BCS Edinburgh Branch

Knowledge Management

Ann Macintosh,

International Teledemocracy Centre, Napier University

Wednesday 6 October 1999. 6.30pm

Apex Hotel, Grassmarket, Edinburgh


The management of knowledge within organisations has become a critical activity because many of the activities of organisations today, and of our economic and social life, are knowledge-driven. By creating processes to capture and embed knowledge within an organisation, organisations are unlocking their workforce potential and achieving vast improvements in productivity, customer satisfaction and new product development. Knowledge management is "the identification and analysis of available and required knowledge assets and knowledge asset related processes, and the subsequent planning and control of actions to develop both the assets and the processes so as to fulfil organisational objectives." This implies that is necessary for organisations: to be able to identify and represent their knowledge assets; to share and re-use these knowledge assets for differing reasons and by different users; which in turn implies making the knowledge available where it is needed within the organisation. It is critical to an organisation's future success to manage this knowledge in a coherent manner, leading to the concept of knowledge management.