Managing networks of communities of practice for organizational knowledge creation A Knowledge Management imperative in the era of globalization

This article explores some imperatives of Knowledge Management for organizational knowledge creation in the era of globalization. As the transformation of Knowledge Management practices of Japanese firms in 1990s shows, Nonaka and Takeuchi’s original model of organizational knowledge creation needs to be expanded by incorporating the concept of “community of practice” as the “engine” of knowledge creation. As an attempt for such expansion, it proposes a model of knowledge-creating organization as a self-organizing network of interactive, overlapping, and self-managing communities of practice. This article also explores some organizational conditions and managerial implications to prevent “malfunction” of communities of practice in the threats of globalization and to facilitate their dynamic evolution. Knowledge-creating organizations and their managers need to give due recognition to and support for “differences” that exist not only among diverse communities of practices but also within each communities. At a micro level approach, they need to “empower” community members by encouraging “story-telling” or “narrative” of members’lives in the communities and by assuring “transparency” of activities and resources to the members. As a macro level approach, they need to develop a “communitarian” organizational structure that fits to organizational knowledge creation in “multiculturalization” of societies.