Preface for the Third Edition - Read

310 B. Concepts and Theories
list of IDs of matching authors or active contributors to the CMS respectively. An
employee search service takes the personnel numbers found in the expert search
and the author search and returns contact details, e.g., telephone number, email
address, instant messaging address. Finally, the check availability service delivers
the current status of the experts and a decision on their availability.
The ICT layer binds the basic KM services of the conceptual layer to application
systems in the current work environment of the searcher that can deliver these services.
In the case example, there might be a yellow page system, a semantic integration
system, two content management systems, an HR system, a Groupware
platform and an instant messaging system that offer Web services fitting to the
descriptions of the basic KM services on the conceptual layer. Depending on which
systems are accessible to the calling complex KM service, the actual implementation
could consist e.g., of basic services (1) and (4), of (3) and (4), of (1), (4) and
(5), of (1), (2), (3) and (4) or of all services respectively. Consequently, the description
of the complex KM service needs to include some specification of what basic
KM services are mandatory and of what combinations of basic KM services are
allowed. Figure B-53 shows the three layers and an example of calls of KM services
from activities in business processes and their binding to the corresponding
Web services on the ICT layer.
The KM service infrastructure supports service-oriented, agile or on-demand
KM approaches in organizations that take into account decentral developments of
KM initiatives. Thus, KM technologies have to operate increasingly on infrastructures
that support the rapid deployment of relevant tools and systems for ad-hoc,
intensive and inter-organizational collaborations (Tsui 2005). Recently, these
dynamic approaches of bringing the right knowledge rapidly to the point where it is
needed have been called just-in-time KM (Davenport/Glaser 2002), workplace
learning (Ellström 2002, Illeris 2003) or on-demand KM (Sampson et al. 2002).
When designing and implementing KM infrastructures, KM initiatives can
introduce service-orientation as additional guideline. The three-layered KM service
infrastructure composes services from heterogeneous applications into specific KM
services and supports their discovery, call and provision from activities within
business processes. This infrastructure aims at solving the following challenges:
Strategy. Strategic alignment is realized by connecting KM services to the materialization
of strategic decisions (e.g., customer orientation) in the form of business
processes and corresponding application systems on the ICT level. The deployment
of KM services in organizations might profit substantially from both, the integration
and the corresponding alignment with strategic goals.
Processes. Process orientation is realized by not only focussing on business processes
as main drivers for calling KM services, but also on knowledge processes
502. See section 7.7 - “Semantic integration” on page 374.