Posted by Daan de Koning on September 01, 1999 at 09:40:10:

In another discussion thread, I stated that (in my humble perception ;-)):
the IT industry needs knowledge management to mature,
and was asked to explain that:

In the early days (birth) the people in the IT industry believed that they could transpose a business organisation to an information system. The datamodel should be a correct representation of the information flows in an organization. (and "should be" is based upon the assumption "can be").

That worked TO SOME EXTENT. Stable, repetitive, routine administrative tasks were automated.
BUT not everything in an organization is stable, repetitive and routine administration. Most of the organization was to complex to be represented in systems based on hard logical principles as computers.

In the second phase (childhood?) the IT industry invented Business Process Redesign / Reinvention / Reengineering. They tried to structure organizations in such a way that information technology should be optimally used and exploited. This worked TO SOME EXTENT. It worked in business processes where information was the basis of the product or service. The way to mass customization was opened (and many insurance companies have followed this route).

BUT not all products and services are so directly based on information and not all business processes are purely information assessment and structured decision making. For most products and services, the context in which the product or service is provided has a variation too dynamic to be decomposed into standard (information) components and standardized actions and decisions.

And now the IT industry starts to become aware that it is people who add value. And in order to add value, people have to act, decide and perform. And in order to act better, decide wiser and increase performance people have to learn, communicate, share knowledge or whatever.

And the IT industry therefor needs to know (and understand) knowledge management and its implications to let information and communications technology support it. The industry will be out of (new) business if they didn't.

Daan de Koning

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Follow Ups:

• IT industry needs KM to mature Gabriel Dreiling 17:58:22 9/02/99 (1)
  • Re: IT industry needs KM to mature Daan de Koning 04:46:09 9/03/99 (0)

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