Brian Vejrum Sørensen

The Knowledge Dimension of Manufacturing Transfers: A method for identifying hidden knowledge

Purpose – In the context of transferring manufacturing knowledge to new locations, whether this is to parties inside or outside the legal boundary of a firm, a key problem remains, that it is often difficult to explain what operators really know, or why what they do really works. Still most attention is given to planning the physical move and to the explicit knowledge associated with normal operations. The paper argues that manufacturing processes rarely contain the necessary robustness that can be replicated in a new context. The transfer, therefore, should encompass a wider range of task situations and the associated sets of knowledge. The purpose of this paper is to develop a method that may help to identify and capture the knowledge tied to non‐normal task situations as a basis for supporting an accelerated learning at the new site.Design/methodology/approach – Three case studies based on observations over one‐and‐half years and interviews (n = 59) with operators, management and technical support staf...