Diagnosing Cultural Barriers to Knowledge Management

Author(s): David W. De Long and Liam Fahey

Source: The Academy of Management Executive (1993-2005), Vol. 14, No. 4, Themes: Strategy,
Culture, and Change (Nov., 2000), pp. 113-127
Published by: Academy of Management
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Academy of Management

Executive, 2000, Vol. 14, No. 4

to
barriers
Diagnosing cultural
knowledge management
David W. De Long and Liam Fahey
Executive Overview

Organizational culture is increasingly recognized as a major barrier to leveraging

intellectual assets. This article identifies four ways in which culture influences the
behaviors central to knowledge creation, sharing, and use. First, culture-and
particularly subcultures-shape
assumptions about what knowledge is and which
knowledge is worth managing. Second, culture defines the relationships between
individual and organizational knowledge, determining who is expected to control specific
knowledge, as well as who must share it and who can hoard it. Third, culture creates the
context for social interaction that determines how knowledge will be used in particular
its
situations. Fourth, culture shapes the processes by which new knowledge-with
accompanying uncertainties-is
created, legitimated, and distributed in organizations.
These four perspectives suggest specific actions managers can take to assess the different
aspects of culture most likely to influence knowledge-related behaviors. This diagnosis is
the critical first step in developing a strategy and specific interventions to align the
firm's culture in support of more effective knowledge use.

argues that creating, organizing, and using knowledge assets are the essence of what firms do. Their
in these activities, relative to the
effectiveness
competition, determines performance.4 Heeding
this counsel, many firms have launched major programs to manage knowledge better, and it is increasingly common to see titles such as chief
knowledge officer and knowledge manager in organizations. Without a doubt, knowledge management has become an important topic.5
But the efforts of many companies to manage
knowledge have not achieved their objectives, and
there is a growing sense of disenchantment among
executives about the practicality of trying to enhance
organizational knowledge. Our research in more
than 50 companies pursuing knowledge management projects (see Appendix) revealed that organizational culture is widely held to be the major barrier to
creating and leveraging knowledge assets. And our
interviews also revealed that, while most managers
intuitively recognize the importance of culture, they
find it difficult or impossible to articulate the cultureknowledge relationship in ways that lead to action.
To effectively diagnose the fit between their existing organization and knowledge management
objectives, managers need frameworks to help ar-

Obviously, there is a set of tools, such as Lotus

Notes, intranets, etc., which you need to be
knowledge-based. But technology is only 20
percent of the picture. The remaining 80 percent
is people. You have to get the culture right.
-Roger Chaddock, associate director,
Computer Sciences Corporation'
What's happened here is 90 percent culture
change. You need to change the way you relate to one another. If you can't do that you
won't succeed.2
-Bob Buckman, CEO of Buckman Labs
As we roll out our knowledge system, we find
we lack a culture that supports collaborative
work because people view knowledge as a
method of securing their job. So they're reluctant to share. The culture is a huge problem.
-Chief knowledge officer, global
engineering firm
A growing number of executives, consultants,
and management theorists have proclaimed in recent years that knowledge now constitutes the major source of competitive advantage for organizaview of the firm
tions.3 This knowledge-based
113

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114

Academy of Management Executive

ticulate how culture affects their unit's ability to

create and apply knowledge. Only then can they
design strategies to either adapt to the culture or
try to reshape it to support the firm's knowledge
management objectives.
The purposes of this article are to demonstrate the
importance of the cultural perspective on many of
the issues central to effective knowledge management; to explore four ways in which organizational
culture shapes knowledge creation, sharing, and
use; and to suggest diagnostic action steps that managers can take to assess the fit between their firm's
existing culture and desired behaviors related to effective knowledge use. In short, our intent is to provide managers and researchers with frameworks for
understanding and diagnosing how and why organizational culture so often impedes attempts to generate and leverage knowledge.
Defining Knowledge
In order to think productively about the problems of
managing knowledge, we need to distinguish between
the concepts of data, information, and knowledge.
While there is no general consensus on the boundaries
of these terms, let us make our assumptions clear. In
this article, we view data as raw or unabridged descriptions or observations about states of past, present,
or future worlds, and information as pattems that individuals find or imbue in data.6
Knowledge, on the other hand, is a product of
human reflection and experience. Dependent on
context, knowledge is a resource that is always
located in an individual or a collective, or embedded in a routine or process. Embodied in language,
stories, concepts, rules, and tools, knowledge results in an increased capacity for decision making
and action to achieve some purpose.7

Embodied in language, stories, concepts,

rules, and tools, knowledge results in an
increased capacity for decision making
and action to achieve some purpose.
Two dimensions are critical to understanding
knowledge in a practical, organizational context.
First, knowledge exists at individual, group, and organizational levels. The focus of knowledge management efforts is primarily on improving knowledge creation and use at group and organizational
levels. Second, knowledge is either explicit or tacit.
Explicit knowledge can be codified and embedded in
formal rules, tools, and processes. Tacit knowledge
is what we know but cannot explain. Automatically
reordering parts when inventory declines to a certain

November

level is explicit knowledge; assessing an individual's potential, or building a cross-functional team, is

tacit knowledge.
We believe that a major source of confusion in
discussions
and knowledge
about knowledge
management in organizations today is the failure
to recognize that there are at least three distinct
types of knowledge.
. Human Knowledge: This constitutes what individuals know or know how to do. Human or individual knowledge is manifested in skill (e.g.,
how to interview customers) or expertise (e.g.,
deep understanding of why customers purchase
particular products), and usually combines both
explicit and tacit knowledge. This type of knowledge may be sentient, that is, located in the
body, such as knowing how to type or ride a
bicycle. Or it may be cognitive, that is, largely
conceptual and abstract.8
. Social Knowledge: This form of knowledge exists only in relationships between individuals or
within groups. For example, high-performing
teams of research scientists or Web-page designers share certain collective knowledge that
is more than the sum of the individual knowledge of the teams' members. Social or collective
knowledge is largely tacit, shared by group
members, and develops only as a result of working together.9 Its presence is reflected by an
ability to collaborate effectively.
* Structured Knowledge: This is knowledge embedded in an organization's systems, processes,
tools, and routines. Knowledge in this form is
explicit and rule-based. A key distinction between structured knowledge and the first two
types is that structured knowledge is assumed to
exist independently of human knowers.'0 It is,
instead, an organizational resource.
Some researchers and consultants argue that
knowledge cannot exist independent of humans, but
we believe, from the practical standpoint of management, that knowledge is regularly created and embedded in routines, systems, and tools.1' Take, for
example, sophisticated accounting software. The
knowledge embedded in the software was originally
created by humans in the form of accounting rules
and software code, and it is useful only in specific
business contexts where it enhances management's
decision-making capabilities. Certainly, additional
human knowledge may be needed to customize the
accounting software in a particular organization,
where existing social knowledge will also affect use
of the software, but a significant amount of structured knowledge does exist in the program.
The knowledge that is embedded in routines,

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De Long and Fahey

2000

systems, and tools, and that requires minimal human intervention to perform an activity, is different
from information, such as that found in books,
manuals, and databases. These resources, no matter how highly analyzed, only become practical
knowledge when individuals can apply their own
experience and contextual understanding to interpret the details and implications for action.'2
The purpose of knowledge management is to enhance organizational performance by explicitly designing and implementing tools, processes, systems,
structures, and cultures to improve the creation, sharing, and use of all three types of knowledge that are
critical for decision making. Knowledge management
is typically made operational through a series of new
projects, (such as British Petroleum's virtual teamwork
program using video conferencing to share human expertise between remote sites),'3 processes (such as creating research teams to visit customer sites), and activities (such as interviewing potential customers).
In recent years, researchers and consultants have
tended to focus on one type of knowledge, ignoring or
discounting the other two types. For example, those
with a technology orientation have concerned themselves primarily with structured knowledge, often
putting text-based information into this category. At
the same time, they have ignored the importance of
human and social knowledge needed to complement
structured knowledge. A growing number of researchers and consultants,'4 on the other hand, have
argued that social knowledge is the only valid notion
of knowledge that managers should be concerned
with. We believe that to effectively enhance their
organization's capacity to create, share, and use
knowledge, managers ultimately must take into account all three types of knowledge.
In this article, however, we set aside the debate
about what types of knowledge need to be managed, or
how culture influences each one separately. Our primary purpose is more fundamental-to help executives understand how cultures can shape the creation,
sharing, and use of knowledge in general. Understanding these relationships first is essential for thinking
productively about the fit between culture and knowledge in any organization. Thus, subsequent references
to knowledge should be assumed to include all three
types described above, unless we indicate otherwise.
And we will leave it to the reader to make the necesscry distinctions between different forms of knowledge
when diagnosing a particular organization.
Understanding
Behavior

Links Between Culture and

The concept of culture, like that of knowledge, is

often used loosely by executives and consulta[nts

115

without any real attempt to define what it means in

practice. Culture is not only intangible and illusive,
but it can also be observed at multiple levels in an
organization.'5 Culture is reflected in values, norms,
and practices. At the deepest level, culture consists
of values, which are embedded, tacit preferences
about what the organization should strive to attain
and how it should do so. Values are often difficult to
articulate and even more difficult to change. Their
impact on knowledge creation and use, however,
which is manifested in behaviors, should never be
underestimated. Thus the arrow leading from values
to behaviors in Figure 1 is more prominently indicated than the others. For example, if a firm truly
holds a value that every customer interaction is important, then particular behaviors and actions can be
expected. Employees will be more likely to treat customers with respect, to ask them questions about
product use and performance, to listen carefully to
their replies, and to develop a mutually supportive
relationship with them over time. Values that inspire
individuals to regard customers as partners are more
likely to motivate behaviors that create useful knowledge about customers.

Values that inspire individuals to regard

customers as partners are more likely to
motivate behaviors that create useful
knowledge about customers.
Norms are generally derived from values, but
they are more observable and easier for employees
to identify. Thus, they are more susceptible to
change. Consider, for example, norms associated
with sharing information. If employees believe
that sharing what they know incurs personal risks
and decreases power, then the social norms governing how individuals should interact will not
support the behaviors needed to create and sustain the exchange of knowledge.
Practices are the most visible symbols and manifestations of a culture. They are a way of understanding any widely understood set of repetitive
behaviors, such as how people in an organization
answer the telephone, fill out time reports, or review a weekly status report. They also include
repeated types of interactions that have identifiable roles and social rules, such as performance
reviews, weekly staff meetings, and Friday afternoon beer blasts. Practices provide the most direct
levers for changing behaviors needed to support
knowledge creation, sharing, and use. For example, the ways in which departmental meetings are
conducted strongly influence the likelihood of a

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November

Academy of Management Executive

116

Elements of culture:

ractices

Behaviors

ibbKnowledge creation,

sharing, and use

Values
Note: The thicker arrow denotes the predominant impact of values on behaviors.

FIGURE 1
Culture Elements Influence Behaviors

group's generating new knowledge or leveraging

its existing knowledge. Are differences of opinion
encouraged and respected, or routinely discounted
by group leaders? Is conflict managed constructively, or is it suppressed or smoothed over?
Values, norms, and practices reflect different
levels of observability of an organization's culture,
but the concepts are also fundamentally interrelated. Values are manifested in norms that, in turn,
shape specific practices. While values shape
norms and practices, sometimes managers will
change practices and norms in an attempt to reshape values over time.

Four Frameworks Linking Culture and

Knowledge
Our research on knowledge management initiatives has shown that knowledge and culture are
inextricably linked in organizations.'6 Indeed, any
discussion of knowledge in organizational settings
without explicit reference to its cultural context is
likely to be misleading. In addition, we found that
culturally generated and condoned behaviors of
both individuals and groups are often inimical to
developing and leveraging knowledge.
To evaluate how an organization's current culture influences the creation, sharing, and use of
knowledge, managers must first understand how
culture actually influences knowledge-related behaviors. These four frameworks provide diagnostic
tools for analyzing how culture currently affects a
firm's knowledge-related behaviors. This is an essential step before deciding whether to adapt

knowledge management objectives to the existing

culture, or to try to change the culture.

1. Culture shapes assumptions about which

knowledge is important
Cultures, and particularly subcultures (which will
be addressed in the next section), heavily influence what is perceived as useful, important, or
Culture
in an organization.
valid knowledge
shapes what a group defines as relevant knowledge, and this will directly affect which knowledge
a unit focuses on.
For example, an advertising agency may give
priority to human creative knowledge, while an
auto parts distributor may value more structured
knowledge embedded in supply-chain processes.
These beliefs about which knowledge is most important do not occur in an organizational vacuum.
They are shaped by values and norms.
In a more specific case, a printed circuit-board
design team was supposed to be capturing lessons
learned in its part of the product development process, which was a core process for the company.
But the group's members were so concerned with
being able to account for their time in the government-funded work that they initially refused to reflect on their experiences and develop lessons
learned.'7 No management initiative to improve
knowledge creation could override the team's wellestablished norm of being billable. The barrier to
creating this new knowledge was removed only
when the knowledge manager found an administrative accounting code to which time for extract-

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2000

De Long and Fahey

ing lessons learned could be charged. Local norms,

such as always accounting for time in some explicit form, and practices, such as filling out time
sheets, determine the priority that individuals accord to different types of knowledge and learning
in every organization. In the case of this design
team, the norms associated with being billable
were so powerful that they had to be accommodated before new knowledge related to the product
development activities could be created and captured.
Managerial actions
This example suggests several actions managers
can take to discover how their culture shapes
assumptions about knowledge creation, sharing,
and use:
* Explore how your culture's (or subculture's)
priorities are likely to support or undermine
more effective creation and sharing of knowledge around a particular activity or process.
For example, is being billable always more
important than some other knowledge-enhancing activity, such as looking for patterns in lost
traincustomers? Is going to a skill-building
ing class a lower-status activity than performing daily tasks?
* Identify behaviors that would demonstrate that
a particular set of essential knowledge-building
activities is critical to your organization. For example, what would sales managers be doing
differently if sharing knowledge about customers across divisions was an established norm in
the culture? What would senior management be
doing and saying that reflected the importance
of this norm?
* Clarify which existing norms and practices may
be barriers to the new behaviors needed. And
ask whether those elements of the culture can be
changed to support these behaviors.
Subcultures apply different criteria in defining
knowledge
To understand how conflicts arise about what
knowledge is important it is critical to underSubcultures
stand the impact of subcultures.
consist of distinct sets of values, norms, and
practices exhibited by specific groups or units in
an organization, such as R&D, sales, engineerand
ing, MIS, different levels of management,
different geographic regions. Subcultures have
them from the
characteristics
that distinguish
firm's overall culture, as well as from other sub-

117

cultures. For example, R&D's values may seem

focused on elegant product features to the detriment of product marketability and profits, while
finance appears to value only controlling costs.
MIS, on the other hand, may seem concerned
only with maintaining
strict adherence to its
technology
standards.
Organizations
usually
have both an overall culture and multiple subcultures. However, the influence of the overall
culture and the amount of conflict among subcultures will vary across organizations.'8
Subcultures often lead their members to define
important knowledge differently than other groups
in the organization.'9 In a major electronics firm, the
engineering subculture was entrepreneurial. Its values and norms encouraged lots of experimentation
and frequent, informal interactions. Thus engineers
viewed knowledge sharing and personal relationships as integrally related and believed that any
attempts to manage knowledge must facilitate such
social interactions. The firm's MIS subculture, on the
other hand, was procedurally oriented and heavily
rule-bound, placing a high value on standardized
processes. The department's managers valued the
structured knowledge that was embedded in processes, software programs, and documents. This reflected the type of knowledge management system
they tried to supply to the engineers.

Subcultures often lead their members to

define important knowledge differently
than other groups in the organization.
Such different views of knowledge often lead to
miscommunication and conflict between functions,
as subcultures apply different criteria in valuing
knowledge.20 And these differences, which often
produce conflicting strategies and goals in knowledge management initiatives, suggest the following actions:
. Identify the distinct subcultures involved in your
knowledge initiative. How are different groups
likely to define knowledge differently? What
values are reflected in each definition of knowledge? What are the critical assumptions that
underlie these value differences?
* Make explicit what types of knowledge are preferred by each subculture. Engage in discussions to achieve some level of shared understanding about the types of knowledge most
important to the business.
* Explore whether your unit's orientation to
knowledge (as evidenced in prevailing norms
and practices) suggests biases and blind spots

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Academy of Management

118

that might lead you to overlook critical knowlopportunities. For example,

edge-management
are you too focused on developing human
knowledge and skills, while ignoring the need to
invest in more structured knowledge for business processes? Are you too committed to placing objects in a knowledge database, while ignoring existing levels of human and social
knowledge, as well as cultural norms and practices, that will inhibit absorbing and applying
the system's content?
* Reflect on whether you are making realistic assumptions about the new behaviors needed to
leverage specific types of knowledge, given the
different subcultures involved. For example, is
an informal, entrepreneurial engineering group
expected to use a formal, procedurally oriented
knowledge repository? Can the system be
adapted to fit the culture? Or should management invest in culture change?
2. Culture mediates the relationships between
levels of knowledge
Culture embodies all the unspoken norms, or
rules, about how knowledge is to be distributed
between the organization and the individuals in
it, as illustrated in Figure 2. Culture dictates
what knowledge belongs to the organization and
what knowledge remains in control of individuals or subunits. This is most evident when management tries to convince individuals to share
the human knowledge they have so that it can
be converted into more structured knowledge,

Unit B

Unit.A

Organizational
knowledge

Organizational
knowledge

~Culture)

Unit A

UnitB

Individual

Individual

FIGURE2
Culture Mediates Relationships Between
Organizational and Individual Knowledge

Executive

November

which the organization will control. A common

instance of this occurs when management tries
to convince sales people to contribute their
knowledge about individual customers to a common customer database.
As we have already argued, human knowledge
transferred into databases is really information
until interpreted by others with the experience
and skills to apply it in a different context. Nevertheless, when people are asked to put what
system, they
they know into an organizational
tend to feel they have lost ownership of knowledge they alone had previously controlled. Often, a company's norms will support this individual ownership, encouraging people to refuse to
share their knowledge, even as the organization
pursues a business strategy whose success requires individuals to share what they know. In
essence, cultural norms and practices determine
who is expected to control what knowledge, as
well as who must share it, and who can hoard it.
must be
objectives
Knowledge
management
aligned with these norms and practices if they
are to be achieved.
Three themes are particularly significant when
culture is used as a lens to understand knowledge
distribution. That is, who controls what knowledge
and where are they located.
Importance of individual knowledge
Knowledge sharing is too often compromised, if
not completely sacrificed, at the altar of norms and
practices that advocate and reinforce the supremacy of individual knowledge. Consider the following example, in which one manager explained
how his company's culture reinforced the value of
individual knowledge:
In divisional reviews, the senior manager
comes around and says, "Show me something
I've never seen before." So the whole goal is
to blow their socks off. Nobody ever says,
"Show me where you've worked together with
another business unit." The assumption is
that the value executives add in these reviews is to cross-fertilize the organization and
to connect related ideas. And the engineers
think their role is to show individual engineering brilliance. It's totally individual. They
reward you to be competitive, instead of recognizing team-based performance and collective accomplishments.
Management's attempts at generating more collaboration and knowledge sharing in this com-

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De Long and Fahey

2000

pany will fall short until they directly address how

the culture reinforces and values knowledge use at
the individual level.2'
The CEO of Buckman Labs took on this challenge
directly when he implemented a knowledge-sharing network to support global sales operations. At
the start, Robert Buckman recognized that the
firm's IT investment would not be sufficient to
achieve his knowledge-sharing
and business objectives, because he knew that the organization's
cultural norms condoned hoarding knowledge as a
source of power. Bulging file cabinets around the
company symbolized individual knowledge banks.
But this behavior began to change when Buckman
told the company, upon launching the computerbased knowledge network:
Those of you who have something intelligent
to say now have a forum in which to say it.
Those of you who will not contribute also will
become obvious. If you are not willing to contribute or participate, then you should understand that the many opportunities offered to
you in the past will no longer be available.22
This was a first step in Buckman's three-year
campaign to reshape norms and practices that defined the relationships between individual knowledge and the organization. The CEO recognized
that as long as people benefited from not sharing,
the organization's ability to leverage their knowledge would be limited, since the investment in
information technology would not change the culture by itself.

The level of trust that exists between the

organization, its subunits, and its
employees greatly influences the amount
of knowledge that flows both between
individuals and from individuals into the
firm's databases, best practices archives,
and other records.

119

proprietary is: "We don't trust you." The level of

trust that exists between the organization, its
subunits, and its employees greatly influences
the amount of knowledge that flows both between individuals and from individuals into the
firm's databases,
best practices archives, and
other records.
Companies with a history of downsizing face a
particular problem in this area. They have to
rebuild trust levels in their culture before they
can expect individuals to share expertise freely
without worrying about the impact of this sharing on their value to the company. To do so
requires paying considerable
attention to the
supporting norms and behavioral practices that
manifest trust as an important organizational
value.
Status differences impede cross-functional
knowledge sharing
A culture that clearly values some units over others is more likely to undermine the cross-functional sharing of any type of knowledge, in part by
supporting subcultures that seek to defend their
own knowledge assets. Managers in one firm
clearly recognized that their culture valued R&D,
marketing, manufacturing, and information systems, in descending order. This shared sense that
functions were valued differently-an
example of
social knowledge-reinforced
a silo mentality and
encouraged employees to spend unproductive time
defending their unit's perspective.
If we recognize that culture is the silent broker,
or mediator between individual, group, and organizational knowledge, then the importance of renegotiating norms around knowledge distribution,
ownership, and access becomes more evident. This
is especially important for traditional firms competing in emerging electronic business environments where intense integration between functions, such as marketing and information systems,
is critical to success.
Managerial actions

Low-trust cultures constrict knowledge

flow

When a mechanical engineer in an automotive

firm sought cost information related to a design
project, an employee in the finance department
responded: "You're an engineer. You don't need
to know that." Cultural norms supporting departmental autonomy made this an acceptable view
of knowledge sharing in this company. But the
implicit message of holding internal information

Whenever a knowledge-management
initiative
threatens (intentionally or not) to change patterns
of knowledge distribution and use, then management should take the following steps:
* Consider how your knowledge-management
strategy proactively intends to change attitudes
towards ownership of knowledge.
* Evaluate how your current culture will facilitate
or undermine the proposed redistribution of
knowledge.

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Academy of Management Executive

. Identify what new behaviors leaders must exhibit to communicate a shift from valuing individual to collective knowledge.
. Make explicit what practices need to change to
reinforce more collaborative knowledge use.

3. Culture creates a context for social interaction

Earlier we said that culture shapes perceptions
and behaviors. One way culture does this is by
establishing the organizational context for social
interaction.23 Cultures represent the rules (e.g.,
"Don't interrupt a superior." "Challenge everyone but the CFO.") and practices (e.g., meeting
formats and frequencies, appropriate uses of email versus voice mail), that determine the environment within which people communicate.
These cultural ground rules shape how people
interact and have a major impact on knowledge
creation, sharing, and use.24
For example, a major bank was interested in
sharing lessons learned from the many electronic
commerce initiatives that had sprung up in its
different divisions. But a lack of norms or practices
to support sharing this knowledge across units
meant there was no organizational context where
one group's valuable experiences were likely to be
passed on to others in the firm. Thus the potential
value of applying this knowledge elsewhere in the
bank was being lost.
By defining the context for interaction, culture
determines how all types of knowledge will be
used in a particular situation. It does this primarily by dictating the norms-the
rules, expectations, and penalties-that
govern social interactions between individuals and groups, and by
shaping people's perceptions of their range of
options acceptable to the organization. For example, where functions, such as R&D and manufacturing, are not expected to continually share
knowledge and collaborate, and are without routine practices to do so, there is no context for
interaction to support this sharing. A new intranet infrastructure or reengineered work process
can surely improve the environment for knowledge sharing. But, unless executives
address
long-standing
interaction patterns and beliefs
shaped by different subcultures, the benefits of
their knowledge-management
strategy will be
limited.
The impact of culture on the context for interaction
can be assessed on at least three dimensions: vertical interactions, horizontal interactions, and special
behaviors that promote knowledge sharing and use.

November

Vertical interactions
Culture shapes vertical interactions in many ways,
but two particularly relevant to knowledge creation and sharing are norms determining the acceptability of discussing sensitive topics, and perceived approachability of senior management.
Sensitive Topics. At Buckman Labs, shortly after the knowledge network was introduced, the
CEO engaged in a lengthy electronic debate
about the sales compensation system. For weeks,
salespeople
argued on-line, sometimes directly
with the CEO, about the unfairness of the existing bonus system. The cultural message underlying this open exchange was that anything is
discussible, a norm that builds the trust necessary to support vertical knowledge sharing. And
we have already pointed out the negative impacts of low-trust cultures on knowledge sharing
in the previous section.
Approachability.
Norms and practices that
make executives accessible
and approachable
also help create a context for effective knowledge sharing. At Chaparral Steel, workers' lockers are intentionally located next to a vice president's office to facilitate informal interactions.25
In contrast, executives in one large manufacturing company we studied seemed unaware of how
intimidating their high levels of technical and
business expertise were to subordinates.
One
manager explained: "When engineers are put in
front of top management, they're thinking, 'I'm
not going to say a word unless I'm positive I can
that's absolutely
say something
accurate.'
There's a feeling of intimidation and a fear of
looking stupid, so people keep their thoughts to
themselves."
Cultures with norms and practices that discourage open and frank exchanges between levels in
the hierarchy create a context for communication
that undermines effective knowledge sharing.

Cultures with norms and practices that

discourage open and frank exchanges
between levels in the hierarchy create a
context for communication that
undermines effective knowledge sharing.
Horizontal interactions
Culture also shapes patterns and qualities of interactions needed to leverage knowledge among
individuals at the same level in the organization.
Three characteristics differentiate organizations in
this arrea: the volume of interactions, level of col-

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2000

De Long and Fahey

laboration and collective responsibility, and an

orientation to seek out existing expertise or knowledge.
Interactivity. Culture determines the patterns of
interaction used to accomplish work. Norms and
practices, for example, that bring people together
vary from one organization to another. One traditional firm may rely on formal communication processes and meetings designed to periodically
bring individuals together, while a more entrepreneurial Internet startup expects frequent, unplanned, and unstructured interactions among employees.
In these organizations,
formal and
informal interactions are valued differently, which
results in different patterns of knowledge creation
and sharing.
To take advantage of new electronic communication technologies, companies like British Petroleum and Buckman Labs have actively managed
the behavioral norms and practices needed to facilitate knowledge sharing. At Buckman Labs, for
example, employees using the firm's knowledge
network now expect a greater level of interaction
when looking for help with a sales or marketing
problem. "If you are in a global company, there's
somebody awake and working all the time. Having
K'Netix26 gives us the capability to respond,"
says one executive. "A new mind-set has taken
hold at Buckman. Rather than picking up the
phone, someone can communicate with a mass
of people faster."
Even though the Internet and other new technologies are greatly reducing communication
barriers, unless cultural norms and practices
support higher levels of interactivity between
the right individuals or groups, these new channels will have relatively little impact on knowledge use.27
Collaboration. Another way that culture shapes
the context for horizontal interactions is through
norms and practices that promote collaboration. In
electronic business, the customer's needs are
evolving so quickly, says the CEO of one Internet
company, that salespeople must feed market information as fast as possible to product developers:
"Our salespeople are attuned to what other functions in the company need, so instead of waiting
until quarterly product meetings, they are telling
our product managers, 'This is what I've seen in at
least 10 calls during the week."'
and cross-functional
Collaboration
problem
solving are also expected at Chaparral Steel,
where every employee carries a business card
reading "member of the sales force." A sense of
collective responsibility leads employees to go to
great lengths to avoid letting colleagues down,

121

frequently offering help to those in other departments, even though it burdens their own work.28
When norms and practices promote collaboration
between functions and operating units, interactions are more likely to lead to creating and sharing new knowledge of all types.
Reusing Existing Knowledge.
Culture also
shapes the context for interaction through norms
and practices that determine to what lengths
employees will go to seek out and build on existing knowledge. Culture may create an organizational context where creative directors for a
global ad agency see each new project as
unique, or an environment where design engineers for an automaker refuse to search out lessons from their counterparts working on other car
platforms. Cultures that primarily reward individual creativity and innovation produce different patterns of interaction around knowledge
than cultures where uncovering and leveraging
existing expertise is the norm. To encourage the
use of existing knowledge, Texas Instruments created an annual "Not-Invented-Here-But-I-Did-It-Anyway" award to recognize those who reuse good ideas
from elsewhere.
Special behaviors promoting knowledge
development
We could address a long list of desirable behaviors
that help shape the context of social interaction to
support knowledge sharing and use. Instead, we
have chosen two that seem most important.29

More and more firms have discovered the

benefits of having their employees teach
others about core aspects of the business.
Sharing and teaching. Cultures that explicitly
favor knowledge sharing over knowledge acquisition will create a context for interaction that is
more favorable to leveraging
The
knowledge.
U.S. Army is one of a growing number of organizations that formally considers knowledge-sharing capabilities when identifying candidates for
promotion. Teaching is another behavior that influences the social context, even as it enhances a
firm's existing knowledge base. Companies as
different as General Motors and Skandia, the
Swedish financial services firm, both recognize
the value of asking managers to teach what they
know about the business as a way of refining
and improving their existing knowledge, even
as they share it. More and more firms have

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122

Academy of Management Executive

discovered
the benefits of having their employees teach others about core aspects of the
business.30
Dealing with mistakes. A large international
engineering and construction company trying to
build a lessons-learned
database found one legacy of large layoffs after a recent business downturn was that engineers in the firm were reluctant to admit mistakes. This, of course, significantly limited the scope of the lessons that
could be captured. How an organization reacts to
mistakes is another norm that shapes the context
for social interaction. Mistakes may be covered
up, explained away, punished severely, or ignored. Or norms and practices may dictate that
mistakes be uncovered and used as a source of
Internet busilearning, as many fast-moving
nesses are now doing. In either case, the approach used will influence how people interact,
and thus will shape the quality of the knowledge
created and applied.
Recognizing this phenomenon, the U.S. Army is
more concerned with the value of recognizing mistakes and fixing them than it is with doing things
right the first time. This attitude stems from battlefield experience, where no plan is ever carried out
without errors. Thus the ability to evaluate and
correct mistakes becomes critical to success. To
reinforce the importance of frank interactions for
diagnosing and learning from errors, the Army

November

strives to separate its debriefing activities from its

evaluation processes. Groups won't learn from
their mistakes if the same interactions are being
used to fix blame, keep score, or humiliate those
involved.3'

Managerial actions
Some key characteristics of organizational culture
that shape the context for social interaction are
noted in Figure 3. Although not a complete list,
these characteristics do demonstrate another way
in which culture affects knowledge of all types,
and it suggests actions that logically follow from
understanding this relationship.
* Identify norms and practices that are barriers to
discussing sensitive topics.
* Find and evaluate evidence that senior management is perceived as accessible and approachable. Are there elements of the culture that inhibit vertical interactions?
* Find norms and practices in the firm that encourage or discourage:
-a

high frequency of interaction.

-an expectation
solving.

of collaborative

Cultural characteristics

*Discussability of sensitive topics\

.Senior management's\
approachability\
* Frequency of interactions
* Collective responsibility for

problemssolving
* Orientation to existing knowledge
and expertise
* Knowledge sharing
(vs. accumulation)

Context for

Behaviors that

social interaction

leverage
nowledge

*Teaching/
Learning from mistakes/

FIGURE 3
Cultural Characteristics that Shape Social Interaction

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problem

De Long and Fahey

2000

-seeking out existing expertise and knowledge instead of "reinventing the wheel."
-teaching
-identifying

others.
and learning from mistakes.

4. Culture shapes creation and adoption of new

knowledge
Knowledge ultimately assumes value when it affects
decision making and is translated into action. New
knowledge32 is either adopted wholesale from external sources, often in the form of structured knowledge, such as a new software-driven manufacturing
process, or it is created internally by taking information from the extemal environment and interpreting
it in the context of the firm's existing knowledge to
create new knowledge that becomes a basis for action. The corporate landscape is littered with examples of firms that had access to new knowledge
about their competitive environments, but that failed
to recognize its potential value.
Consider one well-known case. Ford's market
research department produced what it viewed as
new knowledge: "overwhelming evidence," in the
form of projections, that the minivan would be a
huge success as a new product in the automobile
market. However, Ford's executives, particularly in
the finance department, challenged the validity of
this new market knowledge, labeling the minivan
concept as untested and risky. In this case, the
subcultures involved in negotiating the validity of
the new knowledge failed to agree and act on the
importance of the insights. And Chrysler, of course,
went on to capture this major new market, with a
product that essentially saved the struggling automaker from bankruptcy.33
A firm's culture, and the relationships among its
subcultures, heavily shape how new knowledge

123

about the external environment is created, legitimated (or rejected), and distributed throughout an
organization, as illustrated in Figure 4. The dynamics of this process represent a special problem
for companies pursuing business opportunities
through the Internet, because they are regularly
confronted by competitive
and technological
changes that threaten their survival. Organizations need to be able not only to adopt or create
new knowledge in all forms, but also to legitimate
and distribute it to change strategic direction and
resource allocations faster than their rivals. In
practice, some firms, such as Intel, General Electric, Wal-Mart, and Motorola, have historically
been more successful at this than others.

Effective knowledge-oriented

cultures

The fundamental question for management

is:
What are the characteristics of a culture that will
help a firm rapidly acquire and distribute new
knowledge throughout the organization to enhance
decision making and performance? We have found
four characteristics evident in cultures that are
more effective at creating and integrating new
knowledge from the external environment.
(1) Knowledge from the external environment is
expected to be the starting point, not the end, of
innovation. In this type of culture, norms and practices strongly encourage the exploitation of knowledge from the external environment, rather than just
being satisfied with absorbing it. For example, when
Chaparral Steel bought new rolling mill equipment
designed to produce eight-inch slabs of steel, its assumption was that the performance of this new
equipment, which represents structured knowledge,
could be improved. Indeed, through trial-and-error
and continually pushing the technology's capabili-

Inputs from
external
environment
/

<

~~t ~

_t

~
~

Organizatio'
~~~~
~ability to interpret
and information
t
~~~data
external
~~~~~reflecting
/

ew knowldg
aout comptiv
environmn

Culture

FIGURE 4
Creating and Adopting New Knowledge

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124

Academy of Management Executive

ties, the equipment was soon producing 14-inch

slabs, a level of performance that led the supplier to
try to buy back the new design. The norm at Chaparral is to expect to build on structured knowledge
acquired from outside the organization, not simply to
absorb it. Among the practices that make this level of
innovation possible are continual experimentation
and quick-and-dirty prototyping. But most important
is the attitude within the company that existing external knowledge can and must be enhanced if
Chaparral is to stay competitive.
(2) Intense debate is encouraged on key strategic
issues drawing on extensive internal and external
inputs. Intel's Chairman Andy Grove sees intense
debate and dialogue as a cornerstone of his company's culture, and a key reason why Intel has
been able to adapt and prosper in the highly volatile computer industry.34
Intel's ability to understand how its computer
memory chip business was being transformed was
severely tested in the 1980s. Input from the external
environment was unmistakable. The Japanese were
developing tremendous new capacity to manufacture memory chips. Their quality levels were better.
They had major advantages in access to low-cost
capital. And the industry was caught in a downward
pricing spiral, so that Intel was losing money on
chips. In retrospect, the obvious strategic decision
was to get out of the memory chip business, given the
knowledge of these events. But this interpretation of
external events had to be filtered through the firm's
values, norms, and practices before becoming
knowledge that Intel could act on. In this case, Intel's
identity was closely tied to memory chips, to the
point where many employees couldn't imagine the
company existing without manufacturing them.
To develop an understanding of what the shifting realities of the marketplace meant for Intel,
Grove orchestrated a broad-based, highly emotional debate designed to engage the organization
and clarify its strategic options. What the Intel
culture labeled "constructive confrontation," Grove
concedes is really "ferocious arguing with one another while remaining friends." Such debate and
dialogue demands a set of norms that includes the
acceptance of intense questioning of all assertions

What the Intel culture labeled

"'constructive confrontation," Grove
concedes is really "ferocious arguing with
one another while remaining friends."'
and observations made during meetings. This type
of productive conflict is essential to first generate

November

and then reconcile disparate views, and to create

new knowledge that will become the basis of action. The absence of these norms, and related underlying values, contributed to the missed opportunity in the Ford minivan case described earlier.
Of course, executives like Grove recognize that
not everyone in the firm will accept the perspective
ultimately taken by senior management, based on
its new knowledge of the environment. But the
process of engaging and listening to many views
on an issue increases the likelihood of a better
decision35 and broader acceptance of an emerging
organizational perspective.
(3) High levels of participation are expected in
seeking out, debating, and synthesizing knowledge
related to important business issues. Norms and
practices must go beyond encouraging debate and
dialogue to facilitating contributions from individuals at multiple levels of the organization. Such
participation is enabled by practices that involve
individuals gathering data from diverse sources,
exercising their judgment to transform data into
information, and then engaging in intense interaction and discourse to produce new knowledge that
can be the basis for action.
Today, Buckman Labs has 50 percent of its employees regularly engaged with customers in the
belief that directly interacting with the market is
the key to profitability. With a goal of 80 percent of
its employees on the front line, Buckman has created a huge natural network that feeds information
about customers into the company. Employees are
expected to contribute to the databases maintained on all of the firm's customers, and this detailed information is a source of much richer
knowledge about the marketplace.
Companies whose cultures are most effective at
creating and integrating new knowledge into the
organization have norms and practices that demand broad participation in knowledge gathering
and distributing information about the external environment. At Chaparral Steel, visiting customers
and suppliers is a standard practice for employees
at all levels of the firm. "We send people who can
best tell us what's going on, whoever they are,"
says one executive.36 Cultures that encourage people to directly experience sources of problems,
threats, and opportunities are more likely to lead
employees to see the need for new thinking about
a particular issue.37
(4) Organizations find ways to challenge the existing assumptions and beliefs that shaped the
firm's earlier successes. This is a special problem
for traditional firms trying to move into the Internet-based economy. One vice president of ecommerce observed: "Being a bank doesn't hold us

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2000

De Long and Fahey

back, but thinking like a bank does. Our challenge

is getting people to stop thinking like a bank and
to understand that e-commerce means business
will be done in a fundamentally different way.I
At Intel, Grove found that the company's fundamental beliefs about memory chips were inhibiting
its ability to accept the mounting evidence that it
could no longer survive in a market where it had
once been a major player. For an organization to
question fundamental knowledge about its competitive environment or core technologies, it must learn
how to diagnose and correct errors in its existing
norms and practices. This form of double loop learning38 allows firms to legitimate and apply new
knowledge by questioning their current assumptions. For example, to get out of the memory chip
business and move full force into microprocessors,
Intel had to abandon the practice of using memory
chips as its technology driver. It also had to give up
a belief that the company had to offer a full product
line of memory chips, microprocessors, and other
products to remain competitive.39
Questioning fundamental beliefs and existing
ways of working is a particularly difficult challenge for leadership, but it is usually a key step in
creating new knowledge for the organization. One
of the reasons Ford decided not to build a minivan,
despite overwhelming support from its market research, was that Henry Ford himself objected to the
use of costly new front-wheel drive technology.
Intel's Grove observes that if managers today are
to accurately interpret the profound changes occurring in their competitive environments, they must
"adopt an outsider's intellectual curiosity ... unfettered by any emotional attachment to the past."40

Questioning fundamental beliefs and

existing ways of working is a particularly
difficult challenge for leadership, but it
is usually a key step in creating new
knowledge for the organization.
Managerial actions
It is hard to overestimate how difficult it is to achieve
this type of detachment. And the reflection required
to question existing norms and practices is even
more at risk in an Intemet world where speed rules
and fast decision making is expected from managers. As with previous sections in this article, we
make no pretense about providing a complete list of
the characteristics
of cultures that support the
development of new knowledge around key strategic issues. However, the discussion above suggests several diagnostic actions:

125

* Look for important new knowledge that was ignored, discounted, or undiscovered by your firm.
How did these examples prove costly to the business? What norms and practices created barriers
to adopting, creating, or applying this knowledge?
* Seek out examples of new knowledge adopted
or created with inputs from the external environment that led to bursts of innovation within the
firm, and try to draw lessons from them.
* Identify the norms and practices in your culture
that discourage employees from building on and
extending structured knowledge acquired from
the external environment.
. Find examples where intense debate and dialogue was encouraged on key strategic issues.
Reflect on how conflict played a constructive or
destructive role in those discussions.
What
norms and practices would support more constructive confrontations?
. Look at the evidence you have about the levels of
participation in both acquiring and challenging
knowledge critical to the business. How do your
organization's norms and practices encourage or
inhibit high levels of participation in this area?
* Seek out examples showing how your organization questions its fundamental assumptions, beliefs, and projections about the competitive environment, core technologies, and the culture
itself. What norms and practices would be
needed to support more productive questioning
in these areas?
These actions can help executives begin to explore how their own cultures help or hinder the
integration of new knowledge into the firm. They
suggest areas that may need special attention
from senior management, as part of an overall
strategy to leverage knowledge more effectively.

Aligning Culture With Knowledge Management

Goals
Managers need frameworks to characterize the
links between culture and knowledge so they can
design the interventions needed to create behaviors that will support their knowledge management objectives. A central purpose of this article
has been to demonstrate four ways in which organizational culture influences behaviors central to
knowledge creation, sharing, and use:
* Culture-and
particularly subcultures-shape
our assumptions about what knowledge is, and,
hence, which knowledge is worth managing.
* Culture mediates relationships between individual and organizational knowledge.

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Academy of Management Executive

126

* Culture creates the context for social interaction

that ultimately determines how effective an organization can be at creating, sharing, and applying knowledge.
* Culture shapes the processes by which new orits accompanyganizational knowledge-with
created, legitimated, and
ing uncertainties-is
distributed.
Each way of conceptualizing the relationship between culture and knowledge provides a different
lens for evaluating the fit between current behaviors
and the organization's knowledge management objectives. And each of the four frameworks suggests
diagnostic action steps that can be taken to assess
different aspects of culture most likely to affect critical knowledge-related behaviors. Once the diagnosis is complete, more informed decisions can be
made about how to accommodate or realign the
firm's culture to effectively support management's
goals for leveraging organizational knowledge.

Appendix
Research Approach
The analytic frameworks, associated diagnostics,
and prescriptions presented in this paper emanate
from a number of initiatives in the authors' ongoing
research program. An initial study investigated how
24 companies initiate and manage knowledgerelated projects.41 A second research initiative involved a thorough review of the literature on organizational culture, as well as interviews with 12 chief
knowledge officers across a range of manufacturing
and service organizations. The interviews were intended to explore, among other things, what specific
facets of organizational culture facilitated or impeded their efforts to establish knowledge management as an integral activity in their organizations.
Third, we conducted a systematic and detailed review of the burgeoning knowledge management literature to identify a small number of case studies of
organizations identified as exemplars in the emerging practice of knowledge management. Fourth, we
are now involved in research on the impact of the
Internet on knowledge management practices. Finally, a less formal, but still significant source of
many anecdotes, vignettes, and insights into the relationship between culture and knowledge has come
from the many executive education programs we
have led over the last five years, as well as from a
series of knowledge management corporate consortium meetings, sponsored by Ernst & Young's Center
for Business Innovation.

November

Endnotes
' Moran, N. 1999. Financial Times, Special Section, Knowledge Management. Becoming a knowledge-based organization,
April 28:1.
2Rifkin, G. Nothing but net. Fast company, June-July 1996,
127.
3 See for example:
Nahapiet, J. & Ghoshal, S. 1998. Social
capital, intellectual capital, and the organizational advantage.
Academy of Management Review, 23: 242-266; Teece, D. J. 1998.
Capturing value from knowledge assets. California Management Review, 40(3): 55-79; and Thurow, L. 1999. Building wealth:
The new rules for individuals, companies, and nations in a
knowledge-based economy. New York: HarperCollins.
'For example, see Brown, J. S. & Duguid, P. 1998. Organizing
knowledge. California Management Review, 40(3): 90-111;
Grant, R. M. 1996. Toward a knowledge-based theory of the firm.
Strategic Management Journal, 17:109-122; Nonaka, I. & Takeuchi H. 1995. The knowledge-creating
company. New York: Oxford University Press; and Leonard-Barton, D. 1995. Wellsprings
of knowledge. Boston: Harvard University Press.
5Beyond knowledge management. 2000. The Conference
Board, Report #1262-00-RR; Dyer, G. 2000. KM crosses the chasm.
Knowledge Management, 3(3): 50-54.
6 This distinction
is common in a variety of management
literatures. For a useful synthesis of the differences between
data and information, see Davenport, T. H. 1997. Information
ecology: Mastering the information and knowledge environment. New York: Oxford University Press.
7Despite
the attention paid to knowledge management in
recent years, surprisingly little rigorous thought has been given
to understanding the concept of knowledge itself. The article
that most informed our thinking about the concept was Blackler,
F. 1995. Knowledge, knowledge work, and organizations. Organization Studies, 16: 1021-1027.
8Many
researchers have made this distinction between
knowledge that is more cognitive and knowledge that is more
physical. Two examples are Zuboff, S. 1988. In the age of the
smart machine: The future of work and power. New York: Basic
Books; and Blackler, op. cit.
9 There is growing interest in the phenomenon of social or
collective knowledge. See, for example, Brown & Duguid, op. cit.;
Nahapiet & Ghoshal, op. cit.; and Orr, J. E. 1996. Talking about
machines: An ethnography of a modern job. Ithaca, NY: ILRPress.
" The emphasis on the role of "knower" is becoming increasingly common in the knowledge-management literature. For example, see Glazer, R. Spring 1998. Measuring the knower: towards
a theory of knowledge equity. California Management Review,
40(3):175-194; Sveiby, K. & Lloyd, T. 1987.Managing knowhow: Add
value by valuing creativity. London: Bloomsbury.
1 For an excellent description of this type of structured
knowledge and the evolution of its use in industrial organizations see Zuboff, op. cit.
12 John Seely Brown observes that many knowledge-management advocates have misunderstood this point, applying the
label "knowledge management" to what is really "information
management." See Cohen, D. 1999. A conversation with John
Seely Brown. Knowledge Directions, (1): 28-35.
'3Davenport, T. H. & Prusak, L. 1998. Working knowledge.
Boston: Harvard Business School Press. Readers interested in
pursuing further the issues and nuances of developing a knowledge strategy or a knowledge initiative should see Zack, M. H.
1999. Developing a knowledge strategy. California Management Review, (41)3: 125-145; and Nohria, N. & Tierney, T. 1999.
What's your strategy for managing knowledge? Harvard Business Review, March-April: 106-116.
4 For example, see Wenger, E. 1998. Communities of practice:
Learning, meaning, and identity. New York: Cambridge University Press; and Cohen, op. cit.
of
15Fra detailed review of research and conceptualizations

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2000

127

De Long and Fahey

organizational culture, see Trice, H. M. & Beyer, J. M. 1993. The

cultures of work organizations. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: PrenticeHall. For a more practitioner-oriented summary of the concept
see Schein, E. H. 1999. The corporate culture survival guide. San
Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
16 This finding is supported by others such as Sackmann,
S. A. 1991. Cultural knowledge in organizations. Newbury Park,
CA: Sage Publications; Pentland, B. T. 1995. Information systems
and organizational learning: The social epistemology of organizational knowledge systems. Accounting, Management, and
Information Technology, 5(1): 1-21; Brown, J. S. & Duguid, P. 1991.
Organizational learning and communities of practice: toward a
unified view of working, learning, and innovation. Organization
Science, 2: 40-57.
17 Learning, as we use the term, is the act or process
of
acquiring knowledge. Learning creates knowledge that may be
used to improve individual and organizational performance.
For more on the relationship between the two concepts, see
Leonard-Barton, op. cit., and Dixon, N. 1994. The organizational
learning cycle. New York: McGraw-Hill.
8 Trice & Beyer, op. cit., provided material for defining "subcultures;" also see Schein, E. H. 1996. The three cultures of
management. Sloan Management Review, Fall: 9-20, for an
excellent discussion of the role of subcultures as a barrier to
improving organizational effectiveness.
9 Pentland, op. cit.
20 Subcultures
can come into conflict either because they
value different forms of knowledge, e.g., human versus structured, or because they each place greater importance on different knowledge that happens to be of the same type.
21 Readers interested
in a detailed exploration of these issues in the context of a leading management consulting firm
should see Bartlett, C. 1998. McKinsey & Co.: Managing knowledge and learning, Case study no. 396357. Boston: Harvard
Business School Publishing.
22
Rifkin, op. cit.: 127.
23 Sackmann, op. cit.; Trice & Beyer, op. cit.
24
Social interactions clearly underpin the creation and use of
social knowledge, but these interactions are not the same thing
as social knowledge. This form of knowledge is a product of
social interactions, which are shaped by the cultural context.
The same interactions can also produce human and structured
knowledge.
25 Details about the Chaparral culture are taken from Leonard-Barton, op cit.
26 Rifkin, op. cit.: 127. K'Netix is Buckman's term for its knowledge global sharing network.
27 This point has been made directly and indirectly by many
others. See, for example, Davenport, T. H. & Prusak, L. 1998.

David W. De Long is a researcher and consultant based

in Concord, MA. His work focuses on helping companies
create the organizational capabilities needed to succeed in
environelectronic
business
ments. A research fellow at
Andersen Consulting's Institute
for Strategic Change, and an
adjunct professor at Babson
College, he received his doctorate in organizational behavior
from Boston University. Contact: [email protected].

Working knowledge: How organizations manage what they

know. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.
28 Leonard-Barton, op. cit. See Majchrzak, A. & Wang, Q. 1996.
Breaking the functional mind-set in process organizations. Harvard Business Review, September/October, for excellent insights into how companies are effectively creating collaborative cultures.
'9Many prominent authors in the organizational learning
literature, which preceded the recent emphasis on knowledge
management, have emphasized the two elements we have chosen to focus on. See, for example, Argyris, C. 1982. Reasoning,
learning, and action. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass; and Senge, P.
1990. The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning
organization. New York: Doubleday-Currency.
organization:
30Tobin, D. R. 1998. The knowledge-enabled
Moving from "training" to "learning" to meet business goals.
New York: AMACOM.
31 Sullivan, G. R. & Harper, M. V. 1996. Hope is not a method.
New York: Times Books.
32 Of course, "new" knowledge
that gives the organization
different capabilities for action is continually created by interpreting information from both internal and external sources.
Our focus here is on how firms acquire or create and distribute
new knowledge based on inputs from the external environment
because this presents a critical problem in turbulent competitive environments, now marked by the proliferation of electronic business threats and opportunities.
33 Barabba, V. P. 1995. Meeting of the minds: Creating the market-based enterprise. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.
34 Insights into Intel's culture are taken from Grove, A. 1996.
Only the paranoid survive. New York: Doubleday, and from
on Intel's home page:
Grove's recent speeches available
www.intel.comlintellpeoplelasg/speeches/speeches.htm.
in a variety of liter35 This point had been well established
atures. See, for example, Weick, K. A. 1995. Sensemaking in
organizations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications; de Bono,
E. 1991. Six action shoes. New York: HarperBusiness.
36 Preuss, G. 1994. Chaparral steel: rapid product and process
development. Case Study 9-692-018, Boston: Harvard Business
School Publishing Division.
3 This idea is adapted from Van de Ven, A. H. 1986. Central
problems in the management of innovation. Management Science, 32(5): 590-607.
38

Argyris, op. cit.

cit.

39 Grove, op.

Grove, op. cit.: 93.

Davenport, T. H., De Long, D. W., & Beers, M. C. 1998.
Successful knowledge management projects. Sloan Management Review, 39(2): 43-57.
40
41

tt

/ ~-j

Lian Fcahey is an adjunct professor of strategic management at

Babson College and a visiting
professor of strategic management at Cranfield University, U.K.
He is the author or editor of eight
books and over 40 articles and
book chapters. His recent books
are Learning from the Future:
Competitive Foresight Scenarios
candCompetitors: Outwitting, Outmaneuvering, and Outperforming.
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