Jennifer N Gant

Introduction

There are many ways to explain what Knowledge Management really is, and how it works. Knowledge Management is one of the hottest topics to talk about and study, but do people know what it really is? In this paper, I am going to explain my view point of Knowledge Management and others as well.
Knowledge Management comprises a range of practices used by organizations to identify, create, represent, and distribute knowledge for reuse, awareness and learning (wikipedia). The chapter, “Information is Knowledge in Motion”: A practical Framework for Understanding Knowledge Management, Dr. Jay Gillette states that Knowledge Management works by means of information networking, which we can define as “the movement and use of information “(Gillette, 2002, p 1). I believe Knowledge Management is a hard term to define, there are so many ways to define what knowledge Management really is.
What is Knowledge Management?

In order to understand the true meaning of Knowledge Management one has to synthesis what it means. Dr. Gillette believes there are six component parts to understanding Knowledge Management.
• Wisdom
• Understanding
• Information
• Data
• Facts
• Phenomena (Gillette, 2002, pg 4)

He believes each of these components analyze what knowledge management really is. On the other hand, Rebecca Barclay and Phillip Murray defines knowledge management as a business activity with two primary aspects:
• Treating the knowledge component of business activities as an explicit concern of business reflected in strategy, policy, and practice at all levels of the organization.
• Making a direct connection between an organization’s intellectual assets, both explicit and tacit and positive business results (Barclay, Phillip, 1997).
They also state that knowledge management often encompasses identifying and mapping intellectual assets within the organization, generating new knowledge for competitive advantage within the organization, making vast amounts of corporate information accessible, sharing of best practices, and technology that enables all of the above including groupware and intranets (Barclay& Phillip, 1997).
Why Knowledge Management?

I believe the key to knowledge Management is within the organization of the business. Many organizations know that knowledge management is the key to having a competitive advantage over other companies. Dr. Gillette states, “Operating higher on the scaled requires more knowledge, and greater ability to make decisions. People operating at that level of knowledge are generally higher in the leadership dynamic of the organizations” (Gillette, 2002, p 10). That is why I believe many organization are thriving to get more information about knowledge management to make their organization more efficient.
Conclusion
Dr. Gillette states, Knowledge management is complex, because knowledge is complex. Knowledge consists of at least six layers of interrelated complexities. To understand further, I believe you have to really understand where knowledge comes from. Knowledge management has been embraced by so many people in the business world and I don’t think it’s going away any time soon. The value of Knowledge Management relates directly to the effectiveness with which the managed knowledge enables the members of the organization to deal with today’s situations and effectively envision and create their future (Bellinger, 2004).