Implementation of Knowledge Management

Implementation of Knowledge Management 1. Obstacles to the implementation of knowledge management There are two main factors that affect implementation of KM, organizational culture and technology. Organizational Culture A pattern of shared necessary assumptions that a group has learned in order to solve their problems of outer adaption and inner integration, is a right way to be considered and therefore, to be taught to new group members as an appropriate method to look, understand, think and feel about those problems (Schein 1992:12) is a definition of organizational culture. In other words, it is a framework to perform different tasks within an organization. Culture plays a vital role in the KM initiative. Studies finding causes of KM program breakdown (Barth, 2000; KPMG, 2000) stated that organizational culture is one of the most important barriers to success than others (Tuggle, 2000). Organizational culture is a most crucial factor to create value through leveraging knowledge assets that add to organizations ability (Cole-Gomolski, 1997; Ruggles, 1998). If an organizations culture is aligned with KM then it can implement and use KM for their decision making process. When a group or individual dynamically comes in contact with each other in an organization, it leads to the creation of knowledge that can be mobilized outside the boundaries of organization. For example, a new manufacturing process can fetch changes in suppliers manufacturing method that can lead to a new way of product and process or method enhancement in the organization. Knowledge can be transferred outside from the organization and knowledge from more than one organization interacts together to develop new knowledge (Badaracco, 1991; Wikstrom Normann, 1994; Nonaka Takeuchi, 1995; Inkpen, 1996). According to Krogh, G. V., Ichijo, K., Nonaka, I. (2000) organizations physical, emotional and virtual factors are responsible for knowledge creation. An obstacle to knowledge creation is, when individuals will unable to handle new situation and information. Organizational culture focuses on sharing of knowledge and fear of innovation as well (Microsoft Corporation, 1999). Knowledge sharing can be hindered due to employees different skills, academic and technical backgrounds, languages and expectations. Language difference can cause improper verbal and written communication. An organization should allow their employees to experiment in order to learn from previous failures. Organization must build friendly environment where employees should not be afraid of committing mistakes and must encourage sharing of lessons learned in order to avoid mistakes from being repeated (Ndlela and Toit, 2001). Technology Organizations must have good IT infrastructure that supports collaboration of knowledge workers and data repositories, support computer based tools for conferencing. Furthermore, organizations should have well developed technology that can be aligned with knowledge management. Improper alignment of IT and KM can lead to implementation gap. But it is really difficult for technology structure to fully support all KM aspects, technology is a critical aspect that allows and facilitates many KM processes and initiatives (Alazmi Zairi, 2003; Artail, 2006; Davenport et al., 1998; Hariharan, 2005; Hasanali, 2002; Wong, 2005). Hansali said although technology is important but it has to be used as a tool to support KM initiatives and not as the source of initiative. If technology tools such as intranet, virtual communities of practices could be formed, that can add up to the scope and timeliness of knowledge sharing (Ardichvili, Maurer, Li, Wentling, Stuedemann, 2005). Finally, the architect ure of information system within an organization that wishes to implement KM need to provide tools that support integration of all organizational computer components. 2. Knowledge capture Knowledge capture is a term related to knowledge creation in an organization. According to Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995), an ongoing cyclic process of socialisation, externalisation, combination and internalisation is known as knowledge creation. It is really vital process in knowledge management. According to Manasco, (1996), Knowledge management supports knowledge creation by utilising some mechanism, this mechanism identifies, captures and avail the knowledge. To do this it is important to find what knowledge has to be captured, why it has to be captured, what method is required to capture, how it has to be captured, how it has to be stored, how it can be retrieve and what are the ways it can be used. After answering all the above questions there is a chance in increase of KM initiatives overall success (McCampbell et al., 1999). Knowledge is created when individuals interacts among themselves or with others and with their environment. In knowledge creation when individual and enviro nment interact with each other, changes occur at both the levels, individual influences by themselves and by the environment with which they interact. Knowledge creation within an organization consists of three elements a) the SECI process (socialisation, externalisation, combination and internalisation), it defines the knowledge creation by conversion among tacit and explicit knowledge. b) ba, shared framework for creating knowledge. c) Knowledge assets such as inputs and outputs in knowledge creation. The above three elements need to interact among each other to form a kind of knowledge spiral that captures knowledge. The knowledge assets (input and output) of an organisation are shared in ba, but tacit knowledge which is held by individuals is transformed and improved by spiral of knowledge that consists of socialisation, externalisation, combination and internalisation. Garza and Ibbs (1992), suggested four techniques of knowledge capture, each is for capturing dissimilar types of knowledge:- Examining public knowledge:- it enables capturing of knowledge in order to familiarise people to understand the current thoughts and ideas on a particular subject. Interviews:- they are of two kinds structured and unstructured. Unstructured interviews enable knowledge holder to explain liberally their feelings about the key elements in their work. Structured interviews consists all the questions that of interest to knowledge capturer. In this the interviewee has to give answers of all those questions. Observation: this technique is used to capture knowledge by watching some live incident. Induction:- it allows to identify the gaps in existing rules and to analyse the cause of it by studying the case. According to me there are some other knowledge capturing methods that vary from one organization to the other, because the knowledge structure can differ between different organizations with in same industry. But still the above basic techniques will always be a building block for knowledge capture in any type of organization. 3. KM as a tool for supporting innovation Knowledge management and innovation are related to each other. Organizations have always searched for new and improved methods of doing business to acquire competitiveness. Organizations create and exploit knowledge in order to achieve advantage over their competitors this is what we call innovation. According to Roger (1995), innovation is an idea, practice, or object that is perceived as new by an individual or other unit of adoption.. Innovation can also be defined as a decision making process by evolving change in technology, process and management approach. (Walker and Hampson 2003b, p238). Basically, the term innovation depends upon knowledge development. The transformation of one type of knowledge into other is known as knowledge creativity. Suppose if there is any knowledge involved in technology improvement it should be documented. According to Amidon (1997) there are two important aspects in KM as an approach to support innovation, first, knowledge is the main component of innovation and second, activities involved in managing knowledge flow and its use. Knowledge and knowledge workers are the intellectual capital of an organization. A companys KM performance is directly related to its intellectual capital, which affects its innovation (Wong, 2005). According to Egbu et al. (2001a), any organization that wants to gain competitive advantage needs to be innovative. Method related to the development of new product is called product innovation where as new ideas involved in the deployment of new and efficient method of production is called process innovation. The efforts related to innovation are to find, identify and deployment of new technologies, products and processes. These efforts are documented and available as information. This creation of information involves knowledge evolution. New knowledge motivates organizations into new kind of business in more rewarding industry, when knowledge management is influenced positively by findings of innovation. According to (Harari, 1994; Nonaka, 1994; West, 1992), organization that provides a framework to improve knowledge of their individuals is more likely to face present rapidly changing market and to innovate in the context where it wants to compete and do investment. Managers are responsible to underline their individuals skills and experiences which in turn evolve creativity. KM enables knowledge worker to contribute in facing new problems that requires new approaches of finding solutions and demand for innovative approaches. Today companies are interested in applying new logical approaches derived from contributed effort of KM and knowledge worker to give a better innovative way of success to their business. 4. Difference between Knowledge Management and Knowledge Management Systems Knowledge management According to (Myers, 1996; OLeary, 1998; OLeary, Kuokka, Plant, 1997)., knowledge management is a process of transforming organizational knowledge obtained from available sources and associating human resource to that knowledge. In other words, KM aims to identify, create, collect, transfer and reprocess of knowledge to help organization to compete (Devedzic, 1999, von Krough, 1999). KM involves managing of knowledge according to organizations benefit. KM enhances production and production process of an organization. Knowledge will always available within organization but proper management of knowledge is of great importance for organization to achieve success. This is the reason why companies are using systematic approach for managing knowledge. According to KPMG (1998a), the aims of KM are, To improve response time, To improve decision making process by following KM initiatives, To increase productivity and profitability, Developing different business opportunities, Cost diminution, Staff retention and Increase share value. For example, KM can be used to develop or gather resources such as design, business, learning and training (Liao, 2003). KM also includes organizational learning, organizational memory and management (Thomas et al., 2001). KM can be viewed as an umbrella consisting of organizational learning that involves capturing and utilizing knowledge to create new knowledge, organizational memory that stores organizational knowledge in database repository and management that involves the management of knowledge to enhance its success by top management. To make knowledge serve the organization continuously, it has to be captured, compiled, stored and shared among human resource. Knowledge management system KMS is a type of system that automates the process of creation, collection, organization and exploitation of knowledge. In general the aim of KMS is to automate the KM processes and create knowledge out of knowledge. KMS is a combined form of IT and KM. According to Abdullah et al. , (2002), KMS is a special kind of system comprised with information technologies and communication technologies, that automates KM processes (creation, collection, organization and exploitation of knowledge) by interacting with computer systems of the organization. KM system consists of knowledge repositories, intranets, web portals and decision making tools by which individuals can access the organizational knowledge (Ernst and Young, 2001). KMS must integrate all computer components within entire organization to provide its full feature. If the entire organizations computer components are not integrated properly with KMS, it will lead to implementation gap due to which organization will not be able to c reate new knowledge by exploiting the existing one and hence the organization cannot remain innovative. Finally, I can say that KM is a concept and KMS is used for implementing this concept. The role of organisational memory in KM Knowledge is very important for an organization. Managing that knowledge is really crucial for an organization to achieve success and to be competitive. KM is a concept used for managing knowledge. Today organizations are really interested to know what they know from their past experiences. Organizations forget what they have done, how they have done and why they have done it in the past. Organizational memory keeps the track of it and shares it among individuals within organization. Organizational memory stores and magnifies knowledge by creating, capturing, accessing and reprocessing knowledge of their employees. According to Stein and Zwass (), the process by which knowledge can be brought from past to apply it on present activities, resulting in each level of organizational effectiveness. This organizational effectiveness ultimately improves the performance of organization. Walsh, J. P. and G. R. said, organizational memory is information stored in some database that comes from o rganisations history and can be used to make present decisions.

Oedipus Rex Character Analysis Essay

Oedipus, in Sophocles’ play Oedipus Rex, is by definition, a tragic hero. King Laios of Thebes was given a prophecy from the oracle that he would be murdered by his son’s hand, and that his son would marry his wife, Queen Iocaste. When Oedipus was born, King Laios had him taken to Mt. Cithaeron to die, however, the servant who was instructed to take him to the mountain felt pity for the baby and turned him over to a shepherd from Corinth. Once in Corinth, he was raised by King Polybus and Queen Merope, and the prophecy slowly became a reality. Oedipus grew up, believing that he was indeed the son of Polybus and Merope, when a drunken man informed him that he was not his father’s son. In search of the truth, he went to the shrine at Delphi, where he was told of the same prophecy his birth parents already knew, and fled to Thebes, believing the prophecy pertained to King Polybus and Queen Merope. In going to Thebes, he finds that King Laios was murdered in the same area that he had recently murdered a man in. He tells Iocasta of this event, exclaiming that he had â€Å"killed him. [He] killed them all.† (Scene II, ll. 288-289) His curiosity gets the best of him, and he orders – as the new king of Thebes – that the people find out who murdered Laios, and that they report it to him immediately. When a messenger brings the shepherd to the palace, he is told that he was Laios’ son. Oedipus realizes that he has killed his own father, saying, â€Å"Ah God! It was true! All the prophecies!† (Scene IV, ll. 68-70) Iocaste is horrified by this, and flees to her room, where she is later found â€Å"hanging, her body swaying from the cruel cord she had noosed about her neck.† (Exodus, II. 38-39) Oedipus finds her lifeless body, and breaks down, completely hysterical, â€Å"[striking] his eyes – not once, but many times.† (Exodus, l. 52) His entire lifespan is completely full of tragedy. His nobility, his curiosity, his bad choices, the realization of a foretold prophecy coming to life, the death of Iocaste, and the blinding by his own hand, all contribute to the theory of him being a tragic hero. He was born the son of a king, and lived his life king of both Corinth and Thebes – responsible for the people of his land. His curiosity is his biggest flaw, because he can’t leave well enough alone, and goes to great lengths to find out the truth. His choice to kill the man on the road instead of just letting the confrontation go decided his fate. Realizing that he’s murdered Laios even though he’d tried  so hard to prevent the prophecy from becoming a reality was unbearable. Finding Iocasta dead in her room by her own hand was his suffering. Finally, gouging out his own eyes in a hysterical attempt to punish himself was a punishment far beyond the crimes he had committed. These factors alone do not define a tragic hero, but when brought together the way they do in Sophocles’ play, they make Oedipus a tragic hero.

Eagle Airlines

[pic] Eagle Airlines Business Decisions with Data Models Assignment on Risk Analysis Team Members: Sfykti Dimitra Goumas Evangelos Manikas Athanasios Papaspirou Yiannis As assigned by Mr. Hadjistelios, President of Eagle Airlines, a simulation analysis is developed in order to evaluate company’s intention to proceed with the purchase of a new aircraft. According to the President’s estimations, the uncertain parameters which affect the annual cash flow are the below; 1. Hours flown 2. Charter Price/Hour 3. Ticket Price/Hour 4. Capacity of Scheduled flights 5. Ratio of charter flights 6.Operating Cost/hour The main assumption to work upon the scenarios is that the numbers generated for the different variables remain the same across the years. Initially, a base scenario is built and a profit-and-loss account for a typical year of operation is derived using the most likely values of the different parameters. Upon construction of the base scenario, the optimistic and pessimi stic scenarios are also formulated in accordance to the assumptions by the President in respect to possible variations to higher and lower values than the most likely ones used for the base scenario.For all three scenarios, the demand/cash flow is calculated revealing a wide range of values (from â‚ ¬273. 180 to -â‚ ¬39. 040) among the 3 possible cash flows. In addition, the one-way sensitivity analysis conducted for all six uncertain parameters demonstrate the impact of each parameter on annual cash flow and by the designation of a scatter plot, we can identify to what range of values every uncertain parameter affects the demand. Upon that, a Tornado diagram is plotted in order to visually demonstrate the range of impact of each parameter.According to the diagram, ticket prices/hour and capacity of Scheduled flights seem to be the two important parameters that most influence the annual cash flow, whereas the ratio of charted flights and operating cost/hour are the ones affect the least. Following this determination, a two-way sensitivity analysis is implemented and the outputs shown in a 3D plot illustrate a one-level relationship between the variables. By assuming that the probability distributions are the ones assessed by Mr. Hadjistelios, a test scenario is run using the @RISK add-in with 50. 00 iterations and the results’ interpretation is described below. Interpretation of results The basic data and the main decision factors to be taken into consideration by the President are raised below in order to provide substantial argumentation for the final business decision. ? According to the given data, the annual cash flow of the base scenario is â‚ ¬46. 184, less than the breakeven point by â‚ ¬7. 513. Therefore, in case the base scenario will actually happen, the company will need more than a 5-year lifetime in order to pay out the investment of the new aero plane. In the optimistic scenario, the annual cash flow is â‚ ¬273. 180 and the difference from the breakeven point is â‚ ¬219. 483. According to this scenario, the investment is highly profitable and will be paid off by the end of the first year while a number of approximately â‚ ¬93. 180 profits will be generated. ? In the pessimistic scenario, the annual cash flow is – â‚ ¬39. 040 and the difference from the breakeven point is â‚ ¬92. 737. , which is a bad scenario but at the same time quite unlikely to happen. According to @RISK analysis, as illustrated in the figure below, some important observations are derived; [pic] The probability that the investment will be profitable within a 5-year lifetime is 73. 4%, meaning that the annual cash flow will be greater than the breakeven point of â‚ ¬53. 697. ? The probability the annual cash flow to be less than the breakeven point is 26. 6%, as presented in the graph above. ? However, it is important to refer that the same probability (26. 6%) applies for the company to generate cash over ↚ ¬96. 511. The above implies the fact that if in one year the cash flow is below breakeven point, this under the same probability can be offset by another year’s revenues. [pic] According to the normal probability distribution, the expected value (mean) is approximately â‚ ¬77. 342 that actually is translated into a â‚ ¬23. 645 return on investment. ? A probability over 50% that the company will generate cash flow of at least â‚ ¬74. 467 (median) which represents the 40% of the aeroplane current value. ? However, another important statistical parameter to be taken into account is the standard deviation of â‚ ¬35. 257 that describes a quite wide dispersion/variability of the probability distribution. ? If we do not take into consideration the discount rate of 15%, then the breakeven point will be 36. 00 (180. 000/5) and the probability of the investment to be profitable is 89%. ? In case the company self-funds the purchase out of the cash surplus of the company, t he investment seems to be less risky since potential deviation from the breakeven point does not imply financial obligations to third parties, such as banks (loans and interest rates). [pic] ? The probability that the investment will be paid off already by the end of the first year is 0. 7% while the probability that the company will generate negative values by the end of the first year is 0. % which seems a quite extreme case, with a smallest value of -â‚ ¬22. 642. [pic] ? However, it should be considered that the company operates a number of business parts and it is being taxed for the total activities as a whole, thus with a tax rate of 33% the actual loss will be â‚ ¬22. 642 * 0. 67 =â‚ ¬15. 170, with the assumption that the company is profitable overall. Another important factor to consider is the operations’ expansions by 33% with the purchase of one additional aircraft to the current equipment of the three twin – engine aircrafts which provide charter f lights and scheduled commuter services.The company may redefine the strategy and decide to add new destinations in the services, currently limited to south Balkans, so as under the promising prospects analysed above, to further strengthen the company’s brand name and grow the Share of Market (SoM). The above can be well justified considering both cases of charter and scheduled flights. On the one hand, in respect to charter flights the company seems to have already identified available ground to grow by further building on the level of service.On the other hand, the scheduled flights, currently holding a percentage of 60%, represent the variable that mostly affects the cash flow, according to Tornado diagram. This in combination with the fact that the company â€Å"had slightly more control over the ticket price per/hour of scheduled flights† demonstrates a high future development potential with a thorough strategy. The critical service category in the context of the n ew investment risk analysis for Eagle airlines to analyze is Scheduled flights.Ticket prices/hour and capacity of Scheduled flights, the two most important and correlated variables, should be in depth evaluated according to the most likely possible estimations. For example, according to the data given, the variability for the price per ticket is greater in the higher values than the lowest ones. However, the actual price per ticket is highly correlated to the capacity/utilization rate and the flight hours. The base scenario argues for good prospects, but a deeper analysis could identify opportunities that Eagle airlines should closely monitor and evaluate in order to maximize its profits.It is important also to refer that according to the estimations, there is no high variability of the operating costs compared to the expected value of â‚ ¬445/hour (only â‚ ¬15 in either direction). Some important facts are given also throughout the case providing additional argumentation over the purchase; Piper Chieftain has been maintained according to the legislations and regulatory environment, is in a good condition and the expected normal use is 5 years with possibilities for more, contains the necessary navigation and communication equipment, and insurance has been included in the fixed costs.The above, in case were unknown, would be important cost factors to analyze and include in the risk analysis assessment. The above analysis argues the business decision to proceed with the investment in the Piper Chieftain, having calculating and evaluating the risks involved while recognising the opportunities.

Barkovs Hamlet A Tragedy of Errors Essay - 6762 Words

William Shakespeare authorship: The text of Hamlet contains indications that Shakespeare portrayed himself as an allegedly dead university graduate. HAMLET: A TRAGEDY OF ERRORS, OR THE TRAGICAL FATE OF WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE? by Alfred Barkov To the contents When the text of William Shakespeare: a mask for Hamlet - Christopher Marlowe? William Shakespeare Hamlet is read attentively, and no details are disregarded, it becomes evident that William Shakespeare included in it something quite different from what has been traditionally interpreted. According to the text, prince Hamlet was not a son to king Hamlet, king Hamlet has never been poisoned, pregnant Ophelia was drowned by prince Hamlets half-brother. Though that might sound odd, the†¦show more content†¦According to Shakespeares intention, the whole text of Hamlet is narrated by one of the characters who is Hamlets half-brother, though we erroneously perceive him as if he were Shakespeare himself. The nature of the contradictions is explained with the fact that the text of Hamlet contains two different plots, the one depicting the real events in Elsinore (the prosaic passages), and the other being the text of the drama staged in the castle (the pentameter portion.) The plot of the staged pentameter drama features the real persons with changed biographies. That is, the princes age is twenty within the plot of the staged drama while the real Hamlet who instructs the actors and watches and comments that drama is thirty. Moreover, it appears that he is king Hamlets son only within the plot of the inner drama. In reality, he is a son to king Fortinbras killed by his brother on the very day prince Hamlet was born. This feature was openly manifested in the First Quarto while in the Second Quarto as well as in the Folio it became disguised, and to reveal it, its necessary to compare facts included in the text and apply some logic. The character whom Shakespeare made to narrate the text had many reasons to conceal the truth; what has been apprehended as the content of Shakespeares drama is actually the Narrators faked account of the events in which he played an