Experienced community of practice and knowledge transfer in a science/technology company

Authors

David Cadiz
Terri L. Griffith, Santa Clara UniversityFollow
John E. Sawyer

Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Publication Date

1-23-2006

Publisher

IEEE

Abstract

Capturing what an organization knows and effectively managing the flow of knowledge across an organization is a challenge. One promising method used to facilitate knowledge transfer is the creation and development of Communities of Practice (COP) within the organization. This paper will focus on the relationship between organizational practices and technology tools for the development and support of "experienced" COP - the level and type of community experienced by the individual members. We present the results from survey measures and company archival data of Technical Account Representatives (TARs) at a Fortune 500 company. Results demonstrate support of our arguments for differential relationships between subcomponents of a model of COP and how these subcomponents differentially relate to tacit and explicit knowledge. We discuss how these results provide value to the flow of knowledge and organizations' ability to support the development of knowledge.

Comments

Date of Conference: 4-7 Jan. 2006 Conference Location: Kauia, HI, USA, USA

Recommended Citation

Cadiz, D, Griffith, T.L., Sawyer, J.E., (2006). Experienced community of practice and knowledge transfer in a science/technology company. Proceedings of the 39th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS'06), 9 pages.