Proceedings of the 12th European Conference on Knowledge ...

Mohammad Mirkazemi Mood, Farhad Daneshga and Mona Mirkazemi Mood
Figure 2 shows <strong>the</strong> status <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong>se strategies regarding <strong>the</strong> kind <strong>of</strong> knowledge and level <strong>of</strong> tacit and
explicit knowledge.
Figure 2: KM Strategies (Choi and Lee 2003)
Organizations that are passive in implementing KM have little tendency to apply <strong>the</strong> strategies and
<strong>the</strong>refore, no attention is paid to <strong>the</strong> systematic implementation <strong>of</strong> KM in <strong>the</strong>ir work processes. Those
organizations that capitalize on <strong>the</strong> human oriented strategy are more likely to favor tacit knowledge,
its creation and sharing via human relationships in unauthorized social networks. There are o<strong>the</strong>r
organizations, however, that choose <strong>the</strong> system oriented strategy; consequently, <strong>the</strong>y pursue <strong>the</strong>
processes <strong>of</strong> explicit knowledge acquisition and storage. It should be noted that information
technologies are <strong>of</strong> critical significance in this strategy. The third group <strong>of</strong> organizations includes
those which, partaking <strong>of</strong> a dynamic strategy, tend to use both kinds <strong>of</strong> tacit and explicit knowledge.
According to <strong>the</strong> characteristics <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> desired knowledge, those organizations can use <strong>the</strong> tools <strong>of</strong>
both human and system oriented strategies (Choi and Lee 2002, 2003).
Few studies, however, have tried to propose an applied approach in choosing a suitable strategy <strong>of</strong>
KM for organizations. Wu and Lee (2007) proposed a four level approach for <strong>the</strong> selection <strong>of</strong> a
suitable KM strategy. They considered <strong>the</strong> problem <strong>of</strong> KM strategy selection as a multi-criteria
decision making issue and <strong>the</strong>refore used <strong>the</strong> analytic network process to choose a suitable method.
In this study, human and system oriented, as well as dynamic strategies were chosen as model option
for KM strategies. Wu (2008), too, presented a similar model like <strong>the</strong> previous study. The difference,
however, lies in <strong>the</strong> approach in that he proposed a combination <strong>of</strong> ANP and DEMATEL methods for
<strong>the</strong> selection <strong>of</strong> a suitable KM strategy.
2.3 The relationship between KM strategies, knowledge creation and performance
Choi and Lee (2002) investigated, in a research, <strong>the</strong> relationship <strong>of</strong> KM Strategies and Knowledge
Creation. They concluded that, <strong>the</strong> most suitable strategy, regarding <strong>the</strong> process <strong>of</strong> socialization, is
that <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> human oriented one, whereas, regarding <strong>the</strong> process <strong>of</strong> combination, this strategy is <strong>the</strong>
least relevant and <strong>the</strong>refore not suitable. They also concluded that <strong>the</strong> best strategy for "Combination"
is <strong>the</strong> system oriented one which has <strong>the</strong> least relevancy to <strong>the</strong> socialization process. Balanced
strategy, too, is suitable for both processes <strong>of</strong> Internalization and Externalization. Choi (2002) also
concluded in his research that <strong>the</strong> knowledge creation process in <strong>the</strong> organization, achieved through
using creativity in <strong>the</strong> production <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> products and services, leads to innovation and is <strong>the</strong>refore
important in <strong>the</strong> performance <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> organization. Alongside this study, a number <strong>of</strong> o<strong>the</strong>r studies
include Koh (2000) who confirmed <strong>the</strong> positive relationship between knowledge creation and
creativity, as well as Shani et al. (2000) who confirmed <strong>the</strong> positive relationship between creativity and
organizational performance. Lee and Lee (2007) tried, in a study, to investigate <strong>the</strong> structural
relationships among capabilities, processes and performance <strong>of</strong> KM. They concluded that <strong>the</strong>re
existed a positive relationship among capabilities, KM processes and <strong>the</strong> performance efficiency <strong>of</strong>
KM. In <strong>the</strong> aforementioned study, one <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> investigated processes was that <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Knowledge
Creation. The writers <strong>of</strong> this study divided <strong>the</strong> performance criteria into two groups <strong>of</strong> financial and
customer oriented criteria.
One important point to remember is that organizations pursue different goals out <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong>
implementation <strong>of</strong> KM and, most certainly, managers, too, expect different outcomes from <strong>the</strong>
process. Plessis (2005) outlined <strong>the</strong> goals as: Increase in organizational competitive advantages,
supporting <strong>the</strong> strategy <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> business, performance improvements, turning <strong>the</strong> organization into an
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