The use of social software for
Knowledge Management in
globally distributed settings
Jan Pawlowski & Henri Pirkkalainen
Global Information Systems group
Global Information Systems
Mission Statement
Creating and validating new solutions for Information Systems in a
global context - this includes the support of individuals and
organizations to improve competitiveness, performance, and mutual
understanding
Topics
Designing work and learning processes in globally distributed
organizations
Design & development methods for global information systems
Culture analysis and awareness
Support tools for knowledge intensive processes in global
organizations
ICT4D: ICT for development
E-Learning and knowledge management in global
organizations
Global Information Systems, University of Jyväskylä
The Team
Denis Kozlov
Kati
Clements
Jan M.
Pawlowski
Philipp Holtkamp
Henri
Pirkkalainen
Twitter feedback channel
#GSKM12
You can provide feedback and ask questions
regarding our part and the research topics
through Twitter
Social Software for KM: Contents
Knowledge Management in Global Settings
Social Software – Vocabulary in IS field?
Starting point for global inspection - Barriers
Focus in KM – what has been studied and how?
Towards unexplored research territories
A first question
What is common
knowledge?
Sauna: German instructions
Sauna: American instructions
Sauna: Finnish instructions
Related Concepts (modified,
North, 1998)
Competitiven
ess
Competence
Skill
Knowledge
Information
Data
Symbol
+syntax
+meaning
+context
+use
+applying to
new settings
+
uniqueness
Definition: Knowledge Management
“Knowledge management is defined as the management function responsible for
the regular selection, implementation and evaluation of goal-oriented
knowledge strategies that aim at improving an organization’s way of handling
knowledge internal and external to the organization in order to improve
organizational performance. The implementation of knowledge strategies
comprises all person-oriented, organizational and technological instruments
suitable to dynamically optimize the organization-wide level of competencies,
education and ability to learn of the members of the organization as well as to
develop collective intelligence.“
(Maier 2002)
”Planned and ongoing management of activities and processes for leveraging
knowledge to enhance competitiveness through better use and creation of
individual and collective knowledge resources.”
(CEN 2004)
A first question…
Why is Knowledge a
Global Success
Factor?
Just a simple product?
Business Process Management
in a Networked Business
Processing
A
Management
R&D
Marketing
R&D
Sales
Marketing
Processing
B
Production
Marketing
Sales
IT
Services
Sales
IT
Services
Material Flow
Knowledge/
Information / Data
Flow
Marketing
Some random questions…
Decision questions
– Where to produce?
– How to build partnerships (joint ventures, contractors, …)
– Which systems to exchange knowledge?
Operational questions
–
–
–
–
How to process wood?
When will the next shipment arrive?
How to market the product in Japan?
How to explain the concept and advantages of Finnish
saunas?
– How to find the main problems of customers?
– Which are import and safety regulations?
This means…
Knowledge is a key to global success
Global KM managers need to understand the value
chain and knowledge requirements
Global KM managers need to understand
knowledge processes and culture
Global KM managers are the main hubs for smooth
operations in production and service enterprises
Which kind of IS support is promising or proven
successful?
Summary
Knowledge as a critical success factor
Knowledge management to support businesses
Global aspects
–
–
–
–
Understanding the context
Process design
Systems and tool support
Cultural aspects
Social Software as a promising tool to combine
human- and technology-orientation
– Which tools for which context?
– How to overcome cultural differences?
– How to embed tools?
Social Software?
Social Software
“Social Software enables an interactive way of collaboration,
managing content and connecting to online networks with other
people. It supports the desire of users to be pulled into groups in
order to achieve their personal goals”
(Wever, Mechant, Veevaete & Hauttekeete 2007)
Social Software
4 Cs of Social Software
Cook, N. Enterprise 2.0: How Social Software Will Change the Future of Work, UK:Gover, 2008.
Intertwined terminologies!
Social Media
Groupware
Message systems
Multiuser editors
Group decision support systems (GDSSs)
Computer conferencing systems
Shared information spaces
Workflow management/coordination systems
Ellis, Gibbs & Rein 1991)
…Much older approach in the IS research
Ellis C.A., Gibbs S.J. & Rein C.L. 1991. Groupware: Some issues and experiences. Communications of the ACM 34 (1), 39 – 58.
Collaboration tools
Onyechi & Abeisinghe 2009
Refs to Social Media, Social Software, Groupware, Web 2.0…
Web 2.0
Often explained as the
combination of methods and
techniques on which
Social Media is based on
Still used in IT literacy
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html
What do you focus on when addressing
Social Software?
Research Trends I
Constructive / Design-oriented research
– Tools to improve knowledge exchange and distribution
Do we really understand how global KM works: Qualitative
Research
– Understanding which influence factors and relations emerge in
global settings
– For example: Barriers to KM (why and how)
Relating and quantifying: Quantitative Research
– Understanding behavior in KM settings
– E.g. ISSM, TAM, KM Success Model
• What type of relations, how strong, cause-effect etc.
• Applied for example in Social networking studies, also Web 2.0 focus
Barriers?
Discussed from the viewpoint of an individual or group of people
Can relate to social interaction and as an example to factors that
hinder or challenge knowledge exchange
Might relate to challenges and risks when adopting or using a
specific technology
Challenges set by diverse workers, hierarchies and cultural
influences within an organization
In many cases tied to a specific context
Can be presented as a wider concept “cultural distance”
…or as a question that is formed from the problem,
“How to reward contribution?”…
Barriers
+
Organizational
Dependent on business
and hierarchical process and project
=
“Knowledge Islands”
+
Location, time, culture
and language
Success factors - barriers
Critical Success Factors (CSF)
The relation between a barrier and success factor not always clear
…not always counter balanced in a way that overcoming a
barrier means a success
…not all success factors can be derived from barriers
Barriers are a starting point to understand success factors within a
specific context
Geographical dispersion of individuals
CSF
“set meeting schedules and rules of engagement”
“conduct periodic face-to-face meetings”
Success Factors
Context.
Organization /
Individuals
Instruments
Holistic, integrated and standardized approach
–
–
–
–
KM integrated within culture, coordination, and leadership
Consider relationships and interdependencies
Avoid isolated solutions, e. g., different, incompatible communication systems, no
standards, different knowledge processes,
Knowledge processes and ICT platforms for KM should be standardized
throughout the organization and integrated with the existing business processes.
Knowledge-oriented culture
–
–
–
Supportive organizational culture
Open and communicative atmosphere
Supporting a knowledge-oriented culture through e. g., communication of success
stories and best practices, through the acceptance of errors a s well as promoting
individual responsibility
Management support
–
–
–
Top management to strategic knowledge goals, allocate sufficient budgets to the
KM initiative
Providing good example for the change of behavior
A knowledge champion can act as a coordinator for management support as well
as key speaker and motivator for the initiative.
Relation of concepts
Pirkkalainen & Pawlowski 2012
Barriers
Social Software
(Pirkkalainen & Pawlowski 2012)
… 119 barriers from the literature
Barriers
Social Software
Very much discussed at the moment
Same barriers discussed under different terminology
(Social Software, Social Media etc.)
Related to knowledge sharing, group collaboration etc.
Higher Education, Business and IT, B2B…
At the moment trying to recognize relevant barriers. No
clear context-aware understanding of the biggest
problems
Barriers
Social Software
Financial (resources, time)
Management/Coordination/support
Technology fit
Organizational culture
Social
Relational, knowledge sharing, skills, cognitive, background, preferences
Technical
Availability, Interoperability, Functionality, Usability, conceptual, privacy/security, misuse
Quality
Legal (IPR, copyright)
KM Barriers
(Pirkkalainen & Pawlowski 2012)
KM barriers
The bottleneck usually knowledge sharing
Common ways of categorization (if categorized at all)
Individual, organizational, technological
(Riege 2005)
Individual, social (Disterer 2001)
(Individual: Loss of Power, Revelation, Uncertainty, Motivation
Social: Language, Conflict avoidance, bureucracy and Hierarchy, Incoherent
paradigms)
Individual, social (Bures 2003)
Knowledge sharing barriers
Barrier
Description
Lack of interpersonal Level of trust in a company, between its sub-units, and its
employees seems to have a direct influence on the
trust
communication flow and thus the amount of knowledge
sharing (Riege, 2005)
Lack of opportunities Appropriate infrastructure and resources to facilitate sharing
for sharing (resources, practices within and between functional areas is the basis of a
time,
networks, successful KM (Schlegelmilch and Chini, 2003)
infrastructures)
How
to
reward Managers many have to force people to transform their
contribution
and organisation into knowledge-embracing cultures. No matter
encourage information which reward and recognition system is chosen (Riege, 2005)
sharing
Lack of motivation to Sharing only if it’s important to their work, if they feel
encouraged to share and learn, or if they wish to support a
share
certain colleague (Wheatley, 2000)
Fear of harming his or Fear that sharing may reduce or jeopardise people’s job’s
security or even employee’s corporate position
her image if sharing
“Knowledge is power” - By providing knowledge to the colleague, the exclusivity of
Loss of Power through influence is reduced (Bures, 2003)
Sharing
Pirkkalainen & Pawlowski 2012
Global barriers
…long traditions!
Global IS barriers
Barrier
Description
Cultural
and
language distance
Do the collaborators share the same language,
skills as well as cultural norms, corporate culture,
interpretations etc. Most occurred barrier in Noll
et al, (2010) analysis on collaboration barriers in
GSD.
Geographical
distance
Distributed collaboration (within a country or
cross-border). Third most occurred barrier in Noll
et al, (2010) analysis on collaboration barriers in
GSD.
Temporal distance
Distributed collaboration (Time-zone differences).
Second most occurred barrier in Noll et al, (2010)
analysis on collaboration barriers in GSD.
Lack of trust
Geographic, temporal, and cultural distance have a
significant impact on trust among globally
distributed team members (Noll et al, 2010)
Infrastructure
In distributed collaboration teams and employees
must rely on technology to support the
communication (Noll et al, 2010)
Pirkkalainen & Pawlowski 2012
Methodology to capture barriers
Different approaches depending on the discipline and maturity of the field
KM
Observation, ethnographic approaches
Relying on the rigor of the researcher
The main authors often experts with long history in the field
Experiences
Documented best practices, policies
Also combined approaches applying interviews and surveys within
specific organizations
Global factors
Long traditions, identification turned to concrete context specific
understanding
Social Software
Depending what is analyzed (adoption, influencing factors for sharing,
usability etc.)
Expert interviews, surveys, lab testing etc.
Research trend II - Merging research orientations and disciplines
Social Software in
Knowledge Management
Individuals, process/culture, technology
In many cases generalizing the purpose of Social
Software/media unnecessarily
E.g. “social media is essentially a social networking site, with subscribing”
Support of Social Software for different levels of KM:
Knowledge evolution, knowledge use/reuse, knowledge
sharing/transfer
Not to replace but to support?
Are we discussing a specific service
or about the web in general?
Social Software in
Knowledge Management
http://radar.oreilly.com/2011/03/knowledge-management-social-media.html
Social Software in
Knowledge Management
Social networking as awareness support for Knowledge Management
http://www.jeffhester.net/2011/02/22/social-media-and-knowledge-management/
(Groth 2002)
Social
Software
in KM
Web 2.0
“Web as a platform”
“basis for social media”
The research is linked to Enterprise 2.0
Social
Software
in KM
Enterprise 2.0
Collaboration
Awareness
Documentation
Customer engagement
Interaction with stakeholders
…
Research trends III
Analyzing the cultural, organizational, and individual
context
Identifying barriers and potential success factors
Choosing and creating solutions (=interventions /
methods)
–
–
–
–
–
Aligned with strategies and processes
Addressing barriers
Involving all stakeholders
Not overloading people
Choosing and creating solutions (=interventions / methods)
Utilizing barrier-knowledge in KM processes
Social Software in KM activities and tasks
Not all tools are meant to support
all knowledge steps/tasks
Identifying
Collection, modification, collaboration
Annotation
Sharing, awareness
Knowledge Management Tasks

creation, building, anticipation or
generation

acquisition, appropriation or adoption

identification, capture, articulation or
extraction

collection, gathering or accumulation

(legally) securing

conversion

organization, linking and embedding

formalization

storage

refinement or development

distribution, diffusion, transfer or
sharing

presentation or formatting

application, deploying or exploiting

review, revision or evolution of
knowledge
Source: (Maier, 2004)
Social Software
Maier & Remus (2003) Implementing process-oriented knowledge management strategies
Supporting processes
Process: Push Knowledge
ID
Category
Process
Description
KM process
Push Knowledge
Pushing knowledge to relevant
audiences (within the organization)
Sub-processes
/ aspects
• Training of Social networking use
• Benefit workshop
• Good practice reporting
• Wiki entry
• Notification
Objective
• To activate knowledge flow by sharing relevant information
• Identifying necessary channels to ensure awareness
Constraints
• Informal / formal networks and communities
• Barrier: Lack of conceptual understanding
• Barrier: Technology fitness to task
• Barrier: Unwillingness to share
Method
• Awareness building activities / training
•Relation of content and skill management
• GP reporting
Systems
• Social networking service (internal)
• Wiki (closed)
Actors
• Employee / staff member / knowledge carrier, IT support, manager
From barriers to decisions
Utilizing barrier-knowledge for different purposes
KM projects
KM activities in general
Choosing/evaluating technologies for KM
Designing and developing technologies
Who takes actions on these? Roles and
responsibilities?
Barrier-knowledge
Maier & Remus (2003) Implementing process-oriented knowledge management strategies
KM activities &
instruments
Barrier-knowledge
Knowledge
management starter
Potential case for recognizing and analyzing barriers
Initiation of KM in an organization, potentiality,
awareness, barriers and knowledge gaps
Support in selection of
technologies
Recognizing the barriers crucial for decision process
– Differences in usage of Social Software (networking,
collaborative work etc.)
Criteria to evaluate against must be clear (needs)
– How do you identify
– Preferences, interoperability, security etc.
Reacting vs. proacting
– Changing traditions and tools after the damage is done?
– Clear conceptual understanding before technologies are
introduced to the organization?
Evaluating technologies
Different tools, different criteria
– Required skills, Usability, maintenance, cost, privacy,
extensibility, functionality etc.
Context-dependent
Approaches vary from formal to informal
Applied by an expert, consultant
Applied by IT department, manager,
assigned person/ group
Creating technologies
What are the needs? Could existing tools be utilized?
Any software packages (open source) available? How
to integrate to existing systems…
How to ensure that users are part of the design
process?
Key users, preferences, cultural distance
Wide variety of aspects /influences to be taken in to account.
Recognizing barriers crucial for the analysis
Focus points for research
Ranging from smaller to large research activities
Distributed teams (local to global, small vs massive)
– What type of challenges they face in their work
– How could Social Software support / how should it be
integrated to the working activities / how to ensure adoption /
how could it bridge the gap to other communities or
collaborators/competitors
• For example analyzing where do the collaborators or relevant
stakeholders interact (European projects one perfect example).
– Setting clear Social Software policy that differentiates
between internal/external work, customer relations etc.
Thank You
Contact Information
Prof. Dr. Jan M. Pawlowski
jan.pawlowski@jyu.fi
Skype: jan_m_pawlowski
Office: Room 514.2
Telephone +358 14 260 2596
http://users.jyu.fi/~japawlow
Henri Pirkkalainen
henri.j.pirkkalainen@jyu.fi
Office: Room 511.1
Telephone +358 400247684