MITS5505 - Global Company - Alpha Case Study - Consensus Decision - Knowledge Management Assessment Answer

Assessment Task:

MITS5505 Knowledge Management Assessment Answer

Task 1: Implementation of Knowledge Management

7.1 Give your views on the failure of the implementation of knowledge management at a global company based on five distinct stages of knowledge management: 

Stage 1: Advocate and learn

Stage 2: Develop a strategy

Stage 3: Design and launch KM initiatives

Stage 4: Expand and support initiatives

Stage 5: Institutionalize knowledge management 

Case study: A global company (Source: Chua, A. and Lam, W., "Why KM projects fail: a multi-case analysis", Journal of Knowledge Management, 'ol. 9, no. 3 (2005).) 

A global company, which was one of the top ten organizations in its industry, lost a number of deals because of its inability to offer integrated solutions in the order handling line of business. In response, the management commissioned a KM project known as Alpha with the objective to create a "blueprint for gaining and maintaining global order handling services market leadership". Underpinning Alpha was a comprehensive attempt to manage knowledge across the company. 

Within Alpha, several functions and teams such as business architecture, IT and knowledge content and design were formed. One of Alpha's priorities was to build a network of "knowledge-enabled worktables" to provide staff customized access to Alpha's knowledge base. Due to the teething problem of using new technology and the poor translation of design requirements to system functionalities, the IT team could not complete the first worktable for the sales function on schedule. Meanwhile, the knowledge content and design team had already developed a large amount of content. Fearing that the delay could dampen interest in KM, the team engaged a vendor to develop an Intranet system as a quick alternative to making it's content available. This move was perceived by the IT team as an invasion into its territory. Furthermore, the intranet was treated with scepticism from the rest of the functions in Alpha. By the end of the year, the viability of the worktable was in doubt. Given the high dependency and unsustainable expenditure on external IT resources, Alpha was perceived to be losing control over its IT-related projects. Thus, the management curtailed the worktable project and disbanded Alpha completely when it eventually lost faith in knowledge management. 

The main reasons for the failure of Alpha were as follows: 

• Knowledge was managed within silo-oriented communities. Thus, business-critical knowledge that straddled across multiple functional groups was neglected.

• There was an over-reliance on IT systems to manage knowledge in Alpha. Tacit knowledge and behavioural issues, on the other hand, received insufficient attention.

• Three different external consulting firms were engaged at different stages of Alpha's development. Inputs from these consultants confounded instead of facilitated the KM initiative.

• As time passed, the cost to sustain the KM initiative ballooned beyond control. The management decided to cut its losses and terminated the initiative altogether. 

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