Journal of Information & Knowledge Management

As organisations evaluate increasing retirement rates coupled with the rate of entering engineers, there is a need to address the presence of generational knowledge transfer boundaries. These unidentified boundaries impede the strategic transfer of engineering and architectural knowledge (STEAK) required for continued engineering growth. Using an interdisciplinary approach to define the engineering generational knowledge transfer boundaries provided useful knowledge sharing characteristics and procedures which all generations and disciplines can utilise. This research study provided a level of insight not previously explored and presented a model that can be used to evaluate how organisations will react to and leverage the knowledge across generations. Specifically, this study helps close the generational knowledge transfer boundary research gap with proper identification of the engineering generational knowledge transfer boundaries. This will allow management to propose strategies to attract and retain the next generation of knowledge workers. The article discusses these findings in detail and summarises the results in a proposed STEAK model and framework.

Decision-making is a crucial activity during the planning, design and operation of artefacts. To make a decision several alternatives must be evaluated and compared, which are tasks that require information, knowledge and expertise. A system that organises and manages the knowledge associated with every alternative and links ideas, arguments and issues can greatly improve and facilitate the decision making process. This paper presents how an Issue Based Information System (IBIS) implemented in Compendium (http://compendium.open.ac.uk) has been extended with new functionalities such as access to a toolkit of Multi-Criteria Decision Methods (MCDM), the ability to propagate values throughout the decision records and to perform sensitivity analysis of the recommended decisions with respect to a parameter. These additional functionalities enable the applicability of the system in the support of decisions that require not only argumentation, but also numerical evaluation of the properties of the alternatives such as those proposed during the design, planning and operation of engineering artefacts.

In today's knowledge-based society, discussion on intellectual capital (IC) has become intertwined with knowledge management (KM). KM may be viewed as the activities and processes to create and maximise IC. It may be possible to suggest that an organisation's level of knowledge utilisation is associated with its level of intellectual capital. The purpose of this research was to explore whether there is an association between KM maturity level, as a proxy of assessing the level of KM efficacy and IC utilisation efficiency in companies listed on CSI 100 (China Securities Index Co., Ltd.) in mainland China. A self-assessment of KM maturity level, developed based on the KM self-assessment framework proposed by Collison and Parcell, was used to gauge the knowledge utilisation of an organisation. The intellectual capital efficiency coefficient (ICE), component of the Value Added Intellectual Coefficient (VAIC™), was used to assess the efficiency of intellectual capital. Overall, 26 questionnaires were collected from the surveyed organisations to evaluate their level of KM, which accounted for 25% of the sample. Finally, correlation analysis with SPSS was performed to examine if there was a correlation between ICE and the maturity level of KM in the sampled companies in mainland China. The results showed that the association between the two variables was not statistically significant. In fact, no conclusive evidence was found to support an association between efficiency of utilising intellectual capital, and KM maturity score. The lack of an association may suggest that there may be other intervening variables yet to be identified in the relationship between KM and IC. This study is an attempt to explore the above assertion and to conduct empirical studies in studying their applicability in China, one of the fastest growing economies in the world. While we are not seeking to generalise the results, it may serve as a good reference for further studies in examining the intricate "relationship" between IC and KM, that is, linking a process view of KM to the measurement of value creating intangibles of a corporation epitomised by IC.

Program comprehension is an integral part of the evolution and maintenance of large software systems. As it is increasingly difficult to comprehend these systems completely, programmers have to rely on a partial and as-needed comprehension. We study partial comprehension and programmer learning with the use of concept maps as a tool for capturing programmer knowledge during concept location, which is one of the tasks of software evolution and maintenance, and it is a prerequisite of a software change. We conduct a user study to measure the performance of programmers using concept maps to assist with locating concepts. The results demonstrate that programmer learning occurs during concept location and that concept maps assisted programmers with capturing programmer learning and successful concept location.

The study investigated how MNCs mobilise knowledge transfer fit in subsidiaries recipients. The hypotheses are developed that the knowledge transfer process via personnel aspects enhances the individual and organisational team competency to generate and transfer knowledge to fit with their recipients' needs. This empirical study is based on the data collected from two rounds of mailed questionnaire surveys of 600 MNC subsidiaries in Thailand. A total of 83 usable responses were returned, representing a response rate of 14%. The empirical results clarify some issues and propose the boundary conditions: (a) Firms should select people and orient with the kinds of knowledge to be transferred to take advantage of their effects on performance and (b) the importance of knowledge transfer through people's mobility across focal subsidiary as key drivers behind MNC's remarkable success. However, firms should not forget that in developing countries, there may be weaker informational capabilities and limited support industries.

The purpose of this study is to examine the extent to which some factors such as trust, cultural differences, time differences, language have a significant effect on virtual team's work collaboration. Study population comprised of Jordanian Royal Medical Services; two most largest medical services were selected as a study sample; King Hussein Medical Centre and Queen Alia Medical Centre both located at Amman (the capital of Jordan). A purposive sampling technique was used to select the respondents surveyed for this study and a questionaire was used to collect primary data from the respondents, a total of 120 questionnaires were administered to potential respondents chosen from the two medical services; a total of 105 usable questionnaires were returned, giving a response rate of 87.5 %. Simple regression analysis was performed to test the study hypothesis. The study findings of this research show that there is a statistical significant effect at cultural differences, time differences and language on virtual team's collaboration, whereas, trust factor did not show a statistical significant effect. This study is delimited to only Jordanian royal medical services, as a case study, thus the results of this study cannot be generalised to other medical services.

Studies on organisations have indicated the significance of acknowledging subcultures across an organisation. It is therefore important to consider dedicated Knowledge Management (KM) strategies for different "entities" within each ontology level to suit their unique characteristics. However, a review of the literature indicates that this concept so far appears to have only been applied down to departmental level. There is little research exploring the next level down, to whether or not different "teams" require different KM strategies to remain competitive. In order to answer this question, this research explores what differences there are between teams in the context of KM by using a case study of a medium-sized high-tech manufacturer in New Zealand. Different KM practices between homogeneous teams of design engineers from different technical disciplines within the same department were investigated. The findings confirmed that in the context of KM, teams within a department do not always behave homogeneously. Four factors that caused different tacit knowledge sharing practices between the functional teams in the Engineering Department of the case company were identified: The nature of the technical discipline, team resources, departmental structure design and team culture. Based on these findings, a KM approach defining a specific KM strategy for each team was then proposed. This approach provides managers with an alternative perspective on KM implementation, which may help mitigate the high failure rate of KM among businesses reported in the literature.

This research aims to provide an understanding of knowledge sharing behaviour through the adaptation of two major theories, the Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA) and the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TpB) which were developed by Martin Fishbein and Icek Ajzen from social psychology. Exploring knowledge sharing from a social psychological perspective provides an understanding of the process an individual goes through to make the decision to share his/her knowledge with others as well as the different psychological factors facilitating or hindering knowledge sharing behaviour. Research findings are based on a web-survey of 158 group members of one online community of educators, Tapped In (TI). TI is a professional online community developed and supported by the Stanford Research Institute (SRI International), and directed to enhancing the quality of teaching by developing web-based opportunities of learning and engaging.

Proposing an extended theoretical model of knowledge sharing behaviour in online community, this research tested the predictive power of five major variables on the individuals' intention to share expertise and knowledge. Variables included attitude, subjective norms, descriptive norms, controllability and knowledge sharing self-efficacy (KSSE). The study found that normative pressures, including subjective norms and descriptive norms, had a strong influence on the formation of the individual's intention to share in this specific online community. Knowledge sharing self-efficacy also was found to significantly account for explaining the individual's motivation to share his/her knowledge with other members. Attitude and controllability were not found to have significant impacts on the formation of intention.