Knowledge retention in national agricultural research organisations: the case of Uganda

Organisation knowledge attrition continues to gain attention due to the increasing mobility of organisational employees. Employees leave organisations due to retirement, resignation in search for better employment opportunities, termination of employment contracts, indisposition, unofficially leaving employment, and death. When they leave organisations, they take with them tacit knowledge. Attrition of tacit knowledge leads to loss of intellectual assets and erosion of organisational memory which negatively affect learning and innovation. The knowledge can be subject matter expertise, organisational memory of why certain decisions were made, experience of past research and development projects and the social network in terms of from whom they sought out for answers or collaborated with in executing their tasks. Knowledge attrition is common in many organisations in different sectors. The literature does not show any framework that addresses knowledge attrition right from the time an employee is recruited into an organisation to when he or she leaves it. The purpose of this study was to develop an integrated knowledge retention framework for minimising organisational knowledge attrition. This was achieved by investigating how loss of organisational tacit knowledge can be minimised. The research adopted a single case study design with a concurrent parallel mixed methods research strategy informed by pragmatic philosophical assumptions. It was conducted in Uganda in a large national agricultural research organisation. Data was collected from 36 focus group discussions involving 161 participants, review of organisational documents, 35 interviews, 205 online surveys and a validation workshop by 16 top managers. The main contribution of this research is the novel framework for knowledge retention that comprehensively addresses knowledge attrition from an organisation. The framework comprises two categories of components. The first is the organisational behavioural components comprising knowledge sharing, capturing and documenting knowledge, and knowledge exploitation. This category constitutes the core components of the knowledge retention strategy. The second category is the organisational environmental components. It comprises creating organisational learning environment, having knowledge-oriented governance and leadership, providing necessary capacities and conditions, and providing strategic guidance - planning for knowledge retention. Environmental components have moderating effects on the behavioural components. In addition, it has contributed to the theoretical existing body of knowledge from the framework that was developed. This complements the reviewed literature which uncovered three conceptual categorisations of the knowledge retention strategies based on the timing of capturing knowledge from an individual. The three categories are: Reactive (short-term), Containment (medium-term) and Preventive (long-term) knowledge retention strategies. Although the concept of knowledge retention is not new, this research has contributed to the existing body of literature. Additionally, the study provides a deeper understanding of knowledge retention and opens new research areas. Perhaps this is the first study of its kind in the agricultural sector specifically focussing on agricultural research

Employees' responsibilities in a knowledge retention strategy: a Ugandan case study

When people join organisations, they come with their experiences, skills and expertise and they gain further knowledge as they execute their duties. Employees may write reports, research papers, and books; others may capture their expertise in expert systems. However, whatever is captured in these forms is modest compared to employees’ total knowledge. When they leave their employment, they carry with them most of their knowledge, resulting in loss of organisational intellectual asset and erosion of organisational memory thus negatively impacting on learning and innovation. Tacit knowledge is more vulnerable than explicit knowledge to being lost. An exploratory study was conducted in the Ugandan National Agricultural Research organisation (NARO) to identify strategies that can be implemented to minimise loss of tacit knowledge. One of the research questions this study addressed was ‘how can individual employees help NARO to minimise knowledge loss?’ This paper presents results from thirty six focus groups and highlights mandatory retirement, resignation, termination of contract, death, and absconding as the major reasons for tacit knowledge being lost from the organisation; it also identifies eight responsibilities for individual employees in minimising knowledge loss from the organisation. These responsibilities are: develop a spirit and attitude to sharing knowledge; capture and document processes, experiences and results; mentoring others and willingness to learn; being result-oriented and having passion for the job; be an effective team player; seek opportunities to acquire and improve knowledge; being open, transparent and trusted; and applying acquired knowledge. Whereas the authors acknowledge that management is responsible for ensuring that individual employees exercise their responsibilities in helping the organisation to minimise knowledge loss, it is not a focus of this paper to present and discuss such management responsibilities. Undertaking the responsibilities effectively requires an enabling organisational environment. Such an environment is likely to encourage employees to engage themselves in a positive behaviour of knowledge sharing so that even when an employee who is knowledgeable in a particular aspect leaves the organisation there will be some other employees with such expertise if it is shared within organisational teams or employee groups