Mark E. Nissen

Integrated analysis and design of knowledge systems and processes

Although knowledge management has been investigated in the context of decision support and expert systems for over a decade, interest in and attention to this topic have exploded recently. But integration of knowledge process design with knowledge system design is strangely missing from the knowledge management literature and practice. The research described in this chapter focuses on knowledge management and system design from three integrated perspectives: 1 reengineering process innovation, 2 expert systems knowledge acquisition and representation, and 3 information systems analysis and design. Through careful analysis and discussion, we integrate these three perspectives in a systematic manner, beginning with analysis and design of the enterprise process of interest, progressively moving into knowledge capture and formalization, and then system design and implementation. Thus, we develop an integrated approach that covers the gamut of design considerations from the enterprise process in the large, through alternative classes of knowledge in the middle, and on to specific systems in the detail. We show how this integrated methodology is more complete than existing developmental approaches and illustrate the use and utility of the approach through a specific enterprise example, which addresses many factors widely considered important in the knowledge management environment. Using the integrated methodology that we develop and illustrate in this article, the reader can see how to identify, select, compose and integrate the many component applications and technologies required for effective knowledge system and process design.

Agent-Based Supply Chain Integration

Supply chain management represents a critical competency in todays fast-paced, global business environment. However, in the current transition from EDI to Web-based supply chain technologies, much of the capability for process integration is being lost. And the integration of buyer and seller supply chain processes is critical for speed and responsiveness in todays hypercompetitive product and service markets. Intelligent agent technology offers the potential to overcome many limitations of current supply chain technologies. This paper presents intelligent supply chain agents that represent and autonomously conduct business on behalf of product users, buyers and vendors. We classify and present numerous extant agent applications and extend a technological framework to compare and contrast intelligent agents with other classes of information technology. We then describe an agent-based supply chain process design, along with its developmental techniques, and the structure and behavior of an agent federation used for integration in a major enterprise. We present results of this exploratory research in terms of technical feasibility and process performance in the enterprise context. This work is novel in that it integrates process-level knowledge from operational enterprises with distributed agent technologies. And it makes a contribution by demonstrating how agent-based supply chain integration can be effected along a large-scale, operational, inter-organizational process.

Knowledge Management Research & Practice: Visions and Directions

This editorial paper outlines key directions for knowledge management research and practice. The editorial team presents the results from a small survey of academics and practitioners about the present and future of knowledge management, and the editors include their own informed views on how this journal can help promote scholarly inquiry in the field.

Incorporating software agents into supply chains: experimental investigation with a procurement task

Recently, researchers have begun investigating an emerging, technology-enabled innovation that involves the use of intelligent software agents in enterprise supply chains. Software agents combine and integrate capabilities of several information technology classes in a novel manner that enables supply chain management and decision making in modes not supported previously by IT and not reported previously in the information systems literature. Indeed, federations and swarms of software agents today are moving the boundaries of computer-aided decision making more generally. Such moving boundaries highlight promising new opportunities for competitive advantage in business, in addition to novel theoretical insights. But they also call for shifting research thrusts in information systems. The stream of research associated with this article is taking some first steps to address such issues by examining experimentally the capabilities, limitations, and boundaries of agent technology for computer-based decision support and automation in the procurement domain. Procurement represents an area of particular potential for agent-based process innovation, as well as reflecting some of the greatest technological advances in terms of agents emerging from the laboratory. Procurement is imbued with considerable ambiguity in its task environment, ambiguity that presents a fundamental limitation to IT-based automation of decision making and knowledge work. By investigating the comparative performance of human and software agents across varying levels of ambiguity in the procurement domain, the experimentation described in this article helps to elucidate some new boundaries of computer-based decision making quite broadly. We seek in particular to learn from this domain and to help inform computer-based decision making, agent technological design, and IS research more generally.

Dynamic Knowledge Patterns to Inform Design: A Field Study of Knowledge Stocks and Flows in an Extreme Organization

Knowledge represents a critical resource in the modern enterprise. But it is dynamic and distributed unevenly. Capitalizing on this dynamic resource for enterprise performance depends upon its rapid and reliable flows across people, organizations, locations, and times of application. From a technological perspective, this points immediately to the design of information systems to enhance knowledge flows. The problem is, the design of information systems to enhance knowledge flows requires new understanding. The research described in this paper concentrates on understanding the dynamics of knowledge phenomenologically and on developing and applying techniques for modeling and visualizing dynamic knowledge flows and stocks. We draw key, theoretical concepts from multiple literatures, and we build upon integrative modeling work that composes a parsimonious, multidimensional, analytical framework for representing and visualizing dynamic knowledge. We then conduct field research to learn how this theoretical framework may be used to model knowledge flows in practice. By focusing this empirical work on an extreme organization and processes that involve and rely upon tacit knowledge, we illustrate how dynamic knowledge patterns can inform design in new ways. New chunks of kernel theory deriving from this fieldwork are articulated in terms of a propositional model, which provides a basis for the development of testable design theory hypotheses.

Beyond the Body of Knowledge: A Knowledge-Flow Approach to Project Management Theory and Practice

Much of the theory associated with project management is explicitly organized according to taxonomic bodies of knowledge (BOK). Although such BOK are conceptually simple and easily disseminated, their generally static and explicit nature is out of phase with the dynamics of critical, tacit knowledge as it flows through the project organization. In this paper, we argue for a more descriptive view of project management theory, one that captures the dynamics of knowledge flows, addresses tacit knowledge and provides new insight into interrelationships between the management of project knowledge and the management of project activities in the enterprise. Introducing a multidimensional model of knowledge flow to describe project management theory, we instantiate this model with a project example from the domain of software development.

Knowledge-based knowledge management in the reengineering domain

Abstract A fundamental problem with knowledge management is the information technology (IT) employed to enable knowledge work appears to target data and information, as opposed to knowledge itself. In contrast, knowledge-based systems (KBS) maintain an explicit and direct focus on knowledge. The research described in this article is focused on innovating knowledge management through KBS technology. We refer to this KBS-enabled transformation of knowledge work as knowledge-based knowledge management . Drawing from the recent literature, we identify a number of key activities associated with knowledge management to establish a set of requirements for knowledge management support. We match these requirements with textbook capabilities of intelligent systems and use this analysis to evaluate KOPeR, a KBS employed to automate and support knowledge management in the reengineering domain. We find KOPeR possesses the capabilities required for knowledge management support. And its field application, as part of a major reengineering engagement, reveals four important knowledge effects enabled by this KBS. From this study, we also find KOPeR to be effective in its automation and support of key knowledge management activities. And through its successful use and knowledge effects in this study, we conclude that KBS can be developed and employed for effective knowledge management support.

Agent-based modeling of knowledge dynamics

Knowledge is distributed unevenly through most enterprises. Hence, flows of knowledge (e.g., across time, people, locations, organizations) are critical to organizational efficacy and performance under a knowledge-based view of the firm. However, supported principally by narrative textual theory in the emerging knowledge management (KM) field, the researcher has difficulty describing how different kinds of knowledge will flow through various parts of an organization. This causes difficulty also for predicting the effects of alternate approaches to dispersing knowledge that ‘clumps’ in various areas. This problem is also manifest for the KM professional, who lacks clear theory or tools to anticipate how any particular information technology or other managerial intervention may enhance or impede specific knowledge flows in the enterprise. In this expository article, we build upon a steady stream of research in computational organization theory to develop agent-based models of knowledge dynamics. This work draws from emerging theory for multidimensional representation of the knowledge-flow phenomenon, which enables the dynamics of enterprise knowledge flows to be formalized and emulated through computational models. This approach provides the means for knowledge-flow processes to be visualized and analyzed in new ways. Computational experimentation enables the performance of many alternate process designs and technological interventions to be compared through examination of dynamic models, before committing to a specific approach in practice. We illustrate this research method and modeling environment through semi-formal representation and agent-based emulation of several knowledge-flow processes from the domain of software development. We also outline key directions for the new kinds of KM research and practice elucidated by this work.

Supply chain process and agent design for e-commerce

Supply chain management represents a critical competency in todays fast-paced, global business environment, but neither EDI nor Web-based supply chain applications can enable both the process integration and flexibility demanded in the business environment of today. In contrast, intelligent agents offer potential and capability for buyer-seller integration and flexibility, and early applications show great promise for supply chain integration through agent technology. However, agent technology remains relatively immature, and we have yet to establish, test and verify good design principles and techniques like those now well established for other, more conventional software technologies. The research described in this paper builds upon recent work on agent-based supply chain integration to propose a set of techniques and tools to integrate process and agent design for the supply chain in an e-commerce context. Preliminary results from implementation include successful development of a supply chain agent federation and demonstration of its effective performance in a socially-conforming manner along the supply chain. Implications of this work with respect to the e-commerce context include the potential for rapid agent development by end users themselves.

Agent-based supply chain disintermediation versus re-intermediation: economic and technological perspectives

One important stream of information systems research addresses the role and future of supply chain and market intermediaries. But whereas many researchers hypothesize a trend toward disintermediation—principally enabled by information technology (IT)—others proffer theoretical arguments for IT-enabled re-intermediation. With regard to IT, it is particularly unclear whether the emerging technology associated with software agents is better suited to enable supply chain disintermediation or re-intermediation. And if agent technology is better suited to either disintermediate or re-intermediate supply chain activities, can we say this is always the case? Or will certain contingency factors intervene in various circumstances to suggest agent-based disintermediation over re-intermediation in some cases and vice versa in others? The research described in this paper takes some first steps toward addressing these questions. We first draw from the intermediation economics literature to summarize some of the key works and arguments for and against IT-based dis/re-intermediation, and we use this discussion to outline a preliminary set of conditions favoring agent application in such roles along the supply chain. We then draw from the agent technology literature to summarize key capabilities associated with extant agent technologies, and we compare such emerging IT with more conventional information systems and applications. Guided by this background of intermediation theory and extant agent capability, we describe a proof-of-concept multi-agent system called ‘the Intelligent Mall’ in the context of supply chain dis/re-intermediation. We use this implemented multi-agent system to show how it reflects current agent technology, and we identify the contingent economic conditions that can be satisfied through this implemented system. The paper then closes, as we identify a several new lines of research stemming from this investigation.