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While the codifica-tion strategy relies extensively on codifying and storing knowledge in databases, the personaliza-tion strategy focuses on the tacit dimension of knowledge and invests

& Research Article

Mechanisms for Knowledge

Management Systems Effectiveness:

An Exploratory Analysis

Hind Benbya* and Nassim Aissa Belbaly

e-Business Management School, University of Lecce–ISUFI, Lecce, Italy

Knowledge management systems (KMS) have been implemented in many organizations, yet little research exists to guide their successful development and implementation in practice In fact, while some firms achieve successful outcomes with regard to their IT endeavours, others continue to fall victim to the technology productivity paradox Further, little is known about the diversity of both systems and organizations that have successfully implemented them This article, through an analysis of successful case studies of knowledge management systems, explores the underlying mechanisms under which knowledge management systems effective-ness is most likely to occur The findings imply that three categories of mechanisms constitute important preconditions for knowledge management systems effectiveness; they range from cultural to structural and managerial mechanisms Copyright # 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

INTRODUCTION

It has become largely agreed today that

organiza-tional knowledge such as operaorganiza-tional routines,

skills or know-how are the most valuable

organiza-tional resources of a firm This perspective builds

upon and extends the resource-based view (RBV)

of the firm initially promoted by Penrose (1959)

and expanded by others (Barney, 1991; Prahalad

and Hamel, 1990; Teece et al., 1997) The premise

of the RBV is that organizations employ a mix of

acquisition and configuration of resources to

change how their business is accomplished

Knowl-edge is often the basis for the effective utilization of

many important resources In this context,

informa-tion and communicainforma-tion technologies may play an

important role in effectuating the knowledge-based

view of the firm by enhancing a firm’s capability to

manage the knowledge it possesses This aware-ness is one of the main reasons for the exponential growth of knowledge management systems (KMS) KMS are enabling technologies that support knowl-edge management in organizations (Ruggles, 1997) There are a number of perspectives on KMS, and different typologies concerning such systems have been developed in the literature In fact, while Hansen et al (1999) distinguish them under the personalization/codification perspective, Ruggles (1997) classifies them according to the knowledge management process they support While this growing literature is a good indication of the importance of such systems for both theory and practice, little research exists to guide their success-ful development and implementation in practice (Alavi and Leidner, 1999) In fact, while some firms achieve successful outcomes with regard to their IT endeavours, others continue to fall victim to the technology productivity paradox Further, little is known about the diversity of both systems and organizations that have successfully implemented KMS To address these issues, the current study

Knowledge and Process Management Volume 12 Number 3 pp 203–216 (2005) Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI: 10.1002/kpm.231

*Correspondence to: Hind Benbya, e-Business Management

School, University of Lecce–ISUFI, Via per Monteroni sn 73100

Lecce, Italy.

E-mail: Hind.Benbya@ebms.unile.it

reports the result from a multiple case study of

KMS In particular, this article has two main

objec-tives The first is to show through examples the role

and practical applications of KMS The second is to

analyse how some companies succeeded in

deploy-ing KMS, in particular with regard to the

mechan-isms they deployed to achieve success The paper is

organized as follows The first section presents a

short overview of previous literature concerning

KMS In the second section the research

methodol-ogy will be explained, while the third section

dis-cusses our main findings concerning KMS types

in practice and mechanisms for success Finally

we present the conclusions and indicate future

research issues

THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

KMS origins and definitions

Traditionally, most research in strategic IT has

focused on the ability of IT to add economic

value to a firm either by reducing a firm’s costs

or by differentiating its products and services A

principal argument in this line of reasoning is

that the competitive use of IT has the potential to

provide sustainability and competitive advantage

(Kettinger et al., 1994; Clemons, 1991) As

knowl-edge is often the basis for the effective use of a

firm’s resources, a new line of IT-based systems

to support organizational knowledge management

has emerged called knowledge management

sys-tems KMS have been defined as a line of systems

which target professional and managerial activities

by focusing on creating, gathering, organizing and

disseminating an organization’s ‘knowledge’ as

opposed to ‘information’ or ‘data’

(Becerra-Fernandez, 2000) The development of KMS

demands that knowledge be obtained, produced,

shared, regulated and leveraged by a steady

con-glomeration of individuals, processes and IT but

still to be effective KMS should fit the overall

orga-nizational culture and structure The first and early

adopters of KMS have been large consulting

com-panies; today, such systems are used in a variety

of areas such as medicine, engineering, product

design and construction (Hendriks and Vriens,

1999; Davenport and Prusak, 2000; Tiwana and

Ramesh, 2000)

KMS design finds its origins in knowledge-based

systems and information systems which are mainly

used in intranet development and business process

re-engineering These techniques rely heavily on

business process modelling, which allows the

cap-ture of the significant flows, events, inputs,

resources and outputs associated with business processes Taking into account that the goal of pro-cess modelling is to reach a common understand-ing about how activities should be carried out (e.g in which order) and what it produces, it has become largely agreed that knowledge manage-ment activities should be integrated within day-to-day business processes to ensure continual process improvement and facilitate learning and

memory The main approaches that have tried to develop a systematic method to integrate knowl-edge management into business processes are the common KADS methodology (see Schreiber et al., 1999), the knowledge value chain approach

management (Allweyer and Loos, 1998) and the model-based design of knowledge-oriented pro-cesses Furthermore, research indicates that compa-nies focus on specific business processes to implement knowledge management (Mertins et al., 2001) In particular, organizations try to sustain their core processes which represent the core com-petence and most important capability of the firm (e.g aerospace organizations start their initiatives focusing on the design and R&D process) Nissen

et al (2000) suggest that the first stage of knowledge system design involves process analysis; in fact, until one understands the process, with its various opportunities and required knowledge, it makes little sense to begin designing systems Therefore, business processes determine the underlying KMS because they use all the flows necessary to repro-duce the real working of the business processes (Figure 1)

KMS taxonomy There are a number of perspectives on KMS, and different typologies concerning such systems have been developed in the literature In fact, a first approach to providing a taxonomy of KMS is to distinguish them by where knowledge resides and the extent to which knowledge is structured (Hahn and Subramani, 2002) Becerra-Fernandez (2000) also provides a classification of KMS in terms of knowledge dimensions (tacit/explicit) and the extent of codifiability they require These two classifications are an extension of the taxon-omy proposed by Hansen et al (1999), which distin-guish mainly between two strategies: codification versus personalization strategy While the codifica-tion strategy relies extensively on codifying and storing knowledge in databases, the personaliza-tion strategy focuses on the tacit dimension of knowledge and invests in networks to facilitate

knowledge exchange via person-to-person

con-tacts Another taxonomy of KMS differentiates

them according to the knowledge management

process they mainly support (creation, storage,

transfer and application) (Alavi and Leidner,

2001; Ruggles, 1997; Tiwana and Ramesh, 2000

However, the main important distinction between

the various KMS that exist remains the one that

dis-tinguishes between the tacit versus explicit

dimen-sion of knowledge Accordingly, following this

articulation of knowledge in tacit versus explicit

dimensions, KMS can be classified into three

cate-gories: dynamic systems, process-oriented systems

and integrative systems (Figure 2)

Dynamic knowledge management systems

Dynamic KMS support mainly interactive

commu-nications between experts or team-based

manage-ment and are consequently more concerned about

the tacit dimension of knowledge This category includes:

 expertise location or what’s called ‘yellow pages’

or ‘people finder’ that capture and inventory the knowledge, experience and backgrounds of the firm’s experts and act as connectors between knowledge and expertise seekers and holders;

 communities of practice that provide a social

for-um to groups of people who share a concern, a set of problems and who deepen their knowl-edge and expertise in this area by interacting

on an ongoing basis (Wenger et al., 2002)

Process-oriented knowledge management systems Organizations with significant intellectual capital require eliciting and capturing knowledge for reuse in new problems as well as recurring old pro-blems They focus mainly on the technical side of

Core processes

Value Creation

Information systems Knowledge-based systems

Knowledge management systems

Figure 1 Knowledge management systems foundations

KMS

Dynamic systems

Process oriented systems

Integrated systems

Locate knowledge carriers and seekers

- Create a social forum

- Access to experts

- Support cross functional teams

- provide cross- skills set for projects

- Expert networks

- communities of practice

- Yellow pages

- Best practices

- Process descriptions databases

- Knowledge repositories

- Corporate portal

- Extranet portals

-Intranet portals

- Capture knowledge for reuse

in solving recurring problems

- Improve processes

- Integrate knowledge Source and provide a Single point of access

Figure 2 Knowledge management systems classification and examples

knowledge and can be an important support for

new product development (e.g a system to store

marketing-oriented documents or more focused

on R&D) These systems include lessons learned

systems, processes description databases,

knowl-edge repositories and best practices databases

Integrative knowledge management systems

While the preceding KMS categories focused

mainly on one dimension of knowledge over the

other—either tacit knowledge in the case of expert

networks and communities of practice or more

explicit knowledge focused in the case of

codifica-tion systems in databases—today, most

contem-porary approaches to KMS design rely on an

integrative perspective on managing both explicit

and tacit knowledge dimensions because it offers

unrestricted possibilities for uniformly accessing

knowledge across a variety of sources This is the

case for the corporate portal which integrates

dif-ferent applications from collaboration tools to a

database supporting knowledge embedded within

business processes (Benbya et al., 2004)

KMS effectiveness

The benefits of using KMS are high because they

include the ability of organizations to be flexible

and to respond more quickly to changing market

conditions, and the ability to be more innovative

as well as improve decision making and

productiv-ity (Harris, 1996) Some authors provided empirical

evidence based on qualitative cases with regard to

the performance implications of KMS (Hansen et al.,

1999; Gupta and Govindarajan, 2000; Szulanski,

2000) In particular, KMS are expected to contribute

to the competitive advantage of companies by

sup-porting and enhancing organizational knowledge

For example, KMS foster the systematic

identifica-tion of central knowledge and expertise, encourage

converting knowledge into manifest forms (e.g

explicit knowledge) and make information

accessi-ble to others in the firm for local use in terms of

knowledge reuse and as input for knowledge

development Thus, KMS may ease the integration

of dispersed knowledge (Grant, 1996), speed up the

replication of best practices across time and place

(Nelson and Winter, 1982), avoid double invention,

facilitate leveraging across uses and users (Quinn,

1992; Quinn et al., 1996) and reduce costs of

search-ing and transformsearch-ing available knowledge for local

use (Hedlund, 1994) While potential benefits of

KMS have been addressed theoretically in the

lit-erature, less is known about how these can be

rea-lized in practice Significant failure rates persist

despite tremendous improvements in sophistica-tion of technologies and major gains in related price–performance ratios These conflicting results may be attributable to: (1) incomplete or inap-propriate measures of success; (2) lack of theoreti-cal grounding of the causal mechanisms of KMS success; or (3) myopic focus on financial perfor-mance indicators

In light of the above motivations, in this section

we will review the literature related to these issues, with a particular focus on the measures used to assess the effectiveness of KMS

Several perspectives deal with the assessment of KMS (Lindsey, 2002; Jennex and Olfman, 2004) One approach is whether these systems perform

and consequently if each step of the knowledge process is performed well the system reaches its objectives Other authors also take into considera-tion the organizaconsidera-tional context as they recognize that knowledge management is an organizational change process and that its success could not be separate from organizational change success This is the case for Lindsey, who defines knowl-edge management effectiveness/success in terms

of two main constructs: knowledge infrastructure capability and knowledge process capability Knowledge infrastructure capability represents social capital; the relationships between knowledge sources and users; and is operationalized by tech-nology (the network itself), structure (the relation-ship) and culture (the context in which the knowledge is created and used) Knowledge pro-cess capability represents the integration of KM processes into the organization, and is operationa-lized by acquisition (the capturing of knowledge), conversion (making captured knowledge avail-able), application (degree to which knowledge is useful) and protection (security of knowledge) Jennex and Olfman (2004) propose a model for KMS success based on the Delone and Mclean IS success model The proposed model on KMS suc-cess evaluates as an improvement in organizational effectiveness based on the use of and impacts from the KMS The model uses the following dimensions

to measure KMS success:

 System quality Defines how well the KMS per-forms the functions of knowledge management (creation, transfer, storage )

 Knowledge/information quality Ensures that the right knowledge with sufficient context is cap-tured and available for the right use at the right time

 Use/user satisfaction Reflects actual levels of KMS use as well as the satisfaction of KMS users

 Perceived benefits Measure perceptions of the

ben-efits and impacts of the KMS by users and is

based on the perceived benefit model

 Net impact An individual’s use of a KMS will

produce an impact on that person’s performance

in the workplace

KMS and IT in general can only add value to an

organization when they are used, and that value to

individuals arises when use of the knowledge in

the KMS enables them to perform their work in

ways that are more efficient, more effective and/

or more satisfying In this article we define the

effectiveness of KMS as a value judgment made

by its users and which allows organizations to

accomplish more efficiently what it could not any

other way We distinguish between the context in

which the system is used and its related outcomes

We refer to the factors acting on KMS effectiveness

as mechanisms

The study of published reports on KMS has

iden-tified a number of mechanisms for KMS

effective-ness The results of the studies summarized in

Table 1 show that they can be clustered into three

groups: structural, cultural and managerial First is

the emphasis by so many on the importance of

structural mechanisms that incorporate all the

functional elements of the company that support

and facilitate knowledge management, such as a

dedicated structure, rules and routines Second is

the frequent mention that an organizational culture

of knowledge sharing is a correlate of success

Third is the prevalent, though not universal, use

of incentives to change behaviour and encourage

system usage

RESEARCH DESIGN

This research was undertaken through a multiple

case study (Yin, 1994) In gathering the data,

standard techniques for conducting qualitative case study research were followed (Yin, 1994) In the first stage, qualitative research was carried out with the objective of gaining an in-depth understanding on knowledge management sys-tems and the mechanisms identified from previous research The mechanisms identified from the lit-erature and classified as structural, cultural or man-agerial, on the one hand, and the classification of KMS as dynamic, process-oriented and integrative

on the other, were also found significant in the substantial number of surveys about knowledge management (KM) reported in the literature (e.g APQC, 1996; KPMG, 1998; Heisig et al., 2002) These surveys, together with an abundance of case studies, give an initial overview of the state

of practice of KM and in particular addresses KMS types adopted by some organizations and the conditions that were conducive to success To further our exploration on KMS types, main bene-fits and mechanisms, we studied the 20 multina-tional organizations that were selected for the

2003 ‘MAKE’ (Most Admired Knowledge Enter-prises) study as best practices

These organizations are, according to MAKE,

‘leaders in effectively transforming enterprise knowledge into wealth creating ideas, products and solutions They are building portfolios of intel-lectual capital and intangible assets which will enable them to out-perform their competitors in the future.’ The classification of these best practices

is based on a Delphi methodology, where a panel

of experts on KM validated the results

Table 2 summaries the industry sectors repre-sented and the types of systems that these organi-zations deployed

Thematic analysis of the research findings of the first phase, together with the analysis of published documentation and the information provided by these companies on their initiatives, served to

Table 1 Example of mechanisms studied that affect KMS effectiveness

confirm the taxonomy of KMS proposed in the

arti-cle and to confirm the classification of mechanisms

that these organizations deployed in three groups

(cultural, structural and managerial)

The second phase consisted of an in-depth

analy-sis of four organizations from the above for further

Laboratories, Xerox and Shell These organizations

have been selected consecutively by the MAKE

study as best practices for 3 years; they belong to

different industries and have adopted different

types of KMS Another selection criterion related

to the effectiveness of the KMS deployed in these

organizations that are, according to their managers,

not only fully used within their organizations but

also allow their users to accomplish better what

they could not otherwise

This analysis fulfils a dual function in assessing

the mechanisms that constitute preconditions of

KMS effectiveness in organizations, as well as

forming the basis for the development of a

concep-tual model of ‘Mechanisms for KMS effectiveness’

to be tested empirically in the third phase of the

project

Within this context, the qualitative analysis of the

cases is aimed at answering the following research

questions:

 What were the main functionalities of the used

KMS?

 What were the main benefits they achieved from

their KMS?

 What, according to them, are the main mechan-isms (cultural, structural and managerial) that contributed to achieving the foremost benefits?

 What measurement systems are they using to assess these benefits?

The major method of data collection was based

on semi-structured interviews; in fact, the themes above were explored with a series of key informant interviews involved in the different initiatives

In addition to the interview data, researchers have collected and analysed a variety of company documentation, which included: conference pre-sentations and papers developed by their own employees and with other researchers, and describ-ing their main KM initiatives; internally circulated manuals for KMS users; reports and statistics on their use and participation levels

From the data collected on KMS under investiga-tion in this study, many comparisons and contrasts can be made They are detailed in terms of KMS types and characteristics (Table 2) and in terms of mechanisms (cultural, structural and managerial) used to achieve success and benefits date (Table 3)

DISCUSSION OF THE RESULTS

KMS types The majority of the cases studied were concerned with, bridging the gap between explicit versus tacit knowledge Personalized knowledge, bound to the

Table 2 Knowledge management initiatives deployed by best practices organizations

Leadership Management

Leadership Management

Leadership Management

individual mind, is difficult to articulate and can-not be transferred easily Knowledge codified in databases, manuals and project debriefings, how-ever, can be transferred with relative ease Yet both are needed to make true knowledge sharing happen Tacit knowledge is usually transferred by people exchanging knowledge through social inter-action, e.g during meetings, videoconferences or in discussion groups Transferring codified knowl-edge by means of a codification strategy is realized

by capturing and storing knowledge in documents and transferring it via databases or similar means

In fact, in their preliminary stage, organizations used knowledge repositories where knowledge is codified without contextual information Specialists were assigned to remove the context of the source material to make them more generally applicable;

in doing this, knowledge loses its meaning Furthermore, people often did not find answers to their questions in these repositories Therefore, we believe that contextual information should be included in a knowledge repository and both types

of knowledge have to be transferred to make true knowledge sharing happen In the case of Siemens bridging this gap was even considered as a

dilem-ma since an overemphasis on codified knowledge can miss out on important tacit elements that con-stitute an integral component of the added value that solution selling provides Consequently, Sie-mens based its approach on an interactive solution that starts with informal discussions through ques-tions and answers that, once mature enough, become documented as a ‘case history’; this is the approach used also by Buckman Laboratories to update knowledge within the system Shell, on the other hand started with a codification strategy The organization spent millions building databases

of detailed technical documents; the problem, how-ever, was that nobody searched them and they were quickly out of date Consequently, Shell aban-doned this approach and now focuses on e-learn-ing packages that deliver a mix of standards and

a connection to a global network

KMS mechanisms for success Cultural mechanisms

Organizational cultures are central to knowledge creation, sharing and use and they are increasingly recognized as a major barrier to leveraging intellec-tual assets (De Long and Fahey, 2000; Gordon and

Di Tomaso, 1992) Several scholars and consultants (Davenport and Prusak, 1998) have argued that creating a culture that values creativity, continuous improvement and the sharing of ideas is necessary

retention Measurement Number