it for later use such as Wikis, Databases, and Intelligent agent. Tacit knowledge is quite difficult to code and store by utilizing technology as it resides within each individual. It requires years of practices and learning by doings in order to create tacit knowledge, so it is not easy to understand and code tacit knowledge. Nonetheless, ICT still can partly help in coding and storing tacit knowledge. In this respect, ICT has invented Yellow Page, which is a database of experts created for the user to access (Jawadekar, 2011). It provides a way to code employees and employers by profile and knowledge, so other employees can reach them to get knowledge. As we can see, ICT is an enabler in coding and storing both tacit and explicit knowledge. Besides aiding in knowledge management processes, ICT has also been a main source that connects tacit and explicit knowledge in the four phases of knowledge management life cycle: socialization, externalization, combination, and internalization. In the socialization process, technology tools facilitate individuals to communicate with each other through online communication. People can save a lot of time for travelling as they do not have to travel to meet with each other at one place; they can communicate virtually through the internet. However, people should also keep in mind that they cannot rely heavily on technology in the internalization stage as this process is mainly supported by direct interaction with people. Clearly, there is a real need for ICT in the socialization process. For externalization process, a set of technology tools such as expert networks, collaboration services, and data and knowledge discovery can help companies to convert tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge. These tools of technology allow experts/knowledge workers to share their experiences and knowledge, and coincidently, learn from each other through documents, figures, and information that available within the companies. Technology helps in translating tacit knowledge of people into readily understandable forms. Without ICT, the externalization process would not exist. A number of technologies have been used to support the combination process and sub-processes within this process. The sub-processes within combination process consist of three stages: capturing and integrating, dissemination, and editing or processing. Little or more, ICT has supported all the three subsidiary stages within the combination process. For example, companies use knowledge repository programs like document and content management tools in order to capture and integrate explicit knowledge into a system. ICT has been use pervasively in the internalization process of knowledge management life cycle. Many organizations have used virtual way in order to convert explicit knowledge into organization’s tacit knowledge during the internalization process. Employees can easily learn new concepts or methods through virtual situation. According to Susana et al, ICT has indirectly influenced the structure of the organization which leads to the emergence of new, more flexible organizational forms (Susana Perez et al). There is a relation between technological development and the appearance of new, more flexible organizational forms which suitable to cope with the rapid change in the business environment (Barley, 1990; Malone, 1997; Robey et al., 2000). ICT decreases the level of hierarchy within the organization which makes it becomes flatter and more flexible (Dewett and Jones, 2001). Organizations can make decisions and solve problems faster than before as a result of the development of technology. Nowadays, employees can approach each other and their employers easily whenever they want due to the reduction of vertical (hierarchy levels) and horizontal (functions) barriers as a result of ICT development. ICT facilitates information, ideas, and knowledge to flow throughout the organization which also results in increase the chance to create new knowledge. As a result, ICT indirectly decrease the levels of hierarchy within the organizations and allow information, idea, and knowledge to flow rapidly throughout the firms.
In conclusion, ICT is the main catalyst that supports knowledge management processes which include: knowledge generation, knowledge sharing, and knowledge codification and storage. Without the presence of ICT, it would be hard and take a long time in order to create, share, and code and store knowledge. ICT facilitates individuals to access both internal and external information. Tacit knowledge is very difficult to capture and store in comparison to explicit knowledge as this type of knowledge can only create through learning by doings and it also requires years of practices. ICT can only partly help the tacit knowledge management processes, so firms should not rely heavily on technology and assume that technology can store and capture all of the information for them. ICT should only be used as an aid to capture and store information. Still, organizations need knowledge workers in order to work together with technology in order to create, capture and store knowledge. Besides assisting in knowledge management processes, ICT also acts as an enabler that connects tacit and explicit knowledge in the four phases of knowledge management life cycle: socialization, externalization, combination, and internalization. ICT provides technology tools that facilitate the conversion of tacit knowledge to explicit knowledge and vice versa during those four processes of knowledge management life cycle. New and more flexible organizations have been emerged as a result of ICT development. The ICT has flatten the organization structure which in turn reduces the time spend on making decisions and solving problems within the organizations. From all the above discussions, we can say that ICT has helped a lot in knowledge management and also indirectly changed the structure of the modern organization.   

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