Understanding the Complexity of Reusing Knowledge across Contexts - A situated learning perspective

Abstract: There is a prevailing belief today that knowledge is one of the most important sources of an organization’s competitive advantage. Through attempting to transfer and reuse knowledge organizations try to prevent the reinvention of the wheel. However, these attempts have proven to be problematic in the past. The purpose of our study is to contribute to the understanding of what makes the transfer and reuse of knowledge a difficult and complex task. We aim to do so through looking at an initiative to replicate Six Sigma results at a large Scandinavian manufacturing company. Taking a situated learning perspective, we analyze how people work and interact in communities of practice when carrying out improvement work. Results show that in such an environment, knowledge is contextual and has to go through a process of transformation to be understood and valued by another community. To enable such a process to take place it is important to shift emphasis from transferring knowledge through hierarchies and formal descriptions to activities that connect and expand communities of practice. Suggestions for such activities are given to management.