HMD Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik · 2018
How can knowledge management systems provide employees with the knowledge they actually need without creating information overload?
Mahringer, C. A., & Gabler, M. (2018). Wie können Wissensmanagementsysteme nutzerorientiert gestaltet werden? Die Rolle organisationaler Routinen. HMD Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik, 55(4), 791–800. 10.1365/s40702-018-0412-z
Organizations increasingly rely on knowledge management systems, enterprise search, collaboration platforms, intranets, and other digital tools to make organizational knowledge accessible. Yet more available information does not automatically improve work. When employees have to search through large amounts of irrelevant content, the same systems intended to support knowledge work can create distraction, higher search costs, and information overload.
The article argues that knowledge management systems should therefore be designed around employees’ actual work rather than around abstract organizational structures or generic information categories. Organizational routines provide a useful basis because they show which tasks people repeatedly perform, which colleagues depend on one another, which terminology they use, and which knowledge is relevant for accomplishing shared work.
The article asks: How can knowledge management systems be adapted to the needs of individual employees so that they provide exactly the information required for their work?
The paper develops a conceptual framework linking research on knowledge management systems with organizational routines. It explains how three properties of routines can guide system design: interdependencies among tasks and employees, learning through repetition and observability, and shared acceptance of established ways of working. These insights are then translated into concrete implications for system design, system updating, and organizational development.
Organizations introduce knowledge management systems to increase the value of their knowledge. New technologies and the concomitant ubiquity of information, however, pose threats, particularly when the cognitive capabilities of employees are overloaded. Consequently, knowledge management systems have to be tailored to the specific needs of employees. We argue that considering organizational routines in the design of knowledge management systems might foster usability. Routines support design and management of knowledge management systems because they (1) represent interdependent tasks and actors, (2) enable employees to learn about each other’s tasks and expertise due to their repetitiveness and recognizability and, thus, create shared understandings and (3) include a sense of truce. This article shows how the consideration of organizational routines supports designers in designing and updating knowledge management systems as well as in organizational development via knowledge management systems.
The paper shows how knowledge systems can become more useful when their structure follows the recurring work, dependencies, and shared understandings of employees.
Formal organizational charts or predefined business processes do not necessarily show how work is actually performed. Organizational routines reveal recurring patterns of action and interdependence. Mapping these patterns can help designers identify which employees need which knowledge, which experts should be connected, and which information should be prioritized.
Employees do not need equal access to every piece of organizational information at every moment. Knowledge management systems can use task and routine interdependencies to prioritize relevant documents, terminology, experts, feeds, and recommendations while pushing unrelated information into the background. This makes enterprise knowledge easier to navigate without simply increasing the volume of content.
Organizational routines are not static. As teams adopt new methods, technologies, terminology, and patterns of collaboration, the knowledge system should adapt as well. Search logic, expert groups, access rights, connections, and content structures therefore need periodic review rather than being treated as a one-time implementation decision.
The article connects knowledge management and information systems research with organizational routines, organizational design, knowledge sharing, transactive memory, and the study of technology in practice. It shifts the design problem from asking how much knowledge a system can store toward asking how digital systems can support the knowledge flows that are actually required for collective work.
The routine perspective also adds a dynamic dimension. Because patterns of work change over time, system design becomes an ongoing process of alignment between technology and organizing rather than a one-off technical implementation.
Managers and system designers can start by identifying recurring tasks, dependencies, terminology, and expertise relationships in actual work. These observations can then guide search structures, filters, access rights, expert recommendations, dashboards, groups, feeds, and document categories so that employees encounter information that is more likely to matter for their current tasks.
The framework also suggests reviewing knowledge systems whenever work practices change. New agile methods, reorganizations, technologies, or cross-unit collaborations may render existing categories and expert groups obsolete. Treating the system as adaptable can prevent knowledge platforms from becoming unused repositories or “data graveyards.”
