Understanding the formation mechanism of high-quality knowledge in social question and answer communities: A knowledge co-creation perspective

The social question and answer (Q&A) community provides people with an effective tool to obtain high-quality information. From the perspective of reciprocal determinism and value co-creation, this study aims to investigate the formation mechanism of high-quality knowledge in the community. We develop a model to investigate how cognitive factors and community technological factors influence users’ knowledge co-creation behavior, thereby influencing knowledge quality in the community. A survey of 382 knowledge contributors in a social Q&A community shows that knowledge self-efficacy, topic richness, personalized recommendation, and social interactivity have a positive impact on users' knowledge sharing and integration behavior, which subsequently affect the community’s knowledge quality. Moreover, users' ratings moderate the influence of knowledge sharing on knowledge quality. This research demonstrates the synergistic effect of people and technology in knowledge co-creation, thus advances literature about value co-creation and content quality in online communities.     

A multilevel model for effects of social capital and knowledge sharing in knowledge-intensive work teams

Although it is a widely held belief that social capital facilitates knowledge sharing among individuals, there is little research that has deeply investigated the impacts of social capital at different levels on an individual's knowledge sharing behavior. To address this research gap, this study combines a multilevel approach and an optimal network configuration view to investigate the multilevel effects of social capital on individuals’ knowledge sharing in knowledge intensive work teams. This study makes a distinction between the social capital at the team-level and that of social capital at the individual level to examine their cross-level and direct effects on an individual's sharing of explicit and tacit knowledge. A survey involving 343 participants in 47 knowledge-intensive teams was conducted for testing the multilevel model. The results reveal that social capital at both levels jointly influences an individual's explicit and tacit knowledge sharing. Further, when individuals possess a moderate betweenness centrality and the whole team holds a moderate network density, team members’ knowledge sharing can be maximized. These findings offer a more comprehensive and precise understanding of the multilevel impacts of social capital on team members’ knowledge sharing behavior, thus contributing to the social capital theory, as well as knowledge management research and practices.     

The influence of informal social media practices on knowledge sharing and work processes within organizations

Contemporary information technologies such as social media have invigorated the way knowledge is shared within organizations to the extent that we have to rethink and reassess our understanding of the role and influence of technology in organizational processes and knowledge sharing. This paper uses the strategy as practice lens guided by the interpretivist philosophy to understand the influence of informal social media practices on knowledge sharing and work processes within an organization. The paper uses empirical evidence from the case study of a telecom organization in Tanzania to gain theoretical insight into informal social media practices and knowledge sharing. This research contributes to the Information Systems (IS) literature by asserting that organizational processes are achieved by mundane knowledge sharing mediated by informal social media use within the organization. Also, the study contributes to IS literature by highlighting how emerging informal practices are essential to daily processes within organizations.     

合作创新企业间技术知识转移中知识破损问题研究

知识日益成为企业重要的战略性资源,知识共享与知识转移是合作创新的必要过程,影响合作创新的绩效。而在知识转移过程中,由于各种因素的作用,技术知识经常不能完整传输和吸收,产生知识破损导致转移困难甚至失败。本文首先探讨知识破损的界定,并从其参与要素角度剖析破损成因。在此基础上,从理论角度针对性地探讨减少知识破损的策略与途径,从而促进合作创新中知识转移的顺利进行。     

Why the whole is less than the sum of its parts: Examining knowledge management in acquisitions

This paper seeks to explain why an acquiring organization was unable to leverage the expertise of the acquired organization even though both organizations were highly successful in their own right prior to the acquisition. It offers a knowledge-based perspective by teasing out the essential knowledge attributes pertinent to acquisitions. The research was carried out using an interpretative case study methodology at a Singapore-based multinational organization in the semi-conductor industry. The main data collection method used was face-to-face interviews with some 28 staff from October 2006 to December 2006, almost 2 years after the acquisition exercise. The findings suggest that the lackluster outcome could be traced to three knowledge attributes, namely, accessibility, applicability and cumulativeness. In conclusion, a number of practical and research implications are highlighted.     

开放式创新网络形成及演化的探索性案例研究

企业如何在战略阶段演进中构建与战略网络与商业生态系统相互融合与共同演化的开放式创新网络,已成为开放式创新能否取得成效的关键。本文揭示了开放式创新网络与战略网络、商业生态系统的关联性及内在逻辑,运用探索性案例研究方法,以"每20分钟产生一项专利"的荷兰埃因霍芬高科技园区为研究对象,将园区开放式创新网络形成及演化3阶段的开放式创新网络概括为"1+0"、"1+N"、"N+N"3种形式,得出开放式创新网络的形成及演化取决于战略网络的类型和动态变化趋势以及商业生态系统中核心物种的生态位进化。     

基于B-SECI模型的颠覆性创新过程解构：知识创造视角

知识创造是创新主体不断吸收与转化知识,并将不同领域的显性知识和隐性知识进行有效利用的过程。从知识创造视角出发,构建了契合颠覆性创新特征的SECI改进模型(B-SECI),根据知识转移流动和创造演化等维度对颠覆性创新的发展特征与演化过程进行解构,旨在更能精准把握颠覆性创新演化的内在机理。研究发现,颠覆性创新主要包含隐性知识与显性知识,遵循社会化、外显化、组合化和内隐化等过程,并在具体形式上经历了创意社会化、方案外显化、技术雏形化以及最终的产品商业化阶段。     

Sources of knowledge acquisition and patterns of knowledge-sharing behaviors—An empirical study of Taiwanese high-tech firms

The new knowledge acquisition and sharing stage represents the start of the organization's overall knowledge creation process. It is especially important for contributing to the critical foundation of organizational knowledge creation. This study explores the relationship between employees’ knowledge acquisition sources and the patterns of knowledge-sharing behaviors. We use structural equation modeling to test a sample of R&D professionals from high-tech companies in Taiwan. Data analysis suggests that most employees prefer to acquire knowledge from, and share knowledge with, their team members. This implies that greater familiarity between team members and strengthened cooperative relationships foster productivity. Furthermore, employees should be encouraged to participate in professional communities in order to acquire new knowledge. Knowledge acquired via these channels will facilitate the sharing of R&D knowledge within the organization.     

Characterizing the technology firm: An exploratory study

Technology firms occupy a central position in modern economies. They drive economic growth, productivity gains and have created new industries and innovative products.Many will agree that technology firms are distinguished from others in their emphasis on technological activities. Since this observation is too general, researchers suggested a variety of specific criteria and definitions. A number of definitions of technology firms appear in the literature but many are arbitrary and simplistic and none gained wide acceptance. Similarly, the number of characteristics suggested is large, reflecting a variety of perspectives and interests. In this case too no agreement exists as to which are the important ones. Also, many seem to be interrelated capturing different aspects of the same underlying concepts.This paper is concerned with the issue of definition and classification of technology firms. We demonstrate the usefulness of a different approach to the definition and classification problem. We rely on executives’ evaluations of their firms’ technology profile and level. An analysis of these evaluations reveals the underlying dimensions the executives used in making their judgments. We regard the dimensions we uncover as capturing the essence of technology firms and use them to classify the firms we study. The specific characteristics the executives used to evaluate their firms were derived from a systematic scan of the literature. Thus, the list represents the set of characteristics early researchers viewed as describing and defining technology firms. The connection to early work enhances our findings’ validity and lends some credence to our belief that the three dimensions we uncover (R&D activities which are closely associated with a set of organizational elements and market conditions, product strategy, and corporate culture) can be used by others to define technology firms and classify firms according to their technology level. In our study we use these three dimensions to classify the firms studied. We show that the commonly used practice of classifying firms as high and low technology according to the industry to which they belong is flawed.Our goal in this study is not to offer a “new” or “better” definition and characterization of technology firms or to offer the “best” approach to the generation of the classification criteria. Rather, we demonstrate here the usefulness of a different approach to the problem. While our approach does suffer from limitations it has important advantages. We hope future studies will confirm not only the usefulness of our approach but also the general applicability of the specific criteria we identify in this study.     

From free to paid: Effect of knowledge differentiation on market performance of paid knowledge products

Exploring the factors that affect the market performance of paid knowledge products is of great importance for knowledge payment platforms. Drawing on the sensations-familiarity framework and social capital theory, this study investigates how knowledge differentiation between paid and free knowledge impacts market performance, along with the moderating effect of knowledge providers’ social capital. Technically, a neural network-based text mining model is utilized to transform free and paid knowledge to semantic vectors, whose dissimilarity is calculated as knowledge differentiation. Empirical analysis on a real dataset reveals the positive (or negative) effect of knowledge differentiation on sales (or eWOM, electronic word of mouth), which will be more prominent with the increase of social capital. The results are reinforced with robustness checks regarding alternative knowledge-differentiation measures, more control variables and alternative regression methods. The present study extends our understanding of knowledge payment and free-to-paid consumption, and offers practical implications for content design and product management.     

Academic attitudes toward new media: An exploratory multidisciplinary study

This article looks at the attitudes of UK academics toward new media, utilizing organizational and sociocultural understandings of fields of scholarly enquiry. It focuses on four traditionally distinct disciplines—art and design, computer science, health science, and politics and international relations—representative of the range of approaches in higher education. Agreement was found among respondents across disciplinary communities about what new media represent and how they support their work. Analysis of semantic differential charts identified two dimensions underlying attitudes—“flexibility” and “fitness for scholarly purposes.” Rather than being anchored by epistemological divisions, new media are assessed by practical viewpoints relating to the activity types they allow, and by traditional measures of reliability. In response to questions about other characteristics of their disciplines (such as reputation and audience diversity), distinctions are in evidence, although in some cases these are not traditional ones.     

An empirical investigation of knowledge management and innovative performance: The case of alliances

This paper examines firm-level performance implications of strategic alliances by employing knowledge management practices as intermediaries. Unlike previous research which focuses on partner firm factors, this study investigates how alliance characteristics (i.e., alliance scope and governance) affect interfirm knowledge sharing and creation, and how these two practices and their interaction in turn affect innovative performance. These questions are examined in a sample of 127 German partnering firms. Results show that joint ventures as opposed to contractual alliances are more effective and influential in facilitating knowledge sharing and creation. In contrast, the scope of alliance activities, while positively associated with knowledge sharing, has no direct relationship with knowledge creation. In addition to these results, the study also finds that knowledge sharing, knowledge creation and their interaction significantly contribute to partner firms’ innovative performance.     

Examining the influence of modularity and knowledge management (KM) on dynamic capabilities: Insights from a call center

Modularity in organizations can facilitate the creation and development of dynamic capabilities. Paradoxically, however, modular management can also stifle the strategic potential of such capabilities by conflicting with the horizontal integration of units. We address these issues through an examination of how modular management of information technology (IT), project teams and front-line personnel in concert with knowledge management (KM) interventions influence the creation and development of dynamic capabilities at a large Asia-based call center. Our findings suggest that a full capitalization of the efficiencies created by modularity may be closely linked to the strategic sense making abilities of senior managers to assess the long-term business value of the dominant designs available in the market. Drawing on our analysis we build a modular management-KM-dynamic capabilities model, which highlights the evolution of three different levels of dynamic capabilities and also suggests an inherent complementarity between modular and integrated approaches.     

Research collaboration and research output: A longitudinal study of 65 biomedical scientists in a New Zealand university

Collaborative research has been increasingly celebrated by the science community, but the hypothesized positive relationship between research collaboration and research output is more assumed than rigorously tested. In this paper, we identify three methodological gaps in the literature: (a) hierarchical coding based on the ISI Web of Science database causes severe loss of information on local collaboration, (b) the relationship between research collaboration and research output is likely to be confounded by a common latent variable such as a scientist's ability, and (c) the lack of longitudinal analysis prevents causal inferences from being made. To address these methodological concerns, we constructed a longitudinal dataset of 65 biomedical scientists at a New Zealand university and coded collaboration variables by hand checking each of their publications in a period of 14 years. We found that at article level, both within-university collaboration and international collaboration are positively related to an article's quality and that, at scientist-year level, only international collaboration is positively related to a scientist's future research output.     

Emergency knowledge management and social media technologies: A case study of the 2010 Haitian earthquake

The US response to the 2010 Haiti Earthquake was a large effort coordinated by three major agencies that worked in tandem with the Government of Haiti, the United Nations, and many countries from around the globe. Managing this response effort was a complex undertaking that relied extensively on knowledge management systems (KMS). For the first time, however, US government agencies employed social media technologies such as wikis and collaborative workspaces as the main knowledge sharing mechanisms. In this research we present a case study developed through action research of how these social media technologies were used, what influences they made on knowledge sharing, reuse, and decision-making, and how knowledge was effectively (and at times ineffectively) maintained in these systems. First-hand knowledge of the response is used, offering strategies for future deployment of social media and important research questions that remain regarding social media as knowledge management systems, particularly for disaster and emergency management.     

Gaining social values of wireless technology: An interpretive case study in the healthcare institutional context

The existing literature has given little consideration to social values of information technology in general or of wireless technology in particular. The purpose of this paper is thus to shed new light on this issue. Based on an interpretive case study, we examine two healthcare organisations and discover that social values are often manifested beyond, as well as within, organisations. A matrix of social values in relation to technology changes and their interactions with various stakeholders is further discussed. The matrix helps understand how various social values emerge from and revolve around organisations’ strategic management of information technology. The implications of the findings about social values are discussed and future research directions are suggested.     

Understanding the majority opinion formation process in online environments: An exploratory approach to Facebook

Majority opinions are often observed in the process of social interaction in online communities, but few studies have addressed this issue with empirical data. To identify an appropriate theoretical lens for explaining majority opinions in online environments, this study investigates the skewness statistic, which indicates how many “Likes” are skewed to major comments on a Facebook post; 3489 posts are gathered from the New York Times Facebook page for 100 days. Results show that time is not an influential factor for skewness increase, but the number of comments has a logarithmic relation to skewness increase. Regression models and Chow tests show that this relationship differs depending on topic contents, but majority opinions are significant in overall. These results suggest that the bandwagon effect due to social affordance can be a suitable mechanism for explaining majority opinion formation in an online environment and that majority opinions in online communities can be misperceived due to overestimation.     

多团队系统协作机制的结构方程模型研究——以高新技术企业NPD多团队系统为例

以高新技术企业NPD多团队系统为研究对象,在对MTS理论进行梳理和对NPD团队间协作过程分析的基础上,提出了基于团队过程的NPD多团队系统协作模型。通过问卷调查与验证性因子分析对模型与数据拟合度进行了评价,分别构建了过渡过程协作和行动过程协作的结构方程模型,并考察了两个过程之间的路径影响关系。结果表明,模型拟合度良好,过渡过程协作对行动过程协作有正向影响。     

国际科学合作研究状况综述/FONT

随着科学的迅速发展,科学研究中的合作关系日益成为影响科学生产能力发挥的巨大力量,引起越来越多的科学家以及科技管理人士的关注,对科学合作的研究也在逐渐深入。本文对国际科学合作的研究进展作以综述,以期发现科学合作活动的规律,为提高科学研究绩效提供信息。     

Impact of knowledge incentive mechanisms on individual knowledge creation behavior—An empirical study for Taiwanese R&D professionals

Knowledge incentive mechanisms are a new development in the management of knowledge. The most prevalent perspective presented in the available literature is that the knowledge incentive mechanisms must have the ability to manage the flow of business knowledge. This study explores the relationship among knowledge incentive mechanisms, knowledge psychological ownership, and individual knowledge creation behavior. This study uses structural equation modeling to test a sample of R&D professionals from high-tech companies in Taiwan. Data analysis suggests that knowledge incentive mechanisms promote the psychological ownership by the knowledge owner so that he or she actively carries out knowledge innovation. This implies that knowledge incentive mechanisms stress private proprietary characteristics employees who possess real ownership when they innovate will deem such innovation as an extension of self, giving rise to a protective or defensive mindset, which then has an impact on individual knowledge creation behaviors because of the psychological ownership of knowledge.