A Quarterly Journal of Nowy Sacz School of Business – National-Louis University KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT SPECIAL ISSUE: CONNECTING THEORY AND PRACTICE Edited by Patrick Lambe Volume 10 Issue 1 2014 Contents From the Editor 3 Alex Bennet and David Bennet 7 Knowledge, Theory and Practice in Knowledge Management: Between Associative Patterning and Context-Rich Action Andrzej Lis 57 Knowledge Creation and Conversion in Military Organizations: How the SECI Model is Applied Within Armed Forces David Williams 79 Models, Metaphors and Symbols for Information and Knowledge Systems Nicholas J Milton 109 Findings from International Surveys Providing a Snapshot of the State of KM from a Practitioner Point of View Arthur Shelley 129 Active Learning Innovations in Knowledge Management Education Generate Higher Quality Learning Outcomes Marek Szelągowski 147 Becoming a Learning Organization Through Dynamic Business Process Management 3 From the Editor In 2004 I co-organized and chaired the first International Conference on Knowledge Management (Trezzini et al 2004). One of our goals was to bring together practitioners and academics into a common forum, and indeed there were good contributions from both academe and practice. As an experiment, I conducted a social network analysis exercise, based on participant self- reports of whom they had had conversations with, during the conference breaks. When we shared this at the conference close, it was striking that for the most part, practitioners had been talking to practitioners, and academics had been talking to academics. It was also striking that there was a third, “blended” group of participants, who were active in the teaching and research space, but also in KM implementation and practice. They were the network brokers, holding this rather tenuous web of connections together. Since then, I have argued strongly that KM cannot advance until it breaks down the fragmentation that exists, between schools of practice, and between the realms of practice and theory (Lambe 2011a, Lambe 2011b). Of course, there are positive signals. Many Master’s programmes in KM engage practitioners as adjunct faculty. Several universities actively engage with the practitioner community and industry, and may offer consulting services to clients (Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Bangkok University, Monash University, Kent State University). Academics and practitioners serve together on standards and advisory bodies, and partner in research projects. Discussion forums such as the actKM Forum have participation from both practitioners and academics. The boundaries between academe and practice are also porous, with academics going into practice, and practitioners entering academe. The pertinent question is whether this is enough. While cooperation has positive models to show, there are still very few institutional mechanisms for leveraging evidence from KM practice in KM research, or for testing theoretical postulates in practice. This issue was conceived to explore the relationship between KM theory and practice, and to provide insights to the KM research and practitioner community about how to advance this relationship. In the spirit of the issue, submissions were invited from both researchers and practitioners, and all submissions were reviewed by reviewers who have experience in both research and practice, in a blind peer reviewed process. 4 Our flagship article, from Alex and David Bennet, challenges the entire premise of this special issue. It suggests that an academic-practitioner dualism is a false and potentially misleading construct. The Bennets argue that knowledge management necessarily mirrors the fluidity and complexity of working with knowledge in the world. It is messy by nature. They put an intriguing case for the role of theoretical constructs and frameworks as boundary objects between theory and practice, provoking both dialogue and exploration. For example, we see in Andrzej Lis’ paper how the SECI framework, while increasingly challenged for its lack of empirical underpinning (Gourlay 2006) may act as a sensemaking frame to interpret and account for KM practices in a military setting. David Williams’ exploration of the DIKW framework shows how logical and performative shortcomings in a framework stimulate a push for a stronger theory-based framework that can inform practical decision- making about KM systems design. Nick Milton’s paper points out that consulting practitioners using consistent frameworks covering many organisations and over extensive periods of time, can build a body of data that illuminates both theory (eg. the effectiveness of a framework to assess KM maturity) and practice (eg. in identifying patterns of need and effective interventions). He makes the case for closer cooperation between academics and practitioners in making such data available for research purposes. Arthur Shelley looks at the critical domain of KM education, and illustrates how practice-oriented teaching helps KM students internalize, query and apply KM theories in helpful ways. Finally, Marek Szelągowski’s paper describes how the evolution of business process management practices, which he describes as dynamic BPM, can – almost as a by-product – bring about the characteristics espoused by learning organization theory. This is particularly intriguing because of the difficult relationship that BPM has had with learning organization theory and knowledge management. All three were fashionable children of the 1990s, and some early exponents of KM were also BPM enthusiasts. However, BPM’s rapid evolution into business process reengineering and its alignment with large scale restructuring and efficiency exercises, often meant large scale knowledge loss and actively anti-learning organization practices (Davenport 1995). Against this backdrop, Szelągowski’s paper reads as a long overdue reconciliation between a key business practice and an important theoretical frame. It has not been straightforward to curate a collection of articles, many of them written by practitioners, for an academic journal. I would like to thank Anna Ujwary-Gil who first invited me to undertake this special issue, 5 and who has supported me through several unconventional decisions. To the anonymous reviewers, though you may not always agree with my editorial decisions, your candour, challenges, and care for our discipline have immeasurably improved these papers. To the authors, writing at the boundary between KM theory and practice is a sensitive, sometimes tense, and often difficult task. You have borne the extra work with grace, patience and aplomb. Patrick Lambe Bangkok University, Thailand, and Straits Knowledge, Singapore. Editorial Board, JEMI. References Davenport, T. (1995). The fad that forgot people. Fast Company, October 31. Gourlay, S. (2006). Conceptualizing knowledge creation: a critique of Nonaka’s theory. Journal of Management Studies, 43(7). Lambe, P. (2011a). The unacknowledged parentage of knowledge management. Journal of Knowledge Management, 15(2). Lambe, P. (2011b). The three tribes: knowledge management, learning and intellectual capital - towards a common agenda’ paper presented at the 8th International Conference on Intellectual Capital, Knowledge Management & Organisational Learning, Bangkok, Thailand, 27-28 October. Trezzini, B., Lambe, P., Hawamdeh, S. (2004). People, knowledge and technology: what have we learnt so far? Proceedings of the first iKMS International Conference on Knowledge Management (New Jersey: World Scientific). 7 Knowledge, Theory and Practice in Knowledge Management: Between Associative Patterning and Context-Rich Action Alex Bennet and David Bennet Abstract Embedded throughout this paper you will find the diversity of opinions that correlates to the diversity of theories, frameworks, case studies and stories that are related to the field of Knowledge Management (KM). We begin by introducing the Sampler Research Call approach and the 13 KM academics and practitioners working in different parts of the world who answered the call. We then provide baseline definitions and briefly explore the process of knowledge creation within the human mind/brain. After a brief (and vastly incomplete) introduction to KM literature at the turn of the Century, the frameworks of Sampler Call participants are introduced, and two early frameworks that achieved almost cult status—the Data-Information- Knowledge-Wisdom (DIKW) continuum and the SECI (socialization, externalization, combination and internalization) model—are explored through the eyes of Sampler Call participants. We then introduce the results of the KMTL (Knowledge Management Thought Leader) Study, which suggest theories consistent with the richness and diversity of thought interwoven throughout this paper. The field of KM is introduced as a complex adaptive system with many possibilities and opportunities. Finally, we share summary thoughts, urging us as KM academics and practitioners to find the balance between the conscious awareness/understanding of higher-order patterns and the actions we take; between the need for overarching theory and the experiential freedom necessary to address context-rich situations. Keywords: knowledge, knowledge management, theory, information, learning, surface knowledge, shallow knowledge, deep knowledge, neuroscience, mind/brain, decision-making, higher-order patterns, complexity, thought leaders, practitioners, knowledge (proceeding), knowledge (informing), SECI model, DIKW continuum, wisdom, KM research, KM frameworks.