Education:EGovernment - KM Introduction

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Outline and objectives

• Definitions of knowledge
• Information vs. knowledge
• Perspectives on knowledge
• Knowledge and IT
• Managing knowledge
• Knowledge management concepts

Knowledge in a broad sense

The whole content of the human brain

• skills, expertise, intuition
• information & knowledge about people & society, ethic and moral issues
• knowledge about procedures and structures
• information & knowledge about events, objects and documents
• information & knowledge about relationships, experiences and lessons learnt
• assessment and introduction of new knowledge, experiences and information

Knowledge in a narrow sense

• Knowledge and information in context and relationships
  • know-how and expertise to complete work
  • theoretical and practical insights on how to solve problems in the work context
• Domain knowledge - “Dienstwissen”
• Completing questions
  • know what, know how, know why, know where, know when

Technology mediating knowledge access

• Telecooperation and Internet technology facilitate remote co-operation and collaboration between citizens and public authorities
  • citizens have access to administrative knowledge
  • knowledge shift from the authority to the citizens
• Knowledge is distributed among citizens, administrative staff, the internet portal, different databases and knowledge repositories and new workflow processes

Knowledge in the limelight of IT

• Technical processing requires storability of knowledge
  • for this, knowledge needs to be formalisable, explicit, in most cases also exact and complete
• Formalisable knowledge as basis for storage, transfer and automatic processing
  • simple structures, footnotes, simple links and even semantic nets or hypertext structures
  • rules in expert systems and software agents
• Systems
  • Expert Systems, Knowledge Databases, Knowledge Repositories, Data Warehouses

Information vs Knowledge

• Information = Information + Information
  • Combination of information without adding specific relevance and added value
• Knowledge = Information + pragmatic interpretation
  • subject-relevant
  • more than just information (enriched value)
  • context-related
  • receiving such knowledge may determine next action
• Knowledge = answering five key questions
  • what, when, how, where, why
• Knowledge comprises the description of a problem up to its solution
  • solution path
  • objects, persons, artefacts involved
  • potential deviations and consequences

Limits of IT for knowledge processing

Problems to use IT for knowledge processing and knowledge management:

• knowledge need to be explicit, structured and formalised - but much of the relevant knowledge is implicit
• pragmatics, interpretation of knowledge in specific context
• estimation of relevance
• subjective character of knowledge
• knowledge elaboration, search and retrieval
• putting knowledge in different contexts bears the risk of misinterpretation and failures

Knowledge in Social and Cognitive Sciences

Knowledge is specific to human beings

     Individual

     Group

     explicit

     knowledge and expertise

     models, instructions

     implicit

     intuition and expertise

     group culture and praxis

Distributed Cognition view:

• people embody knowledge in mediating artefacts such as computers, machine agents, rules, norms, practices
• and so, knowledge is always distributed

Knowledge Carriers according to Distributed Cognition Theory

• Knowledge is an abstract issue always belonging to somebody or being embodied in some material or ideal artefact
• In e-Government, such knowledge carriers may be
  • documentation (printed or electronic) in documents, files, administrative acts
  • information systems such as databases, method bases, model bases, workflow systems, management information systems etc.
  • physical artefacts: paper, signs etc.
  • individuals and groups of employees of authorities or firms and citizens
  • organisational structures, organisational cultures, social and cultural work practices
  • products

A Comprehensive Definition for Knowledge

Knowledge may be seen as

• A sort of combining information (net of information)
• Based on a given purpose (purpose-oriented)
• Directed towards a desired goal (goal-oriented)
• Itt meaning is related to a specific context
• Has relevance for somebody (subject-oriented)
  • is object to subjective interpretation
• Collection of ideal models
  • individual or groups of people are modelling circumstances, desires, transactions and procedures of a real world into internal cognitive models (dual material-ideal world)

Perspectives on Knowledge

• Implicit vs. explicit knowledge
• Knowledge types regarding process, content and context
• Distributed knowledge
  • human cognitive (mental) knowledge
  • knowledge in physical artefacts
  • knowledge in formal procedures, structures, practices, norms etc.
• Intellectual property: private, collective, organisational
• Static facts vs. dynamically changing knowledge

Implicit Knowledge

• Difficulties to formalise, communicate and share it and hence to process, transfer and store it in a systematic and logical way
  • explicit documentation needed to automatically process such knowledge
• Two dimensions - distinctions:
  • technical: informal and difficult to formalise such as individual skills and expertise (Know-how)
  • cognitive: schemata, mental models, convictions and perceptions which might be perceived as a matter of course
• Mainly in the heads and in implicit behaviour of individuals
  • social practices
  • encultured knowledge
  • Subjective insights and intuition
• Ideals, subjective values and emotions, beliefs, desires, activities and experiences of individuals

Explicit Knowledge

• Explicitly formalised knowledge
  • in people‘s minds and external to humans in formal rules, norms, physical artefacts, structures etc.
• Mainly structured form
• Can be processed, transferred and stored automatically
  • electronic data processing
  • physical artefacts
  • society

Types of Knowledge and IT Support

[Image from Maria Wimmer]

Property Issues of Knowledge

Private Knowledge

• access only for single individuals
• encoding/decoding or access restrictions

Collective Knowledge

• several individuals share it
• in larger organisational context such as communities of practice, local knowledge workers etc.

Organisational Knowledge Base

• conscious knowledge: part of the organisational knowledge base which is accessible for and can be used by all members of the organisation related to specific processes where such knowledge is required
• latent knowledge: decision-maker know about the existence of knowledge which, however, is not accessible due to access restrictions, structural barrieres, etc.

Management of Knowledge

• Treating an organisation‘s information and knowledge as ”living” and active, rather than simply as a passive collection of records in huge data warehouses and repositories
• Ranging from the management of distributed knowledge to the building up of an organisational memory
• Computer mediated tools support in keeping information and knowledge accessible and relevant within and over the borders of an organisation

Static vs. Dynamic Knowledge

• Active development of knowledge is always done
  • by humans alone
  • by humans in combined human-machine systems where the human contributes with his/her intelligence and adaptability to create
• Knowledge in any kind of artefact is static
  • it needs maintenance by humans to update it, correct it or develop it

Technical Support to Manage Knowledge

• Tools like electronic document management systems
• Collaborative tools such as Lotus Notes
• Argumentation systems such as Issue-Based Information Systems (IBIS)
• Knowledge based techniques
• Further complex support tools for ordering and retrieval such as indexing, categorising, semantic correspondences, definition of hyper-structures, fuzzy retrieval, case based search etc.

Preconditions for Knowledge Management - I

• Requires information about where knowledge is located, available and accessible
• Requires information on where and how to store knowledge
• Competitive advantage results from a smooth strategy to access and retrieve knowledge for a specific need
  • meta-knowledge on the knowledge bases spread over the organisation
  • continuous collection of knowledge and assessment of its relevance
  • adequate strategies for retrieval, access rights, property rights and rights to use the knowledge
• Efficient support and usage of IT potentials
  • telecooperation, communication facilities, groupware support etc.

Preconditions for Knowledge Management - II

• Regarding all levels of an organisation
  • operative level: Usage and development of knowledge
  • strategic level: organisational frame and infrastructure for an organisational knowledge exchange and knowledge creating environment
• Knowledge management is an important task of the core strategic management of an organisation
  • strategic responsibility for an organisational knowledge transfer and to provide an adequate technical and organisational frame
  • control responsibility

Phases and Processes in Knowledge Management

• Management of the knowledge and information sources
• Management of the knowledge carriers and information holders
• Management of the available knowledge offer
• Management of the knowledge needs
• Management of the technical and organisational infrastructure, frame and constraints, communication flows, property rights, knowledge access and knowledge exchange

Integrating Knowledge Management

• Integrated concept on different levels
  • strategic knowledge management concepts
  • integration from the operative up to the strategic level (strategic, normative and operative aspects)
  • support individual as well as collective knowledge development
• Fulfil organisational and infrastructure preconditions
• Provide an adequate knowledge developing frame
• Bridging individual, group and organisation
• Openness for alternative approaches