Overview of Knowledge Management Process

Knowledge Management Processes are the activities or initiatives that enable and facilitate the creation, sharing and use of knowledge for the benefit of your organization. The Knowledge Management Processes include the general infrastructure and processes of your organization and the extent to which these act as enablers of or barriers to, good knowledge management practice. Organizational processes and infrastructure, Knowledge Management Process, and knowledge management infrastructure are the three factors that consolidate the component process in any organization.

An organization has a structure and multiple processes that work within that structure. The processes and structure combine together and operate on a number of levels within an organization. A physical structure of the organization comes from the building in which you work and their geographical location. A form of structure is provided by the way the organization is divided into departments and functions. A different form of structure is provided based on the way how people are organized into hierarchies and the relationships between them. Yet another structure is obtained from the way the resources such as finances, technology, equipment, etc are allocated. Each of these types and layers of structure will have an impact on the way knowledge is created, shared, and used in an organization.

Knowledge Management Processes enable organizations to better create, find, acquire, organize, share, and use the knowledge it needs to achieve its goals. Some of the Knowledge Management Processes that are common for most of the organizations include conducting knowledge audits to identify knowledge needs, knowledge resources, and knowledge flows, creating knowledge strategies to guide the overall approach, and connecting people with people to share tacit knowledge using approaches such as communities of practice or learning events. Additional Knowledge Management Processes include connecting people with information to share explicit knowledge using approaches such as best practices databases, and using content management processes to ensure that explicit knowledge is current, relevant, and easily accessible and creating opportunities for people to generate new knowledge through collaborative working and learning

Knowledge Management Processes also include introducing processes to help people seek and use the knowledge of peers, teaching people to share knowledge in ways that inspire people by using storytelling techniques, and encouraging people to prioritize learning as part of their day-to-day work, by learning before, during, and after the tasks and projects they have performed. Organizations may feel that some of the Knowledge Management Process are newly developed. This is because those Knowledge Management Processes are simply considered from a new perspective, the focus being on knowledge. As such none of the Knowledge Management Processes can suit the needs of an organization. You can select the Knowledge Management Processes depending on the nature of your organization.

A knowledge management infrastructure includes the Knowledge Management Processes which ensure good knowledge management practice. In addition, the knowledge management infrastructure also includes the organizational infrastructure that is created to enable the Knowledge Management Processes. The knowledge management infrastructure takes care of the essential management and staff roles and responsibilities that need to be put in place to support the new processes and initiatives in an organization. Alternatively, the knowledge management framework can refers to the people who will take the lead in driving it all forward and bringing about the necessary changes. The knowledge management infrastructure may have a number of levels, depending on the size and structure of your organization.

The knowledge management infrastructure will be simpler in smaller organizations and a bit complex in larger organizations. The complexity is due to the fact that some principles are applied to the knowledge management infrastructure in formal ways for efficient operation. Regardless of the size of the organization, the knowledge management infrastructure will thin out and get simplified in the long run, as knowledge management becomes integrated into the organization and knowledge management practices become part of the way we do things in our organization. Whenever this happens, dedicated knowledge management roles and functions will probably disappear, but this will take some time. In the meantime, you will need to create and maintain the knowledge management infrastructure to drive and support your Knowledge Management Processes.

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