Working Knowledge [antikvár]

Preface to the Paperback Edition WHEN WE published the hardcover edition of Working Knowledge in 1998, we had no idea where the concept of knowledge management was in its life cycle within organizations. As it turned out, the idea was still in its infancy In retrospect, we can see that the steps taken by the firms we described in the first edition were the easy ones—the walking before the running. These beginning steps were and still are necessary, but now that some organizations have mastered walking, the challenge of running looms. What is also clear to us from this vantage point is how far the knowledge management movement has come. By now most managers have heard of it, and many have become advocates and practitioners. More and more companies have instituted knowledge repositories, supporting such diverse types of knowledge as best practices, lessons learned, product development knowledge, customer knowledge, human resource management knowledge, methods-based knowledge, and so forth. Groupware and intranet-based technologies have become standard knowledge infrastructures. A new set of professional job titles—the knowledge manager, the knowledge coordinator, the knowledge-network facilitator—affirms the widespread legitimacy that knowledge management has earned in the corporate world, as does the formation of its own professional association. Some organizations, including our own employers, now have hundreds of knowledge managers in place. Other signs of the broad acceptance of knowledge management abound. There are several magazines, journals, and newsletters devoted to the field. Almost every leading consulting firm provides some sort of knowledge management service for chents. Prominent business schools offer courses and programs on the topic. Many mainstream vendors of information technology tout the applications of their particular tools to the management of knowledge. Even during a period of considerable technological ferment—including the Year 2000 conversion and the rise of electronic commerce—knowledge management continues to thrive at some of the world's largest software and hardware firms. By all accounts, vii