Knowledge governance and ethos: Managerial work in the foreseeable future

Abstract

How can we manage knowledge, human and intellectual resources, cognitive and behavioral dynamics at their best within the corporations? The main challenge is to use the missing knowledge, often incomplete and contradictory, owned by a single man and globally not available to anyone.

Keywords:

• knowledge governance
• knowledge driven corporation
• minimal governance
• tacit knowledge
• anthropologyof knowledge

Notes

1. Foucault (2001, p. 820; 2005, pp. 135, 262): “Je serais tenté de voir, dans le liberalisme, une forme de réflexion critique sur la pratique gouvernementale.” Foucault didn't directly deal with organizations' knowledge governance, but the perspectives that his studies open seem to me very interesting. In general on Foucault and the management cf. McKinlay & Starkey (1998), or about his liberalism analysis cf. the recent essay by Deschênes (2005).

2. Cf. for example Drucker (1993), Hatch (1997), Hassard & Parker (1993), Borum & Strandagaard-Pedersen (1989, p. 219), Bell (1981), Linstead (2004), and also the wealth of interesting ideas in number 100/2005 of Sociologia del lavoro dedicated to the new paradigms and to the new economic, organizational, and work scenarios: in particular the essays by Bonazzi (2005, p. 24), Butera (2005, p. 45), De Masi (2005, p. 81) and La Rosa (2005, p. 199).

3. And the intangibles list can even continue: brand equity and reputation, strategy execution, innovative culture, ideas and relationships, professional qualification, technological competencies, talents, abilities, guide-values and behavioral rules sharing coming from the specialized and qualified professional communities membership and perhaps even peer-to-peer relationship with the best members of the best practice international communities.

4. For a general panoramic on this themes cf. for example the works published by OECD (1999) and the studies of Lipparini (1998, 2002), Rullani (2004), Vittadini (2004), Cravera, Maglione, & Ruggeri (2001), Rifkin (2000, p. 69), Stewart (2002), Michaud & Thoenig (2004), Guida & Berini (2000), Riboud (1978), Porter (1989), Prahalad & Hamel (1990), Stalk, Evans, & Shulman (1992, p. 57), Eppler (2003), Davenport & Prusak (1998), Panzarani (2004), Bettiol (2005), Low & Cohen Kalafut (2002). In particular many in the last years are the works on the human and intellectual asset, but this is a theme already explored in the past along various lines: this is not the place for a bibliographical excursus, even if it seems proper to me to point out the Foucault treatment (2005, p. 176) during his course at Collège de France of 1979 sur la naissance de la biopolitique, within which he dedicated a specific attention to “the work intended as economic behavior” and to his “division into asset-competence and income,” to the homo oeconomicus redefinition “as entrepreneur of himself” and, therefore, to the “notion of ‘human asset' together with his constitutional elements.” Along this line the comparison with the classic studies of Schultz (1958; 1960, p. 571; 1962, p. 1; 1981) and Becker (1962, p. 9; 1964; 1976) appears really interesting; as can the romance written on this theme by Amidon (2005).

5. Concerning this, cf. the classic studies by Simon (1988). Also consider the critique of Nonaka & Takeuchi (1997, p. 75); according to them, his "Cartesian" rationalism precluded him to understand important dimension as the “behavioral knowledge” written by Barnard (1938) and the “tacit knowledge” by Polanyi (1966). For a recent panoramic on these themes cf. also North (2005) and Rizzello (2003). In general, Senge (1990, 1992), Argyris & Schön (1998), Tomassini (1993), and Miggiani (1994) can be particularly useful on learning organization. Equally useful are Nonaka & Takeuchi's critique and counterpoints (1997, p. 35).

6. On the knowledge management, as well as on learning organizations, voices and opinions are obviously manifold and sufficiently dissenting each other to feed a wide debate: for a quick synthesis cf. for example Daft (2001, p. 271), Quagli (2001), Garvin (1998, p. 47), Venzin, Von Krogh, & Roos (1998). For an introduction of knowledge development cases and experiences achieved in Italian organizations cf. Montironi & Genova (2004), rather, for a systematic knowledge management in the organizations theme analysis very up-to-date and deep, even with a comparative Italian–French research built on event studies, the work by Minguzzi (2006) is interesting.

7. Cf. for example Nonaka & Takeuchi (1997, pp. 27, 300), in their opinion in the near future “the top management will evaluate not only through economic performance criteria, but also through the knowledge vision quality able to offer to the others both within and outside the organization.” As Quinn reminds us (1992), the ability to manage the “intellectual asset” has quickly become, in our time, the critical and distinctive manager ability.

8. As an example, see Fleck (1983, p. 101). Obviously an unlimited theme: personally I find useful knowledge and epistemology definitions of Abbagnano (1988), the anthropology of knowledge by Elkana (1989), the sociology of culture by Griswold (1997), and the social story of knowledge by Burke (2002) as maps to orient the navigation. Concerning the corporate organization the synthesis on knowledge management by Daft (2001, p. 271) can be useful.

9. On ways of worldmaking cf. Goodman (1978) and Douglas (1990, p. 43). Cf. also De Geus (1988).

10. It's a duty to mention at least a classic: Berger & Luckmann (1967).

11. As pointed out by Douglas (1990, p. 96), “it's ingenuous to treat the identity characterizing members of a class as a quality concerning things or as a power of recognition concerning the mind.” Comparisons among different cultures make clear that “no superficial identity concerning qualities explains how the elements are assigned to a class.”

12. Other classics: Geertz (1987, p. 6) and Bruner (1992).

13. Cf. for example the corporate culture survival guide by Schein (2000).

14. In addition to the classic Polanyi (1966), cf. Nonaka & Takeuchi (1997, p. 68) that support one of the most important representatives of the Austrian economic school, Hayek (1945), “pointed out as a pathfinder the importance of tacit knowledge, specific of the context and concerning the particular space-temporal circumstances,” even though not succeeding to fully understand the importance of the conversion process of specific context knowledge, mostly “tacit,” in explicit knowledge. Cf. even Daft (2001, p. 273): the explicit knowledge (the know “what”) is that kind of knowledge “which can be coded, written and transmitted,” instead the implicit or tacit knowledge (the know “how”) is often very difficult to translate in words as “it's built on personal experiences, on approximate rules, intuitions and subjective judgment,” practical competencies and creative solutions.

15. On the group value and on the “group attitude” in the industrial society cf. the interesting pages written by Actis Perinetti (1956), which anticipate many themes that the specialized Italian literature will develop only later in time.

16. On these categories cf. the interesting study by Hayek (1986, p. 51), that moves partly within the paradigm of the general theory of systems, but mostly within the perspective of methodological individualism, according to which the comprehension of social actors actions and perspectives is the fundamental moment of every analysis. In particular Hayek affirms that Greeks of the classic period “were luckier” than us, because “they own two different words to point the two kinds of order, that are taxis to indicate built order, as for example the order of a battle array, and cosmos for a spontaneous order. Albeit a working organization is structured as taxis, that is an ‘artificially built’ order,” to be more precise willfully planned “aiming to achieve concrete purposes." In this paper, I extend the meaning of cosmos in order to include some auto-organizational dynamics evolving in the flattened and knowledge-driven pyramids of net economy: these auto-organizational dynamics don't consist only of simple adapting answers to the environment (as could be argued being inside a traditional systemic vision), but they realize themselves into elaborate action strategies and tactics (consciously or not, tacitly explicitly depending on the instances) in specific situations by organizational actors. This circumstance implies for the organizational actors, as argued for example by Lanzara (1993, p. 11), the possession of negative capability, that is the ability of “being” in the uncertainty, of acting in complex and messed up situations keeping themselves oriented towards the “activation of contexts and possible worlds.” Negative capability that represents the distinctive competence of man of achievement and consists in the ability of managing moments of indefiniteness and of absence of direction, eventually reorganizing their own action model and developing new routines understanding the action potentiality disclosed in those moments. For a specific analysis dedicated to organization, enterprise, and knowledge concerning Hayek cf. Fiori (2006) and Novarese (2006). For an analysis of static and dynamic orders in the complex society through the Hayek's perspective cf. Robilant (2006), moreover, for a deep dynamics examination of spontaneous social order concerning Hayek (but not only), cf. Moroni (2005).

17. Moreover, as pointed out by Kaneklin and Olivetti Manoukian (1990, pp. 31–32), within the work organizations we can often find people with the thought of the organization “as a strong, complete, mono-dimensional, flat idea: the ambiguity of communications, the pluralism of variables through which decisions must be confronted with, the existence of multiple, differed, contradictory connections, the occurring of difficulties and denials and the arising of new needs, all that is organization's life cannot be seen, taken into consideration, taken into account ( … ). For these persons—using an effective Bion's expression (1971, p. 125)—‘words are things: those things that are supposed to be represented by words, are for them undistinguishable from the name that designate them and viceversa.' From here comes a sort of impossibility to switch from the specific case to a trasversal generalization, to an abstraction, or also to conjugate a general principle with the determined situation.”

18. In this sense Foucault (1975) has masterfully explored in terms of prison, military, hospital, scholastic, and industrial manufacturing disciplining.

19. Considering Landier's (1988, pp. 63–70) contribution often considered almost “subversive” by many organizational specialists apparently inspired especially to Edgar Morin's epistemology, therefore, schemes, concepts, and languages of organizational tradition are completely inadequate facing new conditions of world competition characterized by uncertainty, upheaval, globality, and interdependence of phenomenons, while appropriate organizational answers can be supplied looking at complexity scientific models: therefore, the organization must subdivide itself into cells following the systemic-cybernetic logic surpassing every recall to the pyramidal organization, the “centralized and arborescent” communication webs, the not differentialized growth of varied organizational parts and organizational joints, the lock up regarding the entrepreneurship or the inter-entrepreneurship among (inner or outer) cells of an organizational system subdivided in auto-managed, independent, and nimble groups.

20. As Dante reminds us, “the most beautiful branch that the rational root grows up is the discretion.”

21. As Wittgenstein said (1964), there is an evident use of the verb “know”: when we say “now I know!” meaning “now I can do it!” and “now I understand!” For an interesting journey in the fields of knowledge and management cf. also Nonaka & Takeuchi (1997, p. 49).

22. By proposing the concept of epistemic driver, I imply the reference to the episteme written by Foucault in Les mots et les choses (1966) which refers (given the intended differences) to the whole of the conceptual matrix, anonymous and unconscious, being then the base of knowledge (and practices) of a certain epoch, forming the common background. The passage from an episteme to an other one takes place through a series of enigmatic discontinuities, being them in other words, radical and unexplainable breakups by whom who lives them as he is dipped into them. Breakups cause things to be suddenly not perceived described, told, characterized, classified, and known in the same way.

23. Cf. once more Nonaka and Takeuchi (1997, p. 33): “The difficulty of Occidental observers to take into exam the issue of the creation of cognitive organization has a fundament in the absolute adherence to the assumption by which the organization is a machine engaged in the ‘elaboration of information.’ This concept is deeply rooted in the history of management in the West, from Frederick Taylor to Herbert Simon, and is explained into a vision of knowledge as a necessarily 'explicit' and sometimes formal and systematic event. The explicit knowledge can find a numerical and verbal expression and can be easily communicated and shared in raw data, formulas, codified procedures and axioms. It is often assimilated to an informatics code, a chemical formula or a system of general rules ( … ) The representation of knowledge in the Japanese companies is perhaps radically different. For them verbal and numerical knowledge is nothing but the tip of an iceberg, being knowledge in primis a ‘tacit’ event, something difficult to catch and to express. The tacit knowledge is especially personal and not formalizable, features that complicate its communication or sharing with others. It's a comprehensive category in which subjective insights, intuitions, and clues fallout. It, in the end, has its deepest roots in action and individual experience, in addition to ideals, values, and personal emotions. In detail, two dimensions of tacit knowledge can be distinguished. The first is the technical one, including the whole of anilities and informal strengths summed up in the term know-how that are to be caught ( … ) In the meanwhile, in the tacit knowledge a relevant cognitive dimension concerning, schemes, mental models, beliefs, and perceptions are strengthened to the point that they have become axiomatic. This cognitive dimension of tacit knowledge reflects our representation of reality (the being) and our vision of the future (the compel of being). Despite their difficult formulability, these implicit models determine our way of perceiving of the surrounding world.”

24. Somehow it's an organizational figure similar to the project leader delineated by Nonaka & Takeuchi (1997, p. 302), even if not necessarily under the subjective profile the epistemic driver has to find out the "particular pleasure of experiencing new things and take risks.” Cf. also, in very operative terms, Coulson-Thomas (2003).

25. Cf. Kaneklin and Olivetti Manoukian (1990, p. 29). Morin (1983, p. 74), “today we know that everything that ancient physics considered as a simple element is organization; the atom is organization, the molecule is organization, the star is organization, life is organization, society is organization. We completely ignore though meaning of this term: organization.”

26. To learn to create and manage knowledge gifted with competitive value means not only being able to gather chances that appears and supply high quality services and products, but especially being able to create new opportunities, new services, and new products.