Life away from Home...

Freedom....
The first thing which comes to our mind when we say 'Away from home' is freedom. Freedom to do what you want, go where you want, spend all night out, buy what you like and just chill out doing nothing.

Yes that's true, you get to do all those things & more when you are away from home. Life just rocks. You are in total control of your life and there is no one to stop you from doing anything. That's how people live in the western world, free to do what they want but it's a bit different in the eastern part or you can in the Asian countries. In the Asian countries the youngsters mostly stay with their parents not that they can't afford a house but just coz it's the culture their and it feels good as well to them. Everything has it's own merits and demerits some may like one the others may like the other. It's individuals choice but not all get options. I was lucky that after staying for 21 years with my parents I got a choice to come to London to study and which lead to working here. When I flew from Mumbai, India to London I thought now I am free, to do what I want and to live life how I want, not that I wanted to party all night, drink, smoke and enjoy as I don't do any of those but to live the way I want and to shape my life the way I want, but that never happens. What you think and what you plan is just for you to know or think that you know what you are doing but what happens is what God has planned for you, but this doesn't mean that you leave it to God, as God wants you to think and plan but leave everything to him and believe in him.

So there I was free to live my life.

But as you know there is a famous saying that with freedom comes responsibility. Staying away you are in charge of your life but at the same time you are also in charge of your clothes, your food and everything you would need. It's actually not difficult to do all those things yourself coz end of day you know whom you are doing it for, and for that reason it makes it easier for you, but the only problem is the thought that all these time you had these things served to you and now you have to do it yourself makes you think that you are missing something.

So far I don't know or I think no one can say which life is better. What i think is you just have to enjoy your life no matter how you stay.

Life in London
My first house, just opposite to the wembley football stadium. A view of wembley stadium from my house.

Virtualization

Virtual Environment can be defined as “distributed organizations and teams of people that meet and work together online. Group members rely on support systems to help gather, retrieve and share relevant knowledge” (O’Leary, 1997). Virtual teams are growing in popularity and many organizations have responded to their dynamic environment by introducing virtual teams (Cascio, 2000). Virtual team is used to cover wide range of activities and forms of technology supported working (Anderson et al, 2007).

Companies consider innovation as their core competitive strategy. The pressure of global competitive force exerts producers to continuously innovate and upgrade the quality of existing products (Acs and Preston, 1997). And so innovation have become the most important key issue for companies to be successful in the 21st century (Sorli et. Al, 2006). And information technology offers solution to typical innovation problems. Based on conventional information technologies and Internet based platforms virtual environment can be used to sustain innovations through virtual interaction and communication (McKie, 2004). Also a virtual network structure is used to improve communication and co-ordination, and encourage the mutual sharing of inter-organizational resources and competencies (Chen et al, 2008b).
Anderson et al. (Anderson et al, 2007) suggests that effective use of communication, especially during the early stages of team development, play an important role in gaining and maintaining trust. Virtual team may allow people to generate more productivity at a distance.

There exist some advantages and disadvantages of virtual environment. Some of the advantages include reduction of travel time and cost, enables recruitment of talented employees, builds diverse teams, promote different areas, resource discrimination (Bergiel et al., 2008). Disadvantages may include requirement of complex technological application, lack of knowledge about employees about virtual teams, not an option for every type of employee and not an option for every type of company (Bergiel et al., 2008). Thus virtual team is beneficial for projects which requires cross functional or cross boundary skilled input.

The specialised skills and talents required for the development of new products often reside locally in the organization. Firms therefore have no choice to disperse their new product unit to access such disperse knowledge and skills (Krazer et al., 2005). For this reason virtualization becomes mandatory.



Virtual environment helps to get information without personally contacting the person and asking for help. It eliminates the geographical barrier and helps in effective communication of information between individuals. If the organization is large than knowledge management becomes difficult. It becomes impossible to capture all the tacit knowledge without using technology. Virtual environment thus helps in capturing the tacit knowledge across the organization. Employees can be engaged in knowledge sharing with different kinds of virtual environment. Virtual software’s like Second Life help organizations test their product or services before introducing it in real life. Some times testing of a product is not possible in a real world. Like in the case of a retail firm it becomes difficult to test new product or service as the firm in open 24/7 and is constantly filled with customers. Second Life also facilitates virtual conferencing where people are just required to appear online on second life on their computer and they can attend the conference from any where around the globe. Medical operation testing is also performed through Second Life. It also enables e-learning where live lectures are held which student can attend sitting at their homes.

So with this we conclude that virtualization though not a must is required by an organization to facilitate knowledge sharing. It eliminates the barrier for knowledge management and provides efficient means of sharing tacit knowledge. It helps in innovation and testing of new products and services. To gain competitive advantage over others, a firm must implement virtual environment through the form of different technologies. The advantages of implementing virtual environment are more over the disadvantages and so suitable consideration should be given by the organization.

References:
Acs, Z.J. and Preston, L, 1997, “Small and Medium Enterprises: Technology & Globalization”
Anderson, A.H., Mcewan, Bal and Carletta, 2007, “Virtual team meeting: An analysis of communication and context”
Bergiel, J.B., Bergiel, E.B., Balsmeier, P.W., 2008, “Nature of virtual teams”
Cascio W.F., 2000, “Managing a Virtual Workplace: The academy of Management Executive”
Chen, H.H., Kang, Y.K. Xing, Lee, A.H.I and Tong, 2008b, “Developing new products with knowledge management methods and process development management in a network”
McKie, 2004, “Innovation Management Technology”
O’Leary, 1997, “The Internet, Intranet and the AI Renaissance”, IEE Computer
Ozer M, 2004, “The role of Internet in new product performance: A conceptual investigation”
Sorli, M., Stokic, D., Gorostiza, A. and Campos, 2006, “Managing product/process knowledge in the concurrent/simultaneous enterprise environment”

What’s Web 2.0?

Web 2.0 also called as the wisdom Web, people-centric Web, participative Web, and read/write Web is the second phase in the evolution of World Wide Web. It ignited in the last few years with the successful implementation of some Web 2.0 based applications like MySpace, Flickr and Youtube. In a survey conducted 89% of the CIO’s reported that they have adapted at least one or more form of Web 2.0 tools and they see relative high business value in technology (Young, 2007). Realising the importance even the IT vendors and service providers are incorporating the Web 2.0 technologies and bringing new tools in the market.
Web 2.0 is both a usage and a technology standard. It is a collection of strategies, technologies and social trends. It is more dynamic and interactive than its predecessors, Web 1.0, letting its users to both access and share information (Murugesan, 2007). Some of the technologies it includes are blogs, wikis, RSS (Really Simple Syndication), Mashups, tags, multimedia sharing, podcasting and folksonomy. The concept of Web 2.0 began in 2004 during a brainstorming session between Tim O’Reilly and MediaLive International. After which a Web 2.0 conference was called (O'Reilly, 2005). Later Web 2.0 clearly took a hold, with more than 9.5 million definitions posted on Google by 2005 and 135 million by 2007 (O'Reilly, 2007). Still there exists a huge amount of disagreement with some people calling it a marketing fad and some considering it as a new conventional wisdom.
Based on the concept of Tim O’Reilly, Paul Anderson stated six ‘big’ ideas why Web 2.0 had such a huge impact (Anderson, 2007). These are the reasons why Web 2.0 received an overwhelming response. The first one being individual production and user generated content. Web 2.O have made it possible to upload a video or a photo from a digital camera into people’s own web space, tag it with keywords and make it available for their friends to see within a few clicks. Individuals are writing their own blogs and working together to create information through wikis. Secondly it harnesses the power of the crowd. Web 2.0 harnesses the power of the crowd by letting them upload images, videos and share among others. It helps in tagging webpage’s and sharing it with others over the internet. The third one being data on an epic scale. Web 2.0 technologies help capture the data from millions of users and then mine and sift this data to provide targeted recommendation. An example of this would be Amazon who captures your buying choice and then floods you with offers for the same. The next is the Architecture of participation. This occurs when through a normal use of the application or service the system gets better. An example of this Google search, it is designed in such a way that as more and more user participates it gets better. The fifth one is the network effect. The network effect is an economic term used to describe the increase in the value of the existing users of a service in which there is some form of interaction with others, as more and more people start to use it (Klemperer, 2006; Leibowitz and Margolis 1994). Once the network begins to build up and people become aware of it, the service popularity increase and the product takes off rapidly. The last one is the openness. An important technology in the development of Web 2.0 has been the open source software such as Firefox browser and others.
On of the other important driver in the fast development of Web 2.0 was the emergence of new technologies. These were underpinned by the idea of Web as a platform. Earlier software application ran on the user’s machine, but with web as a platform software services run within the user’s browser.
Web 2.0 has got several usages. One of the most important and talked about is in educational and institutional issues. Wikis have been used by most universities to help student share information. The example for this is the wiki created by Middlesex university information system students to share their views on dissertation. This helps the students to reflect and comment on each others view. By using blogs to write about the subject the student is studying helps them to get views by other students and transform the learning into a conversation. But it also faced by challenges like the production and authentication of the information. One are where it is already facing an impact is the Virtual Learning Environment. The VLE connects the user to the university resources, regulations, help, contents like module and assessment. There is an argument that this kind of applications can be misused.
Other educational use includes scholarly research, academic publishing, and in libraries, repositories, and archiving. Apart from education Web 2.0 is also used in social working with Social Work 2.0, public diplomacy and some governmental functions (William D., 2005; Jonathan B., 2009).
One other use encountered by me while working for a call centre which I realised now while studying Web 2.0 is the group messaging. While working for call centre we used to have pick up and drop service as we used to work at night. Every night we used to get message about the timing of the pick up and the car number. This message always ended with Web 2.0 or SMS 2.0. After researching it now I came know that group messages can be send using the SMS 2.0 technology. It is also used in SMS marketing where the person subscribes for messages of his interest and those messages are delivered to him on a timely basis.
So what will Web 3.0 look like? Tim Berners-Lee perception of the Web included a scenario where autonomous agents and machine processing units will carry out actions on human’s behalf. Tim Berners-Lee stated that the next step after Web 2.0 will be likely to involve high power graphics. Ted Nelson, the inventor of hypertext is focusing on displaying documents including links in three dimensions. IBM is developing a new protocol Hyper Speech Transfer Protocol which allows users to create a network of voice sites or interconnected voice using mobile phones.

References:
Eggers, William D., 2005, “Government 2.0: Using Technology to Improve Education”
G. Oliver Young, 2007, “Efficiency Gains and Competitive Pressures Drive Enterprise Web 2.0 Adoption”
Klemperer, 2006, “Network Effects & Switching Cost”
Leibowitz and Margolis, 1994, “Network Externality: An Uncommon Tragedy”
Murugesan, 2007, “Understanding Web 2.0”
O'Reilly, 2005, 2007, “What Is Web 2.0: Design Patterns and Business Models for the Next Generation of Software”
Paul Anderson, 2007, “What is web 2.0? Ideas, technologies and implications”
Jonathan B., 2009, “The Role and Regulations for Technology in Social Work Practice and E-Therapy: Social Work 2.0. In A. R. Roberts (Ed)”

Importance of IT in Knowledge Management

The debate about the role of information technology in knowledge management has been lively and ongoing. Great claims have been made by KM theorists about the use of information technology in KM. Dash in 1988 stated that "successful KM requires a skilful blend of people, business processes and IT".
A study at American Productivity and Quality Centre revealed that implementation of KMS requires setting up a suitable IT infrastructure. Cole-Gomolski states that the idea behind KM is to stockpile worker’s knowledge and make it accessible to others via a searchable application. With this we are sure of one thing that KM does require information technology. But till what extent it is required and how important IT is in KM?

The sphere of knowledge management revolves around three important aspect People, Process and Technology. The ultimate purpose of implementing a KMS is to benefit/support the organization in whichever ways possible. People being the end users are the ones responsible for the attainment of this purpose. Without people it would have never been possible. You can have sophisticated infrastructure and technology but without the interference of human it’s just useless. But some people in a CoP go out of the limb and say that process is more important than people. Their reason in saying so is that in an organizational context the other two can change but only through a deliberate and established process the objectives of KM can be achieved. Even their part is right to an extent; say that we have good people and a decent technology and are poor in the process. The objectives won’t be achieved. Others say that good People overcome bad process and technology. But isn’t it hard to have a lot of good people in one place. Whereas technology can only automate the process, speed it up and get decisions quickly. But then recently why there has been so much emphasis on technology. We will take a small example of Facebook website to understand this, at Facebook all the people come together and share their views. The process is by joining a CoP within Facebook or sharing what they are currently doing. But would that be possible without the technology which is the Facebook itself.

Despite the differences Harris states that KM can be defined as a set of practices allowing organizations to create, refine, store, and share knowledge, often through information communication technology (ICT). One of the reasons why KM system fails is that they are not effectively used by the people. And why they are not used is that they do not satisfy the needs of the people. That means the process and the technology is not effective.


So do the three spheres of knowledge management play an equal part in the successful implementation of a KMS? Well to me it depends. They are actually a shifting set of variables where emphasis is giving to a specific one but all three are required for the KMS to work. It depends on what you are trying to achieve and how big is your organization. If the organization is large then definitely a good technology is required as scalability comes into picture. Here more emphasis will be given on getting a good technology as people and process won’t be an issue. Whereas in some other case technology is easy available and people and process are given more emphasis. While in the case of Social Software (Web 2.0) all three are given equal importance as all three are required for its successful working.
Nirmala Palaniappan, KM head at Oracle have very rightly compared the people, process and technology sphere of knowledge management to Body, Mind and Soul. Soul is the people; mind becomes the process and body the technology. The knowledge is the blood which flows and keeps the system working.
My personal experience was a little bit different as we didn’t have any technology for knowledge management but still we practised knowledge management. I was working for a very small search engine marketing firm where what we did was market products/services on Google, Yahoo and MSN. How we practised knowledge management was through three different get together of one hour each every week. First was a presentation or a book review. Here what we had to do was present on a recent happening or review a recent book. Second was “Know Your Client”. In this we had to present everything about the client we were handling, how we researched the client, their competitors and how we made our online campaign. Each and every detail of how we handled the client was presented to others in this. The last thing was a Quiz. This was like any other quiz. Every week we had a different topic. End of every get together was a small discussion related to advertising where we tried to fit online advertising to that particular topic of the get together.

References:
Cole-Gomolski, 1997, “Users loather to share their know how”, Computerworld
Dash, J., 1998, ‘Turning technology into TechKnowledge’ Software Magazine
K. Harris and M. Fleming and R. Hunter and B. Rosser and A. Cushman, The Knowledge Management Scenario: Trends and Directions for 1998-2003, Gardner Group 1998.
Nirmala Palaniappan, Paper on KM at the SEPG International Conference - 2002

KM Models

Ikujurio Nonaka and Hirotaka Takeuchi in the early 1990's articulated a model for KM called SECI model and with this started the episode of KM models. Over the years various KM models were proposed by researchers based on their own view of KM and some categorised these models into different categories. Here we will go through each of them in brief, see what they all have in common and will try and put them in practice with our own experience.

Ikujurio Nonaka and Hirotaka Takeuchi (1991) proposed the SECI (Socialization, Externalization, Combination, Internalization) model. In their model they emphasis on the following points
• Two forms of knowledge (tacit and explicit)
• An interaction dynamic (transfer)
• Three levels of social aggregation (individual, group, context)
•Four “knowledge-creating” processes (socialization, externalization, combination and internalization). (Despres, C. & Chauvel, D. 2000.)

They state that the philosophical inquiry of knowledge is known as "epistemology" and in their model they look into the contrasting approaches of epistemology. They also introduced a concept of Ba which means "place" which was originally proposed by the Japanese philosopher Kitaro Nishida. Ba is here defined as a shared context in which knowledge is shared, created and utilised.
Eg. : Taking this concept in the real world, a retail firm where i work, the employees based on their knowledge of sales create sales forecast i.e. they predict the sales for a particular day of the week. These forecast are discussed amongst the employees until they agree on a threshold value. Goods are then manufactured accordingly. So the Ba in this case will be the place i.e. the retail firm. It is the place where tacit knowledge is getting converted into explicit. The explicit knowledge is then used by the other employees to produce the goods. So there is a transfer of knowledge. This can be said as Socialization. With the help of the knowledge, the employees are able to generate sales forecast. This can be termed as Externilization i.e. developing concepts. The forecast is then discussed amongst the other employees to agree on a threshold value. This can be termed as combination. Then the threshold value is used for manufacturing goods i.e. Internalization. So the SECI model totally fits into my firm. The limitations to SECI model is that it rely on the tacit knowledge. Again in my example what if the senior most employee who usually creates the forecast leaves the company. For this reason my organization keeps track of all the forecast made and to which extent it stand true. This helps them to make accurate forecast and also to deal which situation of employee leaving.

Over the years after SECI model researchers classified the KM models into categories depending upon their view of KM. Starting with Gunnar Hedlund (1994) using his N-form notion classified the models into cognitive, skill-based and emodied forms. His classification was based on types, forms and levels of knowledge. In his N-Form notion he mostly emphasis on knowledge transfer, storage and transformation.

Michael Earl (1998) classifies KM models into 3 broad categories. They are Technocratic, Behavioural, Economical. His classification was based on the uses/functions of knowledge. His idea was that an organization usually concern itself with creation, protection and leveraging its knowledge.

Later organizations according to their need started combining all forms of models available to give rise to a totally new and hybrid model which could suit them. There has been number of models proposed by different organizations. One such model proposed by American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) as reported by Van Buren (1999), a senior associate with ASTD was intellectual capital management model. The model included two set of measures
• Those pertaining to intellectual capital stocks, including (a) human capital, (b) innovation capital, (c) process capital and (d) customer capital
• Those pertaining to financial performance and business effectiveness.

As i was looking into different types of models i came across that all of the models have five things in common. These can be called as 5 common phases of KM models. They are
(i) Knowledge Creating Phase
(ii) Knowledge Sharing Phase
(iii) Knowledge Structuring Phase
(iv) Knowledge Using Phase
(v) Knowledge Auditing Phase

Now using the above phases let us try making a KM model for an IT firm. In an IT firm the system analyst gathers information from the clients for the system to be developed. Then combining his knowledge and the information collected he tries to structure the information to make a prototype. This prototype is then shared with the clients and the coders. The coders use this information and their programming knowledge to develop the system. The system developed is then tested for bugs. To my knowledge this is how most of the the IT firms work. So now lets try to make a model which could suit them. A model is generally a process or a life cycle or a framework. The model below is a very simple/basic one and addresses only the above mentioned requirements of the firm.

The elements of this model are :
(i) Knowledge Carriers.
(ii) Knowledge Transfer.

Knowledge Carriers are the people having the tacit knowledge. Knowledge Transfer is the transfer of knowledge between the carriers.

It starts with knowledge sharing and knowledge sharing occurs at multiple levels. Firstly the tacit knowledge is mapped from wherever possible. (In our example above the system analyst interacts with the people who will be using the system and tries to get as much information. This can also be the Knowledge Creating/Gathering phase.) Next the knowledge gained is used to build a structure. (In our case the prototype developed by the analyst.) The structure then serves as an explicit knowledge. (In our case it serves as an explicit knowledge for the coders to develop the system i.e the next level of knowledge sharing or knowledge using phase.) The explicit knowledge can then be transformed again into explicit or tacit. (In our case it is being transformed into explicit and a system is developed.)

References :

Nonaka, I. 1991, The Knowledge Creating Company. Harvard Business Review, November-December, 96-104
Ikujiro Nonaka, Ryoko Toyama and Noboru Konno, SECI, Ba and Leadership: a United Model of Dynamic Knowledge Creation
Despres, C. & Chauvel, D. 2000. A Thematic Analysis of the Thinking in Knowledge Management.
Earl, M. & Scott, I. 1998 What on earth is a CKO? Survey IBM. London Business School
Van Buren, M. 1999, A Yardstick for Knowledge Management , Training & Development, v 53(5), pp 71-78, May

What is Knowledge Management ?

There has been lot of definitions of Knowledge Management by well known researchers and guru's of KM. Before going into defining KM let us first look at what is knowledge and what does management refers to. Knowledge can be any meaningful information and the simplest way of defining management is planning, organizing, controlling and prioritising. This brings us very close to the definition of KM by Karl Wiig (1997, 1999) and Bhatt G. D. (2000, 2001).

Karl Wiig (1997, 1999) states that

"KM is to understand, focus on, and manage systematic, explicit, and
deliberate knowledge building, renewal, and application – that is, manage
effective knowledge processes (EKP). "

Bhatt G. D. (2000, 2001) states that

"The knowledge management process can be categorized into knowledge
creation, knowledge validation, knowledge presentation, knowledge distribution,
and knowledge application activities."

Now the question which arises is why to manage it.

Richard E. Combs states that some of the barriers for learning are knowledge transfer, space, time and memory, culture clash , competitive intelligence and managing historical and tacit information. He states that a neutral platform is needed where issues of language don't exist, where space, time and memory are no longer a barrier to interaction or knowledge, which looks at the exterior events and helps management to looks at what lies before it, which can save and store what was said and done and acted upon. (Richard E. Combs)
KMS provides this platform to overcome all the above mentioned barriers. Taking into account all the definitions of KM and reasons why it is required we can define KMS as

"A platform to overcome barriers to knowledge like knowledge transfer, space, time and memory, culture clash , competitive intelligence and managing historical and tacit information for an organisation to get help in decision making and to gain competitive advantage."

Considering the example of my previous employer i.e. Sutherland Global Services, a BPO in relation with KM. We had our individual account in a software system called as Peoplesoft. Using our userid we used to login to the account to mark our attendance. It used to show us our attendance for the month selected, holidays taken, holidays requested and whether approved or not, our shift timings, task for the week etc. The records of our individual account can be seen and managed by our team leader through his account. The shift timings, task for the week and holiday approval was managed by our team leader. And the team leader's account were managed by the Team Manager and it goes up the hierarchy. This system eliminated the culture clash, the space,time and memory issues and provided competitive intelligence and helped in managing information. It provided a platform for overcoming the barriers to knowledge and also helped in decision making and to gain competitive advantage.

Considering our definition the Peoplesoft software can be considered as a KMS. In this case it worked because it succeeded in achieving the functionalities for which it was designed. Like it provided with successful transfer of knowledge between the employees overcoming one of the barriers to knowledge i.e. knowledge transfer. It eliminated the space, time and memory barrier by storing information on a computer eliminating space and memory issue and transfering it as and when required between the employees without wasting much time. It helped in managing the historical information by storing the attendance of the employee, their salary slips, holidays taken etc. It also helped in converting the tacit knowledge (knowledge from the team leader or manager) into explicit knowledge used by the executives for doing their task. As the team leader gets all the holiday request's of his team in his account, it helps him in decision making to approve or reject the holiday request. As the HR manager can see the attendance of all the employees it helps him in allocationg salaries accordingly i.e. again it helps in decision making. The entire system provides a competitive advantage as it provides greater service eleminating all the hassle.



References :

Bhatt, G. D. (2001), ‘Knowledge management in organizations: examining the interaction
between technologies, techniques, and people’, Journal of Knowledge Management, vol. 5,
no. 1, pp. 68-75

Wiig, K. M. (1997), ‘Knowledge Management: an introduction and perspective’ Journal of
Knowledge Management, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 6-14

Richard E. Combs, Why Manage Knowledge?

Difference between Organization/CoP/Social Network

Difference between Organization/CoP/Social Network

Organization can be defined either based on function or on structure (Yorktown Heights 1985, p.216). Heights states that living organism known for their complex functions such as the ability to grow, metabolize, reproduce adapt and mutate can be defined as an Organization based on functions. Organization has got several other definitions based on the researches on sociology, economics, political science, psychology and management (Wikipedia). It means different to different individuals. To me it means a list of responsibilities in order to accomplish my objectives. If we narrow it down, organization can also be defined as a group of people bound formally to achieve a set goal under a set rules. On the other hand CoP is defined as a group of people bound informally with a primary purpose of sharing information, practice and experience. For example a community created in UK during 1981 with an intention to offer guidance, advice and where appropriate mandatory actions to preserve rational, objective and ethical investigation of UFOs and witnesses can be considered as a Community of Practice. Social Network is again an association of people drawn together by family, friends, hobby, work, kinship, dislike or any sole reason (Answers.com).
With the above definitions we can say that a social network can be a CoP or vice versa as the members are loosely associated and are not formally bound. But one of the major difference between CoP and Social network as stated by Steve Denning in his book, The Leader’s Guide to Storytelling is that the latter consist of a group of people who are linked together for mutual benefits while CoP is a group which is formed for the purpose of improving member practice.
While the members in an organization are formally bound, which makes an organization different from CoP and Social Network. We can have a CoP within an organization. "CoP is typically not an authorized group nor a role identified on an organization chart." as stated by (John Sharp, 1997). What hold the people in a CoP is the common sense of purpose and a real need to know what each other knows (John Seely Brown).

One of the other difference between organization and CoP would be that CoP is self organized where as organization is organized by its leader/owner.

Facebook when started was restricted only to Harvard University students. It was created for the students to share pictures, compare them, search for people in their class etc. So this can be called as Social Networking as their is a network of students. It can also be called as CoP as the students are sharing pictures between them. Later Facebook expanded to Stanford, Columbia and Yale University and then gradually to most universities in America and Canada. Now Facebook has around 700 employees who are formally bound to it. They work to maintain the website and advertisement on it and to get revenue out of it i.e. they do business. The company’s objectives and goals remains the same i.e. sharing but now they have one more objective and that is earning revenue. This makes them an Organization by one of the definitions of organization by The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language by Houghton Mifflin, 2000 stating "An organization is a structure through which individuals cooperate systematically to conduct business".

Now, if we take extreme examples like Facebook (a social network) and a CoP for UFO's as mentioned above the difference between the two are clear but if we consider the KM conference which is held regularly then some will argue that it is a network while others will say it’s a CoP. So we can conclude stating that difference lies in the eyes of the beholder. It’s the way we perceive the two.

References :

Yorktown Heights 1985, Dissipation, Information, Computational Complexity and Definition of Organization, New York

John Sharp 1997, Communities of Practice: A Review of the Literature

Houghton Mifflin 2000, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language

Steve Denning, The Leader’s Guide to Storytelling

Shawn 2006, The difference between communities of practice and knowledge networks