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

Jiří Franek and Eva Grublova
Knowledge facilitators (KF) are workers who facilitate capturing, indexing, availability <strong>of</strong> knowledge to
KUs and KCs. They are responsible for organizational knowledge base, e.g. an organized structure
that facilitates <strong>the</strong> storage <strong>of</strong> data, information, and knowledge to be retrieved in support <strong>of</strong> a
knowledge management process. KF’s job includes knowledge integrating (to find and close
knowledge gaps), retention (to store data, information and knowledge in e.g. databases), syn<strong>the</strong>sizing
(to network knowledge bases and workers), reporting (to make lists, abstracts <strong>of</strong> new knowledge and
information sources, to support knowledge sharing) and editing (o edit and administer knowledge
base). They can be called knowledge managers or knowledge brokers. KFs have to possess not only
all knowledge worker abilities but also have to have a managerial or leadership skills. Their main job
is to communicate and make connections between knowledge and people. With regard to <strong>the</strong> scale <strong>of</strong>
organization’s operations and size, organization should set up a formal position <strong>of</strong> knowledge
manager. It is a role with operational and developmental responsibility for implementing and
reinforcing knowledge management principles and practices. Knowledge manager work involves
promotion <strong>of</strong> access to information, intelligence support, expertise, and good practices. As a head KF
knowledge manager has to monitor knowledge flow between knowledge workers. On <strong>the</strong> figure 3 <strong>the</strong>
knowledge flow among mentioned type <strong>of</strong> knowledge workers is shown. KFs should capture, share,
store and disseminate knowledge between knowledge creators and users. Their actions are focused
on knowledge assessment and identification <strong>of</strong> gaps. KUs contextualize <strong>the</strong> desired knowledge and
KCs doing updates <strong>of</strong> knowledge to cover knowledge gaps.
Knowledge
retrieval and
creation
knowledge
assessment
knowledge
update
Knowledge
acquisition,
utilization and
application
Knowledge
capture, sharing,
storing and
dissemination
knowledge gap
identification
knowledge
contextualization
Figure 3: Model <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> knowledge flow among knowledge workers, own elaboration.
3. Knowledge worker typology identification instrument concept
3.1 Basic assumptions
Based on <strong>the</strong>ories and concepts about tacit and explicit knowledge, knowledge workers and
knowledge work <strong>the</strong> aim <strong>of</strong> this framework is to find a method that can be used for identification <strong>of</strong>
knowledge workers in organizations. To support validity <strong>of</strong> presented methodology a pilot study will be
performed and analysed. The instrument is inspired by works <strong>of</strong> o<strong>the</strong>r scholars and authors. The
design follows <strong>the</strong> approach to knowledge worker as mentioned above.
3.2 Knowledge worker’s typology factor determination
The business world heavily favours <strong>the</strong> use <strong>of</strong> instruments such as <strong>the</strong> Myer-Briggs Type Indicator
(MBTI) personality style assessment (Myers et al., 1998, Mládková, 2008), to assess differences in
personality styles or talent management (Buckingham, C<strong>of</strong>fman, 2005). But such as tools are
inspirational not sufficient when it comes to knowledge work itself. Essential principles about
knowledge work (i.e. activity conducted by knowledge workers) can be more appropriately derived
from works <strong>of</strong> Bloom (1956) (in Dalkir, 2005, p. 152-155) and his Taxonomy <strong>of</strong> Learning Objectives.
Bloom divided knowledge into a hierarchical scheme that distinguishes between psychomotor skills
(manual or physical skills), <strong>the</strong> affective domain (e.g., attitudes, emotions), and <strong>the</strong> cognitive domain
(e.g., knowledge, mental skills). We can assume that psychomotor and cognitive domain can be
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