Social Networks and Communities of Practice

This topic will focus on the discussion of social networks and communities of practice and the differences between the two concepts. I will also have a discussion on the difference between communities of practice and an organisational group or team.

Social networks

Social network is a group of individuals who are interconnected and interact in different ways in different environments. These can be in different scales. From a small family to a far wider group of individuals such as a whole country or even the whole world can be a social network. It is not necessary to have common interests or common goals for the individuals involved in a social network. They can have their own views or interests, political views, etc. These individuals can be even from different social backgrounds speaking different mother languages. The purpose of a social network cannot be always defined as specific. It can either have a specific purpose or it can be just interaction with each other.

With the rapid improvement in the technology the concept social network have become more and more popular as the technology today plays a critical role opening lots of new paths to communication. For an example Internet it self can be called as a social network. There are lots of social network tools in use around the world, such as Facebook, HI5, Secondchance, etc. The question is that do all these social network tools do a good job for the people or the societies? Even though it’s out of the scope in this topic it is a critical question that needs to answer. While I agree that they do a tremendous job to the society and individuals by keep them connected, I also think these social network tools bring bad influences as well to the societies.

Communities of practice

“Communities of practice are groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly.” (Wenger, 1998).

According to Wenger (1998) who introduced the concept of concept of communities of practice (CoP), in his paper on “Communities of Practice”, there should be 3 main characteristics in Communities of practice. They are Domain, Communities and practice. These describes that CoP is not simply just a network of connections between people or a club of friends. CoPs have an identity with a shared domain of interests. So the members require a commitment or a dedication to the domain. Members share their knowledge; help each other, which will build relationships among the members to learn. The members should be practitioners in that domain. The individuals in a CoP is necessarily should share there experience, stories, any tools they use or approaches for a specific problem.

In our class sessions we found out lots of different definitions that would explain CoP. Our group came up with our definition after understanding the concept behind. In the presentation all four groups made their points which basically mentioned that “A group of people work for a specific goal.” Then the question was raised by out lecturer which was “The difference between an organisation and a CoP”. It was then we understood what we have been missing from our findings. My understandings of Communities of practice are a knowledge sharing process of informal groups of people with common interests. As an example our classroom is a Community of Practice, where a group of individuals with a common interest of the subject domain “Knowledge Management” share each others ideas and experience.

They are more closely related with practice based perspective in knowledge, that the people involved in a CoP are having knowledge which is embedded into each individual and inseparable from the activities they carry out (Hislop, 2005). Apart from been informal CoP typically are ad hoc and these communities are mostly develop out of the communications and interactions. Unlike an organisation CoPs have limited control and also there are no specific social or organisational boundaries. A CoP can exist in two different boundaries sharing knowledge at the same time. The following diagram illustrates a CoP existing in two different frameworks.

CoP are now been implemented vastly in the cyber world. The World Wide Web is use frequently for communication. IM services, blackboard, and even some social network tools are been used for communicate topics on special domains. Furthermore IP Telephony, Video conferencing are also widely using CoP technologies.

How an organisation differs from Communities of Practice?

The main difference I understand is that an organisation works for a specific goal. Even a formal team in an organisation works for that same goal. So the members in an organisation focus on that target. It is totally different from the members of a CoP who share knowledge on a commonly interested domain. In an organisational team the members may not even have the same interest at all. This is one reason for a lacking of knowledge sharing in an organisational context. The following table describes more on the difference between a CoP and a formal work group.

	Communities of Practice	Organisational work group/ team
Objective	Evolving Shaped by common values Internally negotiated	Clear, Formally defined Externally determined
Focus of efforts	Collective practice /Knowledge	Provides specific service or product
Membership	Voluntary	Typically formalized and delegated
Time frame	Indefinite, Internally negotiated	Permanent, or with finite time-frame/ objective

Adopted from (Hislop, 2005)

CoP is extremely a valuable concept. It explores and distributes knowledge immensely. Share best practices. The members are enriched with different experience and solutions which eventually will help them individually to look at a problem more confidently which they could not before. The next topic will continue with a discussion on social network technologies and how communities of practice should be implemented in an organisation for better outcome.

References

• Etienne Wenger, 1998, “Communities of Practice”, http://www.ewenger.com/theory/
• Hislop Donald, 2005, "Knowledge management in organizations"
• Lynne Stallard, 2006, “Work based learning and communities of practice”, http://www.icvet.tafensw.edu.au/ezine/year_2006/nov_dec/litreview_workplace_learning.htm

Knowledge Cafe on 15th Feb 2008

The Knowledge café which was held on the above date as a class session was to discuss about “The worst consequences that could happen as a result of No Knowledge Management”. This was not discussed only in an organizational point of view, but a much broader view which included social and personal point of views.
The café began to work by asking each team to come up with consequences that could happen when there is no knowledge management.

Suggestions and decisions in Group 3

I as a member in group 3 will be first focus on the ideas we came up within our team. The task was to gather ideas from each team member without discussing within the given time. So we came up with 32 ideas. The following figure shows a photograph of the ideas we suggested.

Figure 1: Ideas of group 3

Following were the considered ideas as bad consequences after the discussion among the team.

1. No interaction between employees
2. No knowledge storage
3. No communication
4. No training and development
5. No sharing of ideas
6. No documentation
7. No transfer of knowledge
8. Redundancy
9. No expression of ideas
10. No culture
11. No system in place
12. No rewards
13. No socialisation
14. Goal uncertainty
15. No innovation
16. No regulations
17. No process view
18. No technology
19. No quality assurance and products
20. No learning attitude

At the end of our discussions we came up with the most worst three things that could happen if there is no knowledge management.
1. No socialisation and culture (No interaction, communication and culture).
When there is no socialisation people will tend not to communicate or interact with other people. This may be able to bring down a whole civilisation or a culture.

2. No system (No storage, documentation, innovation, regulations or technology).
The word “system” stands as an overall of systems which can exist. For an example social systems, organisational systems, technological or information systems, etc. When there is no knowledge been transmitted or when there is no interaction the possibilities for a system to exist fails. There will be no knowledge pass on with generations in a social society or there will be no knowledge distribution in an organisation since there is no storage or documentation. So there will be no rules and regulations or no new innovations of technology. One of the main reasons for human begins to be more advance from other creatures in this world is the ability of better communication and knowledge distribution.

3. No training and development.
No communications meaning no training. People will loose the attitude and the interest to learn about something. Hence the development process in every aspect will fail.


Final general discussion

The following figures shows the main three worst ideas each team came up in the knowledge cafe.

Figure 2: Ideas of group 1, group 3 and group 2.

Figure 3: Ideas of group 4.

The ideas presented by each group were almost similar because every body had come up with same kind of facts (e.g.: no communication and no documentation).
Each group made a 5 minute presentation about the suggestions they made. There were few points elaborated at the end of the Knowledge management cafe. There should be some kind of a communication method to transfer knowledge or information. The employees in an organisation should have the necessary access to communicate with the relevant person directly rather than go through a hierarchy of people.
Finally I think the worst suggestions made by group 3 are the best of all the groups since it covers all the possible areas which are relevant to knowledge management without focusing on organisational or technical systems.

Data, Information and Knowledge

Different authors, scholars and researchers have come up with different definitions to Data, Information and Knowledge. Even in our class room we had different views about these three elements. Some argue that there is no different at all among these elements. This will discuss about my views on Data, Information and Knowledge, after all the readings and discussions I have encountered.

What is Data

Data are discrete row facts. The use of data is relative, as it can be either useful or not. Data has no significant meaning or interpretation. For an example Data can be just numbers, images or sounds which derive from observation and/or measurement.
The amount of data needed is also depends on the nature or the purpose. For an example a study or a research on a vast subject area like 'Nature of Earth' will need lots of data, but in an organisational context the data is more precise. Analyze or argue of these data should be done with the correct approach and techniques, which will eventually comes with experience. But gather too much of data also may make it difficult to identify the data that matters.

What is Information

When data is given with significance by categorizing, condensing then it is information. This requires some intellectual input of analysis and also should have relevance and a purpose.
Information should handle with care and cautious as it has the ability to change the way or path the receiver distinguishes about a certain matter. So the creator for some piece of information should have the expertise on the relevant area.

Path to Knowledge




Knowledge can be address as a set of valuable and organized information from a “Human mind”. It has a significance and usefulness. But it is not that easy to explain knowledge and stop in just one sentence. Knowledge can be also differing from person or purpose.
A person may keep some information in his/her mind by just memorizing them. For an example the ATM card pin number, a telephone number. These types of knowledge can be for a shot time in human memory. For an example a person can memorize a mathematical equation or a result of a formula such as “5 X 2 = 10”. But if you ask the answer for “1234 X 4321” it may be hard for the same person to answer as it is not memorized. There should be some analytical skills to find the answer to such a mathematical expression. This can be said as the ability to understand.
From that view knowledge can be understood as data or information added with further intellectual analysis. This process involves interpretation and adding up meaning and it is also structured with existing beliefs and knowledge bodies. People who have the ability to “understand” can synthesize new knowledge, or in some cases, at least new information, from what is previously understood. This means that understanding can build upon currently held information and knowledge. A proper example would be a university student survey, where the statistical data will be analyzed and understand to either justify a course of action or to decide on certain matters. This process involves knowledge from experience or may be previous surveys, from collecting data to analyse data and information and will finally develop new knowledge.
This understands the connection and the relationship between data, information and knowledge is not exactly unidirectional. While data and information provide the foundation to create knowledge, knowledge can be use to create data and information as well. It is always a dynamic process. Furthermore the knowledge each party posse shape the type of data or information that will be generated. The following figure graphically displays the connection between the three elements.





References:

• Hislop Donald, "Knowledge management in organizations", 2005
• Bellinger Gene, "Data, Information, Knowledge, and Wisdom", http://www.systems-thinking.org/index.htm, 2004

Can knowledge be managed?

From an organisational point of view knowledge has a far more importance and value than an individual. Managing the available knowledge is critically an important aspect to an organisation for its growth and success. But this process has to do with lot of caution since knowledge is a very sensitive entity.

According to Polanyi’s (1967) concept has two dimensions for knowledge which are tacit knowledge and explicit knowledge. Tacit knowledge which is bounded into individuals which mostly gain from experience and personal-interactions is hard to express where as explicit knowledge is easy to articulate or capture.

Predominantly based on this concept different scholars have presented number of knowledge management models from organisational and social aspects. The SECI model of Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) is one very famous knowledge management model. Even though it is most popular as a knowledge management model, it is more focused in knowledge creation process. The model is about transferring of tacit knowledge and explicit knowledge to others by story telling, documenting, through discussions and inventing of knowledge, etc. Further more the model addresses knowledge dissemination through the processes of “socialisation” and “combination” which is sharing knowledge with others in the forms of tacit and explicit respectively. To be able to share the knowledge more successfully within a modern organisation knowledge storage is also essential. A knowledge base system is one example for storing knowledge.

Definition for Knowledge Management.

Knowledge management is a process of a combination of knowledge creation and knowledge utilisation followed by storage, dissemination and use of knowledge to accomplish any existing objectives or to create new opportunities.

What is knowledge?

It is really difficult to define knowledge. There are lots of views in the literature. But in general knowledge can be said as an organised set of information, ideas and rules. Information is disorganised. In a sense, according to Marakas (1999) information becomes knowledge when it is given a meaning made by mind (Ganesh, 2000). This is ultimately understanding of disorganised information and the relationships or principles in between. This involves experience and skills. So knowledge is organised. The disparity between the knowledge and the information is depending on the users’ perspective (Ganesh, 2000). Knowledge is context dependent, since understanding is interpreted in reference to a particular paradigm.

Assessment of Knowledge Management Models.

Number of knowledge management models which represents a wide spectrum of views exists in the literature of Knowledge Management. These models are developed as different theoretical constructs or simplified representations for better understanding, analysis and improvement of the process of knowledge management. In reality there is no hard wired knowledge management model to be used in any kind of organisation. An organisation can have its own model for knowledge management depending on the field or the area which the organisation is operating such as Technology or social fields.
Broadly, the literature identifies three categories of Knowledge Management models (McAdam and McCreedy, 1999).

• Knowledge category models
• Intellectual capital models
• Social constructed models

This article will be mainly discussing about the knowledge category models and will be briefly focus on the intellectual capital models and social constructed models.

Knowledge category models

Knowledge category models consider knowledge as discrete entities (McAdam and McCreedy, 1999).

The differentiating characteristic of knowledge from the epistemological models (Gebert, 2003) perspective is the difficulties of articulation of knowledge (Moteleb and Woodman, 2007). The knowledge is categorized as Tacit knowledge and Explicit knowledge. The knowledge which is difficult to express or in other words non-verbalized in most cases to others is define as Tacit knowledge by Polanyi (1966). On the other hand the knowledge that can be communicated or articulated to others is define as Explicit knowledge. Explicit knowledge is often specified as being in computer programs, writing or drawings.
The SECI model of Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) represents the knowledge management process as a continuous spiral process. The following figure best describes SECI model.

SECI model figure is from the website 12Manage

This model presents the process of transferring tacit knowledge to others as tacit knowledge and transferring tacit knowledge to others as explicit knowledge and vise-versa. SECI model provides a framework for an organisation to manage knowledge by categorizing their knowledge assets. Knowledge assets are not static it can be always dynamic (Geytere, 2007). New knowledge assets can be created from the existing knowledge assets.
The drawbacks or weakness in SECI model is that it was created from a study of Japanese organizations. In most cases the people are bound to their work or organization for a long time and are heavily depend on tacit knowledge. But modern organizational knowledge transferring process can be more complicated and the storage of knowledge is also an important factor.
In a more intricate model by Hedlund and Nonaka (1993) describes that there are four knowledge sources for an organisation. They are the individual, the small group, the organisation and the inter-organisational groups such as suppliers or customers. The issue in this model is that it assumes these knowledge sources as knowledge and can be segregated (McAdam and McCreedy, 1999). The following figure describes Hedlund and Nonaka (1993) model.

Hedlund and Nonaka (1993) model figure adopted from McAdam and McCreedy (1999)

Intellectual capital models

There are different models that represent knowledge as intellectual capital. A famous model is Skandia’s intellectual model. Almost all the intellectual models are mechanistic in nature. In these models knowledge is also treated as an asset same as any other asset in an organisation (McAdam and McCreedy, 1999).

Social constructed models

These models in most cases take a balanced approach between scientific and socially constructed knowledge. These models assumes a wide definition of knowledge and views knowledge as being intrinsically linked within the social and learning processes within the organization (McAdam and McCreedy, 1999).