Designing Knowledge Strategies

The purpose of this paper is to analyze how managers should design the company’s knowledge strategies. That is a new dimension of knowledge management and it can be performed by using design thinking and the theory of knowledge fields and knowledge dynamics. The analysis is based on a critical literature review and on the known-unknowm matrix developed at the individual level and then extended at the company’s level. Knowledge strategies deals with the intangible resources of any organization and becomes more important in the knowledge intensive business services (KIBS). Designing knowledge strategies follows a different approach than that known for business strategies. Their purpose is to design a thinking framework in the absence of knowledge that generates uncertainty and psychological difficulties in making decisions. Knowledge strategies do not follow the Porter’s principle of competitive advantage, but they are designed following the known-unknown dynamics within an organization. From designing thinking perspective, they adopt abductive thinking instead of induction or deduction. The main categories of knowledge strategies resulting from the known-unknown dynamics are knowledge exploitation, knowledge acquisition, knowledge sharing and knowledge exploration. Knowledge exploitation aims to use efficiently all the available knowledge within an organization; knowledge sharing implies a process of increasing the knowledge entropy of a given team or organization that leads towards increasing innovation; knowledge exploration aims at reducing the absence of knowledge by creating new knowledge. Knowledge exploration reduces the uncertainty and increases chances for better decisions.