It seems to me that part of the problem with knowledge management, apart from the word “knowledge" which I’ve discussed elsewhere , is a decent definition of “management”. Whole books have been written on management and what it means, and there is a healthy literature that seeks to define the differences between management and leadership. Despite this there is no exact meaning for management, although the generally accepted meaning, as will be seen later, is much more precise than knowledge. The concepts of management and leadership are intrinsically linked to work and organisation. Indeed Drucker said that management is a ‘… specific kind of work’ and ‘… is a generic function of all organizations, whatever their specific mission’. He also said management is quite simply ‘the application and performance of knowledge’. But just what we mean by knowledge, management, work, and organisation depends on whether we adopt a social action or an instrumental discourse.

The social action discourse sees organisations as contested environments, where work solely reflects the interests of individuals. These interests may or may not align to the stated goals of the organisation, and are associated with gender, ethnicity, class, education, and power. Organisations are therefore negotiated order and the manager’s role is to constrain, construct, and maintain that order. The emphasis is on self-actualisation and the exercise of social authority. In this approach, management is a harnessing and marshalling process aimed at improving worker satisfaction so they in turn will work towards organisational objectives. Management is therefore essentially an irrational social activity, that may draw on technical skills, but which is more reliant on brokering, networking, negotiation, and the manipulation of meaning.

Instrumental accounts of management are dominant in the literature. In the instrumental discourse management is a rational technical activity consisting of the skilled application of authority and scientifically based techniques. In this discourse organisations are societal sub-systems that satisfy collective needs, and work is goal-directed for known purposes. The organisation is a product of managerial action, which allocates authority, exercises control, and assigns resources, which means work can be analysed for the way it contributes to attainable and identifiable ends. Taylor in particular is famous for his scientific management principles, which is an instrumental approach. Fayol, Gulick and Urwick are equally famous for defining the functions of management as planning, organizing, directing, controlling, staffing and reporting. These prescriptive approaches remain popular and are the underlying ideas for the codification efforts of knowledge management, as well as the techniques espoused in the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK®) and Projects in Controlled Environments (PRINCE2™).

It seems to me that regardless of which discourse is used the central tenants of management are the creation of order and maintenance of control to achieve a desired end purpose. This is achieved through understanding, supervision, brokering, and leadership. Understanding is a tactical, operational and strategic activity that seeks to reduce complexity. It is a sense-making process essential to effective management, and informs the supervision, brokering and leadership components of management. Supervision is largely a tactical activity at the individual or sub-unit level, and deals with the allocation of tasks and resources. Brokering deals with groups and priorities at both the tactical and operational level, and seeks to connect others with information, and put that information into context so they can use it. Brokering assigns organisational meaning, whilst leadership deals with purpose and change at the strategic level.

Taking into account the short discussion above I would define management as ‘the application and performance of knowledge with the intention of creating order and/or maintaining control to achieve a desired end purpose’. But if management is conceived as a process that includes understanding, supervision, brokering and leadership, and necessarily involves the application of knowledge, then what is knowledge management? Well that question continues to confound.

I define knowledge management as:

‘… a trans-disciplinary approach that integrates tools, techniques, and strategies to retain, organise, share, analyse, improve, and apply business expertise. It is disciplined, deliberate, purposeful, and conscious, and of necessity involves the design, implementation and review of processes to improve knowledge creation and sharing behaviours. Ultimately knowledge management relies on individual and collective discipline to achieve business objectives’.

However, I am not entirely satisfied. Are there better definitions out there? I’d be interested in your thoughts.

Regards Graham