Current events article critique
Instructions
In this short report, you will research a current event article (no older than 180 days) that addresses the importance of knowledge and
knowledge management in placing the organization at competitive advantage. Articles may be obtained from any newspaper, business
reporting outlet (such as Newsweek, Wall Street Journal, FastTrack, Wired, or Inc.), business periodical, or a documented online, credible
news outlet.
To successfully complete this assignment, a student must understand KM and strategic alignment as well as the trends impacting the
selected industry. Students are encouraged to select a current event article discussing the organizations or industries in the Bank of
Knowledge Assets.
Required Elements to include in the Current Event Article Critique:
�Discuss the highlights of the article and how it addresses the use of KM for competitive advantage;
�Describe the competitive pressures placed on this organization/industry.
KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT 2
Knowledge Management
In the modern current times, industries in the bank of knowledge assets have found
the importance of knowledge management. The industries have found out that these assets
range from concepts (ideas), connections (relationships), and competencies (ability to
execute) (Cao & ICWL, 2014). Therefore, knowledge management is a set of techniques,
activities, and tools that help an organization to capture and disseminate resources,
capabilities, information, perceptions, and wisdom. To make it simpler, knowledge
management is the deliberate efforts to uncover and use data and knowledge assets, mostly
tacit knowledge.
One of the current event articles about knowledge management is in the Knowledge
Management and E-Learning: An International Journal (KM&EL) published on December
- The article finds out that, for instance, World Bank is able to create value through
suppliers, employees and financial, organizational, and physical manipulation. The article
asserts that knowledge management makes industries in the bank of knowledge assets to have
a competitive advantage. One of the reasons behind this is because knowledge management
brings about the realization of organizational efficiency (Cao & ICWL, 2014). Industries in
the bank of knowledge assets have a competitive advantage in that they have become speedy
and response-oriented. Knowledge management is making these organizations to have
organized data to make their operations run smoothly. The organization, according to Cao &
ICWL (2014), uses knowledge management to organize information, provide accurate data,
and also give useful information tailored to meet organization’s need in a timely manner.
Knowledge management in these current days is making organizations to recycle and re-use
knowledge rather than reinvent the wheel.
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The article describes that industries in the bank of knowledge assets have a
competitive advantage through knowledge management as they can maximize their
organizational potential. The article gives an example of a 3M Company that usually learns
from its mistakes and uses those mistakes to transform the weaknesses into profitable
products. In maximizing organizational potential, knowledge management makes a company
to preserve memory, leading to overall effectiveness and efficiency in an organization.
Potential is also maximized as the respective companies are able to combat the impacts of
staff turnover. In addition, critical knowledge retention through knowledge capturing is aided
and transfer of knowledge between staff is facilitated. The ability of knowledge management
helping organizations manage intellectual capital is another dimension indicated by the article
to make organizations have competitive advantage. These organizations, as Cao & ICWL
(2014) assert, are operating in the absence of middlemen as they are using specialists who
directly discipline their performance using organized feedbacks from customers,
headquarters, and colleagues. The organizations are now evaluating their workers based on
their ability to deliver good results rather than on the competencies in executing their jobs.
Therefore, organizations are in constant motion of recycling and reusing knowledge, as well
as utilizing the shared experiences and knowledge.
There are some competitive pressures placed on this organization as the article
describes it. One of the pressures is security. Organizations in the bank of knowledge assets
are finding it hard to provide optimum security to sensitive information in KM. Information
sources of many organizations such as World Bank are prone to phishing. This makes
customers to lose trust on the companies to which they are loyal. Another competitive
pressure facing this industry is getting people motivated. In this era of technology, knowledge
management assumes that people can be made to share, learn, and above all have a common
culture using technology (Cao & ICWL, 2014). This is not true as the lack of drive to share
KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT 4
the knowledge makes it hard to streamline KM. Another pressure facing the industry is
keeping up with technology. The industry is finding it a challenge to dispense information, as
well as transferring it faster and effectively. From the time they were discovered, knowledge
management tools have been affected by incompleteness, that is, it has not been able to
address the matters of agility, responsiveness, and smartness.
Measuring knowledge is another challenge facing the industry in the bank of
knowledge assets. The article provides that knowledge is not the usual phenomena that can be
quantified easily. This is because knowledge is very complex as it is mainly deducted from
human interrelationships as well as experiences. The organizations, as the article
demonstrates, are focusing on results and efforts rather than shared purpose. KM has been
applauded for allowing others to become voices of power in companies (Cao & ICWL,
2014). This tendency has brought in the pressure of overcoming shared leadership as giving
voices of power to workers in an organization can result to internal conflicts. Even with the
modern era of information technology, knowledge management is pressured with the
challenge of keeping data accurately. This is because there are constant battles within an
organization since not all employees welcome the idea of keeping data current by removing
old and wrong concepts (Cao & ICWL, 2014). The last pressure engulfing the industry is
determining the exact place for knowledge management in the organization. The article
provides that most companies are confused whether knowledge management should be under
human resource, communications, or information technology.
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Reference
Cao, Y., & ICWL. (2014). New horizons in web based learning: ICWL 2014 international
workshops,SPeL, PRASAE, IWMPL, OBIE, and KMEL, FET, Tallinn, Estonia, August
14 – 17 ; revised selected papers. Cham [u.a.: Springer.
