Tacit knowledge elicitation and measurement in research organisations: A methodological approach

Contextual complexities as a result of the nature of knowledge based resources of organisations are increasingly the bases of competitive advantage. In the third generation of KM theories and techniques, intra-organisational flows of knowledge resources have become as important as the resources themselves. Management of such flows is an imperative rather than an alternative for most organisations. When attempting to implement effective KM strategies, most organisations assume complete awareness of what knowledge-based resources they own and which elements of these need to be shared. However, such an assumption may not always be valid. While many scholars have conducted research into measurement and management of explicit knowledge, limited progress has been made in applying similar processes to tacit knowledge resources. The KM research and practice communities agree on the importance of identifying and measuring tacit knowledge-based resources, while absence of suitable instruments designed to apply to it continues to be a problem. This paper outlines a method to identify and measure organisational tacit knowledge-based resources based on the concepts of tacit knowledge stocks, their intra-organisational flows, and enablers and inhibitors of such flows. The research paper describes the method, and the process of its validation, performed within a research and development organisation.