Know-How Transfer and Change Management in Organisations 1 von X Janine Dietrich, Ingo Trenkner UNIVERSITÄT HILDESHEIM Know-How Transfer and Change Management

Know-How Transfer and Change Management in Organisations

1 von XJanine Dietrich, Ingo Trenkner

UNIVERSITÄT UNIVERSITÄT HILDESHEIMHILDESHEIM


Know-How Transfer and Change Management

in Organisations

Hauptseminar„Innovation, change & decision making in international

organisations”

Prof. Dr. Jürgen BenekeSS 2004

22th June 2004




Structure • Introduction: Evolution of Know-How Transfer

• Know-How Transfer in organisations• Knowledge • Knowledge Management• Knowledge Management in action – the transfer of best practices• Practice Exchange in a Best Practice Marketplace at Siemens

• Change Management• Use and Definition of Change Management• Three Phases of change process by Lewin• Barriers of Change and means to overcome them

- Factors of acceptance- Change of attitude- IPK Model of Intervention

• Intercultural Dimension of Management Theories• On Change Management• On Knowledge Management• General decision-making in different cultures




Introduction• Knowledge Proliferation lies in human behaviour since its

existence

• For passing and preserving knowledge, devices and methods have been developed and used during our evolution

• In ancient times most of the knowledge was passed down through generations orally

• By recording it, knowledge also became available for further generations

• In modern times new technologies offer unprecedented opportunities to utilise much more of humans inherent knowldege




Study of Knowledge

Michael Polanyi Ikujiro Nonaka

Professor of Hitotsubashi University Graduate School of International

Scientist and philosopher who lived from 1891 to 1976




What do we mean by “Knowledge”?




• Explicit knowledge comes in the form of books and documents, white papers, databases…it is transmittable in formal and systematic language.

• Tacit knowledge is personal, context-specific, and therefore hard to formalize and communicate…it is difficult to document in any detail.




“Knowledge that doesn`t flow doesn`t grow and becomes useless…”




Knowledge Life-Cycle (adapted from Nonaka and Takeuchi 1995




“Knowledge is no good if you don´t apply it,”

said Goethe.




“Knowledge Management”

• The management of the enviroment that makes knowledge flow through all the different phases of its life-cycle.

• KM is therefore a concious strategy of getting the right knowledge to the right people at the right time.




Knowledge Management in Action

- The Transfer of Best Practice




Why Best Practice Sharing?




Practice Exchange in a

Best Practice Marketplace at Siemens

What is inside?






The person offering a practice describes:

• The Problem

• The Problem-solving approach

• The solution process

• The critical success factors

• The expense involved

• The results






• Support Top-Management

• Mobilizing Employees

• Design of a content structure






Summary:

1. The installation of an intranet-based database system

2. The mobilization of employees for the exchange of experience

3. The collecting of business-relevant best practices

4. The communication of the project




Practice Exchange in a Best Practice Marketplace at Siemens

Groups to be defined:

• To control communication and promotion activities• Persons who are responsible for relevant topics at the

operational level• To mobilize employees to actively participate in the

process• To find sponsors and ensure that the top-management is

committed




Change Management

Use and Definition of Change Management

• Change Management offers the right means to get innovations into action

• Change Management can be defined as management of all measures concerned with the initiation and the realisation of new strategies, structures, systems, and modes of behaviour

• The measures aim to overcoming barriers and blockades hindering the employees to use these new concepts




Change Management

Change-Process by Lewin




Change Management Barriers of Change

• Mental barriers of employees as well as hindering factors in their work surroundings make the change process a difficult task

• Four main factors for accepting change:• Sensibility: being informed about the ongoing change measures• Ability: enough competence to fit requirements of new activities• Liability: Executives need to initiate appropriate measures of control• Commitment: Employee‘s involvement in change process

• If these factors are considered comprehensively maximum motivation of employees can be achieved




Change Management

Change of employees‘ way of

thinking and acting

• Behavioural change due to incentives• Change of attitude due to direct and personal

experience• Change of attitude due to socially transmitted

experience




Change Management

• A substantial means for the achievement of a change of attitude is participation

• Successful implementation of new concepts highly depends on the motivation of staff

• Pro-Active Change Management with its „model of intervention“ aims at systematic realisation of new projects by anticipating barriers and finding the means to overcome them.




Change Management

Pro-Active Change Management does:

• Hermeneutical talks and observations as well as partly structured interviews ( qualitative analysis)

• Use of structured questionaires ( quantitative analysis)

• Description od causes and interrelations of barriers and proposals for their defeat

• Deduction of measures from barriers and dirvers concentrating on the four factors of motivation of employees Sensibility, Ability, Liability and Commitment




Change Management




Intercultural Dimensions of Management Theories

• Knowledge Management and Change Management are based on cultural background

• To put a management theory into practice one needs to consider cultural differences

• Dimensions which have to be taken into account in these cases are:

- Uncertainty avoidance

- Power distance

- Individualist or collectivist society

- High context or low context





Change Management

• In countries with a higher uncertainty avoidance and less tolerance for ambiguity employees have a need for stability and expect loyalty from their employers

• Assumption: countries with less acceptance of uncertainty will face more problems to undertake any radical changes





Knowledge Management

• Explicit knowledge is highly codified and relatively easy to transfer

• Context related knowledge varies across cultures. Degree to which knowledge is tacit determines the use of appropriate knowledge management tools and its eventual success





General decision-making in different cultures

• Decision-making is influenced by the cultural dimensions:

Power-Distance, uncertainty avoidance, individual-/collectivism

• Affects interaction of managers with employees concerning the participation, inclusion and empowerment of employees

• Comparison between german, U.S. and african managers




Conclusion

• The transfer of knowledge is about finding out what you know and using it to improve performance.

• The transfer of best practices is the fastest and most effective way to achieve improvements.

• Change Management offers the right means to get new concepts into action.

• For the implementation of KM and CM cultural differences need to be taken into consideration.

Documents

Know-How Transfer and Change Management in Organisations 1 von X Janine Dietrich, Ingo Trenkner UNIVERSITÄT HILDESHEIM Know-How Transfer and Change Management