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In the last few years, Knowledge Management (KM) practices have evolved in organizations. Due to the
introduction of Web 2.0 technologies, new usages of information and knowledge sharing have emerged
(Enterprise 2.0). The new generation of employees (Generation Y or Milennials) has new habits at work.
They use everyday Web 2.0 technologies (Blogs, Wikis, RSS, Folksonomy, social networking platforms,
Mashups, Podcasting, etc.) in the private arena, and therefore, consider that such technologies for ecollaboration
and self-organizing are the best means/methods to work. They are eager to simply and
quickly find good information/knowledge, anytime and anywhere, and are not intimidated by knowledge
complexity and organizational hierarchy.
Thus, the concept of KM has been impacted and has evolved towards more human interactions management
and interpersonal networking, in addition to traditional information and knowledge processing.
Organizations are currently developing a new type of KM which is social-based and may be called KM
2.0. They become knowledge-centric organizations because they focus more on KM and social collaboration,
rather than on hierarchy and control. In this new era, all employees can equally participate
in creating, using, and sharing information and knowledge. Knowledge is no longer a matter for experts.
Every individual (or knowledge worker) plays a central role in this case. Knowledge generated by
employees is not only used for designing value-added products or services, but also for inventing new
work modes based on people empowerment, user emergent participation and collaboration. Business
models, organizational management, work modes, knowledge worker’s skills and behavior, and so forth
are intended to be transformed, reviewed, and even sometimes to be rethought.
The book aims to give an overview on theoretical and empirical research that investigates the next
Knowledge Management (KM) generation (McElroy, 2002) in the Web 2.0 age, which would be called
KM 2.0 (Dudezert & Boughzala, 2008). It highlights evolutions of the KM area with a global focus and
an international dimension of studies. The objective is also to compare different approaches and practices
developed in different countries and cultures. |
