READIT-2007 - Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research

FROM MANAGEMENT OF ORGANIZATIONAL KNOWLEDGE
TO MANAGEMENT OF ORGANIZATIONAL MEMORY
K.K.Kuriakose*, H.Seetha*, S.A.V.Satya Murty*, S.Athinarayanan* and P.Swaminathan *
Abstract
Globalisation ubiquitous computing and knowledge centric view of the organization has brought
knowledge management to the central stage in many organizations. Knowledge management enables
organizational knowledge to grow flow and create more value in the organization. Knowledge Management is
the process by which organization generates wealth from its knowledge based assets.
Organizations which were initially concentrating on information management, started moving to
knowledge management then to organizational memory and organizational learning. Organizational memory is
the combined repository of data, information and knowledge across the organizational boundaries captured in
accessible repositories. These repositories consist of documents, computers, people and culture. Any
progressive organization will be continuously acquiring, updating, storing and managing the memory for
making it available to all the relevant employees and improving the organizational effectiveness. Organizational
learning uses organizational memory as its knowledge base. The effective utilization of organizational memory
will result in organizational learning and improved organizational performance.
This paper discusses the management of organizational memory and organizational learning and its
relationship to information management and knowledge management. It also discusses a conceptual frame
work for management of organizational memory in a large Research and Development Organization.
Key words: Knowledge Management, Organizational Memory, Organizational Performance
INTRODUCTION
Knowledge Management is a conscious strategy of getting the right knowledge to the
right people at the right time, and helping people share and put knowledge into action for
improving the organizational performance. The key concept is ‘organizational performance’
or ‘productivity improvement’. If the usage of computers for productivity improvement can
be analyzed, it can be seen that the starting point was basic data processing systems. Data
processing systems process transactions and produce reports. It represents the automation of
fundamental, routine processing to support operations. For this purpose Electronic Data
Processing(EDP) departments were set up in many organizations. The idea of using the
information captured in transaction processing system for decision making gave birth to
Decision Support Systems(DSS), Management Information Systems(MIS), Enterprise
Information Management (EIM) etc, though the contribution from data processing system is
minimal . In a similar way is the idea of ‘Knowledge Management’ has evolved from
‘Information Management’ ? There are contradicting views on this. In this paper we consider
‘Knowledge Management’ as different from ‘Information Management’ and the only
similarities are both aids in improving organizational productivity and both use ‘Information
Technology’ like computers , networks etc.
Organizational Memory(OM) can be defined as a set of repositories of data,
information and knowledge that the organization has acquired and retains over a period of
time. Stein and Zwass (1995) define OM as the means where by knowledge from the past is
brought to bear on present activities resulting on higher or lower levels of organizational
* Electronics and Instrumentation Group, Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research
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