Knowledge in Knowledge Intensive Organizations

Abstract

The importance of knowledge is increasingly critical to competitive advantage in today's organizational environment. In the following research a comparison between two kinds of knowledge intensive organizations is carried out, namely consulting firms on one side and crime investigation departments on the other. The purpose is to point out differences and similarities in their way of organizing knowledge, and then investigate whether they are learning organizations. The study opens with an analysis of knowledge sharing, where four processes are pinpointed: teaching, coaching, systematizing and training. The analysis deepens then to investigate the three levels of learning: the individual level, the group level and the organizational level. Within the group level particular emphasis is put on communities of practice. The study continues examining the learning organization and the most diffused barriers to learning, the ego-defenses. What was originally believed about the two organizations turned out to be quite different from reality.