A systemic study of learners' knowledge sharing and collaborative skills development : a case study in a British business school

Knowledge management, as Leistner (2010) argues, is a “misnomer”. Knowledge cannot be managed since it relates to prior experience and is present merely in the mind of individuals (p. 4). We can manage knowledge flow, but not the knowledge itself. Leistner states that ‘‘you can enable a flow by creating an environment that people find safe, attractive, and efficient, and that motivates them to share their knowledge. This could be either face-to-face or by recording relevant information that can be used by others to re-create knowledge in their own frame of reference’’ (p. 10). Therefore, managing the flow is “as much about creating conditions that will make sharing more likely as it is about trying to have a direct influence on people’’ (pp. 17-18).In the arena of creating such conditions, operational research (OR) is assumed to offer special capacities to lead the advancements in knowledge management and knowledge sharing research. However, the role of OR is not clear in knowledge management. There is also very little account of OR studies concerning knowledge management in combination with social network analysis. This situation has not changed over past years. In addition, although soft-OR tools promote specific solutions with which to tackle complexity management in organisations, there are very few studies concerning the use of action research and soft-OR tools such as the Viable System Model, which are designed specifically for knowledge sharing projects and simulating social networks.This research intends to design, develop and implement a soft canonical operational research (SCOR) methodological framework for the processes of knowledge sharing. The researcher combines Davison et al.’s (2012) canonical action research and Checkland’s (1985) F-M-A soft account of action research. The framework has, in itself, an embedded solution for skill development and performance improvement through collaborative knowledge sharing and experiential learning/practising. In this research, a combinative perspective of VSM and SNA is considered.Adopting a pragmatic philosophy with an interpretivist ontology and relativist epistemology, the researcher inductively conducted two cycles of action research and analysed the outcomes. Four types of transformations occurred in (1) individuals’ skill level, (2) performance, (3) knowledge network and (4) gradual development of strategies across levels. This research elucidates said transformations and explains the key mechanisms for facilitating collective knowledge sharing in order to develop skills and to improve performance. It also brings to light the evidence regarding two unplanned phenomena that occurred in both cycles: leadership development and autopoiesis.Reflection is provided on the design of the soft-OR multi-methodology and on how this design has been useful and effective in the present research. In addition, the study’s contributions to knowledge and practice are also explained. This research suggests that guided self-organisation is a more effective approach for skill development than traditional methods and that it can create an effective context in which a knowledge network is able to reproduce itself. Finally, the limitations of the research and implications for future studies are clarified

Multifaceted understanding of user behaviour and implementation success of electronic medication management system

This study aims to comprehensively understand user behaviour and the implementation success of an electronic medication management system (eMMS) with multiple perspectives, such as user resistance, assimilation, changes in user perceptions, etc. Two cross-sectional surveys were conducted in an Australian hospital, one at the time of implementation and another one at one year after the implementation. The data collected were quantitatively analysed with SEM. FsQCA (fuzzy set Qualitative Comparative Analysis) was also employed to complement SEM-based analysis. User resistance study indicated that performance expectancy, switching costs, and facilitating conditions are direct predictors of clinician resistance, whereas effort expectancy and social influence showed indirect effects on clinician resistance through performance expectancy or switching costs. The study of changes in user perceptions indicated that most expectations had been positively confirmed in the assimilation stage. More importantly, while performance expectancy and social influence remain important one year after the implementation, effort expectancy and facilitating conditions are moving toward a decrease in importance to the success of eMMS. IT assimilation study showed that nurses with more absorptive capacity are more deeply and widely assimilated. For doctors, their direct supervisors and intrinsic motivation influence their depth of assimilation. Interestingly, nurses with a more favourable perception of performance expectancy have assimilated more deeply, whereas more deeply assimilated doctors are those with a less favourable perception of performance expectancy. FsQCA analysis showed that doctors should have a high general ability and high selfmotivation, and they should be rewarded in their performance evaluation for both high assimilation width and depth. In contrast, nurses should have a high general ability for high assimilation width and high self-motivation for high assimilation depth

Workflow interpretation via social networks

We sought to determine how people worked in practice, how management saw they worked and examine ‘gaps’ between these two ‘views’. In order to see potential differences, we examined workflow management through interviews with managers and a questionnaire with employees. The results were analysed through Petri Nets in a simplified form. The second unit of analysis was examining relationships between employees and therefore their knowledge flows using Social Network Analysis to illustrate work patterns staff had with one another. Through overlaying the two we gained some understanding of matches and mismatches. The study took place in three IT units of one organisation – an Australian university. The outcomes of our study comprise potential recommendations for improving work efficacy, such as re-organising work practices, or potentially changing who works with whom.10 page(s