Analysing knowledge
requirements:
a case study
D.B. Schwikkard and
A.S.A. du Toit
The authors
D.B. Schwikkard is a Freelance Consultant, Schwikkard
Consulting, Randburg, South Africa.
A.S.A. du Toit is a Professor, Department of Information Studies,
RAU University, Johannesburg, South Africa.
Keywords
Knowledge management, South Africa, Service industries
Abstract
This paper presents the findings of a knowledge audit conducted
to determine the knowledge requirements of a large service-
based enterprise in South Africa. The objective of the knowledge
audit was to identify and describe the current and future
knowledge requirements of the enterprise. The results indicated
that employees have some basic knowledge and information
needs that must be satisfied before any further investigations
take place. Once the fundamental building blocks of knowledge
content are established, it is recommended that more
sophisticated solutions can be developed. Broad
recommendations for establishing a knowledge management
strategy that will be a source of sustainable competitive
advantage are proposed.
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Introduction
The shift to knowledge as the centre of wealth
production has made senior leadership of most large
enterprises aware that they must develop better
techniques to manage this vital asset. Gartner Group
(2000a) supports this view with its forecast that, by
2005, 75 per cent of global enterprises will require
significant transformation of governance, human
resources, workplace policies and workforce planning
in order to establish an effective strategy for managing
knowledge. In order to succeed, such transformation
initiatives require senior leadership support as well as
adequate commitment of resources to sustain and
direct activities, thereby ensuring alignment with the
enterprise’s vision, strategy, and business objectives.
This paper presents the findings of a knowledge
audit conducted for a large service-based enterprise
in Southern Africa. The knowledge audit forms the
basis for the initial investigations into defining an
enterprise-wide knowledge management strategy and
identifying relevant solutions to the enterprise’s
workforce.
Business information is often seen as a hierarchy
ascending from data to information to knowledge.
For the purpose of this paper, data will be regarded as
text, images and numbers in their undigested form,
while information are data that has been processed
and presented in such a way as to be relevant in a
decision-making situation. Knowledge may be seen
as the network of rules that enables people to use their
know-how and their know-what to give structure and
meaning to data and information (Kok, 1999, p. 9).
Explicit knowledge is articulated knowledge –
knowledge that has been formalized by the way of
speech, text, visual graphics and the data we compile.
Tacit knowledge includes the intuition, perspectives,
beliefs and values that people form as a result of their
experience (Doyle and Du Toit, 1998, p. 4).
The enterprise in question consists of a number
of separate entities, which have been gradually
acquired over the past 4 years. The head-office of
the enterprise is in Johannesburg, South Africa,
with branches in Australia and the UK. Each entity
offers a specialized product or service, which the
senior leadership considered to be a valuable
enhancement to the overall core competencies of
the business. The company has a R3 billion annual
turnover and is made up of about 890 employees.
The main focus of the business is to target the
enterprise resource planning (ERP) activities within
its client base with a view to offer specialist
outsourcing capabilities. These capabilities range
from operational services to strategic consulting and
implementation.
Aslib Proceedings
Volume 56 · Number 2 · 2004 · pp. 104-111
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited · ISSN 0001-253X
DOI 10.1108/00012530410529477
Received: 20 September 2003
Revised: 30 October 2003
Accepted: 15 November 2003
104

One of the main concerns confronting the business
at present is the lack of proper integration between
each of the different entities. Each entity has
developed its own processes, technology solutions
and organization culture. As a result, there are
numerous conflicts between these entities, which
inhibit knowledge sharing and have resulted in less
than efficient performance across the enterprise. The
potential synergies that were envisioned from the
merging of the various entities are not being realized
and the enterprise urgently needs to identify a
solution to enhance a common understanding of the
mission and objectives across the group. This is
essential if the enterprise is successfully to package
the various service offerings when going to market.
The knowledge audit constitutes a valuable
component of the overarching knowledge
management framework that has been developed for
the enterprise. The benefit of developing a
framework, according to Robertson (2002) is that it
“builds an approach to knowledge management that
is specifically tailored to the organisation’s
environment, processes and goals”. The actual audit
is aimed at what Eisenhart (2001) refers to as
“harvesting” or gathering the knowledge that is
required across the enterprise so that it is readily
available to all employees who need it. The audit itself
consists of a process of identifying the knowledge that
leadership considers to be critical to the success of the
business and then studying the target audience to
ensure that any gaps or overlaps in knowledge types
have been identified. The resulting analysis provides
an initial basis for populating the proposed
knowledge management solution with relevant
content.
Knowledge audit
An Internet search conducted in the year 2000 on the
topic of knowledge management produced more than
37,900 Web pages and 266 book titles
(PriceWaterhouseCoopers, 2000). Excluded from
this total were the many conferences, journals and
associations that have dedicated valuable resources to
investigating knowledge management. Despite the
plethora of content on this topic, anyone trying to
implement knowledge management will find very
little on the actual methodologies that might be used
to form the basis for instruction in this regard. One of
the fundamental requirements for a successful
knowledge management initiative is that it maintains
a consistent and a clear focus based on the company
strategies and business drivers. Unfortunately, many
initiatives are not afforded this luxury. As Capshaw
(1999) observes, “[o]ften the directive to do
something in support of KM is given, but there is no
direction”. This is a common complaint made by
those who have been instructed to launch a
knowledge management program. Gartner Group
(2000a) observes that the majority of inquiries
directed to its knowledge management practice are
product-related. For example, the client may be
deciding whether to acquire a system for document
management, data warehousing, information search
and retrieval, or an integrated suite of such products.
However, prior to embarking on this exercise, the
client has not implemented internal processes for the
management of intellectual assets. Gartner Group
argues “this situation of looking for KM products
without first having established an operational
foundation and process for management of
intellectual assets is an invitation to failure”.
A search of public domain literature will find
frequent mention of the requirement for what is
cryptically referred to as a “knowledge audit” at the
launch of any knowledge management initiative.
However, upon closer inspection, very little of the
literature investigates the topic beyond the most
superficial discussion of what such an audit might
entail. Robertson (2002) observes that “many
different ‘knowledge management frameworks’ have
been produced [however] only a few of these have
reached prominence and a broad audience”.
Researchers on the topic will frequently encounter
references to reputable consulting enterprises that
own proprietary knowledge audit methodologies
(Allweyer, 1997). Such methodologies are not
publicly available but can be acquired for a fee,
should one wish to implement knowledge
management within an enterprise. This may not
always be an economically viable option for an
enterprise, nor does it provide any opportunities for
the client to compare the suitability of each
technique. Despite the lack of published accounts
that precisely detail how to execute a standard
knowledge management audit methodology, it is
possible to extract sufficient insight from existing
literature to develop a basis for the creation of a
customized knowledge management methodology for
a specific enterprise. This approach is compatible
with that offered by Kirrane (1999, p. 3) who asserts
that:
No template exists for making knowledge
management easy, because it ultimately requires
complex interrelated changes in organizational
culture and systems. However, by investigating
knowledge management more deeply – perhaps
with a knowledge management team – you’ll be
able to choose which characteristics best fit your
[enterprise].
Gartner Group (2000b) advises that, in order to
minimize the risk of failure, as well as align knowledge
management to the strategic direction of the
enterprise and to define the requirements for
knowledge management technology support, the
knowledge management team should adhere to some
Analysing knowledge requirements: a case study
D.B. Schwikkard and A.S.A. du Toit
Aslib Proceedings
Volume 56 · Number 2 · 2004 · 104-111
105