Emil A. Røyrvik

An empirical study of an informal knowledge repository in a medium-sized software consulting company

Numerous studies have been conducted on design and architecture of knowledge repositories. This paper addresses the need for looking at practices where knowledge repositories are actually used in concrete work situations. This insight should be used when developing knowledge repositories in the future. Through methods inspired by ethnography this paper investigates how an unstructured knowledge repository is used for different purposes by software developers and managers in a medium-sized software consulting company. The repository is a part of the companys knowledge management tool suite on the Intranet. We found five distinct ways of using the tool, from solving specific technical problems to getting an overview of competence in the company. We highlight the importance of informal organization and the social integration of the tool in the daily work practices of the company.

Practical knowledge management tool use in a software consulting company

Assessing the contribution of a technical skills management tool for supporting organizational learning.

Putting Agile Teamwork to the Test – An Preliminary Instrument for Empirically Assessing and Improving Agile Software Development

Team organizing is a major way of assisting collaboration in knowledge intensive work such as software development, and is especially favored in agile approaches. Motivated by the challenge of transforming an organization from traditional command-and-control management to collaborative self-managed teams, we present an instrument that we argue addresses key concerns and characteristics of teamwork, and presents them along five dimensions that must be addressed when improving teamwork in agile software development. The dimensions are shared leadership, team orientation, redundancy, learning and autonomy. The instrument gives a radar plot of the status of the teamwork. We present empirical examples from using this instrument with three teams and briefly outline potential uses of the instrument.

Integrative visualisation and knowledge‐enabled value creation

Performance measurement and management in firms where knowledge is the central strategic resource provide composite challenges. Not only are the knowledge resources tacit, collective, complex, deeply rooted in culture and hard to imitate and transfer, but the processes of value creation and their outputs are also of a more or less intangible nature. This paper is an attempt to give an alternative activity‐based entrance to the field of intellectual capital and performance management. On the basis of three case studies the paper illustrates the development and utilisation of a new method for linking intellectual capital and value creation based on the three phases of modelling, measuring, and action. In parallel the concepts of resolution, elevation and conveyance are developed and explored as notions giving guidance and evaluation in the process of developing and using a measurement system for intellectual capital management.

Skills Management as Knowledge Technology in a Software Consultancy Company

Skills Management as Knowledge Technology in a Software Consultancy Company : Learning Software Organizations Workshop, 12 -13 September, Kaizerslautern, Germany

Mythmaking and Knowledge Sharing: Living Organizational Myths and the Broadening of Opportunity Structures for Knowledge Sharing in a Scandinavian Engineering Consultant Company

With examples from Scandiaconsult, a Scandinavian engineering consultant company, this paper is an exploration of some of the constructive mythological aspects of living knowledge emerging in the symbolic interaction of organizational work life. Framed within the overall challenge of organizational knowledge sharing, and the approach of the communal resource as a (partial) solution to that, we more specifically look at ways of broadening the opportunity structures for knowledge sharing through the twin principles of organizational myths and rituals ‐ as processes whereby people can identify and tap into the reservoir of living knowledge in the organization life, often in the realm of the informal or shadow organization. We explore in what ways the myths and rituals can leverage knowledge sharing especially in the face of distributed work environments inhabited by multiplex interested knowledge workers, and in our case with the additional challenge of mergers and acquisitions. We argue that active mythmaking is very far from manipulation or plain rhetoric, but rather a complex and interwoven processes of displaying cultural premises and transforming barriers and misbelieves into trustworthy relationships, and thus rendering possible conditions for lowering the costs of knowledge sharing. The mythmaking, of course, has to be deeply interwoven with the already existing mythic reservoir.

Transformative visualisation and emergent capabilities: experiences and insights gained from an activity-based view of intellectual capital

During the last decade, there has been a strong interest in a more in-depth understanding of knowledge-based value creation. In the business world this interest gained impetus by the introduction of intellectual capital in the early 1990s. Since then, companies have tried to measure and manage their intellectual capital to improve performance and internal and external communication. Unfortunately, experiences indicate that the methods used are far from sufficient to grasp the essential aspects of knowledge production processes or to give any guidance on how and where improvements could be achieved. In this paper, we present experiences and lessons gained the last three years from the use of Value+™, a methodology originating from an activity-based view of intellectual capital. Through three in-depth case examples illustrating the phases of modelling, measuring, and actions for improvements, we discuss and evaluate the methodology and its outcome in terms of the concepts resolution, elevation, and conveyance.