Introduction
Information delivery is a way of making information readily and costs effectively available to an authorized person to whom it might be relevant (Alix‐Marie & Terren, 1987). Knowledge management is the conversion of tacit knowledge to explicit knowledge and then sharing it within an organization. To be more accurate and technical, knowledge management (KM) is a process through which an organization does generate value from its knowledge-based and intellectual assets. Both information delivery and KM are vital for any organization, and when comparing them head-to-head, there is one that is better than the other because of the value it does bring to an organization. Many organizations prefer KM to information delivery because through the same there is the delivery of value to an organization. The paper explains the two into detail and then recommends KM to take priority giving reasons for the same.
Information delivery
Information delivery is the process of readily availing information in a cost-effective manner to any authorized individual to whom that information is relevant (Diso, 2005). With effectively delivering information then there is a limitation of knowledge to small pockets of a few individuals that have access to the limited amount of the organizational information assets. For instance, many enterprises are implementing business intelligence solutions that are massively simplifying and improving their ability to access, analyze and comprehend mountains of raw data gathered by their operational computer systems daily. Many of these organizations stop short of entirely exploiting that knowledge because they have restrictions on access to that information to a handful of managers or knowledge workers (Diso, 2005). Also, many of the companies lock their valuable information within documents that are inaccessible to the majority of the enterprise.
With real-time information delivery, there is sharing of information with as many people as possible, thus, boosting the productivity of employees. That also enhances the business’s ability to be proactive instead of being reactive to the opportunities that are coming up. A component of an overall BI information delivery solutions specialize in the delivery of rightful information to users in near-real-time of real-time to their chosen devices (Alix‐Marie & Terren, 1987). There is pressure for companies to bring information to its users in a cost-effective manner so that they can make vital decisions every day. For those enterprises to meet this challenge, they must have the ability to deploy information delivery systems to many people across the entire enterprise readily and at low costs of ownership. They do that in the following ways:
- Avail information in real-time to everyone who has an impact on the key business processes, for instance, managers, employees, customers, suppliers, partners, and citizens.
- Provide information to people the way they want the information, especially month most used common formats like e-mail, MS-Excel, Web pages, Word processing documents and Adobe PDF.
- Increase the ability of users to interact with that information even from mobile devices such as tablets and smartphones.
- Use a personalized, secure as well as n organized approach to BI that provides information broadly throughout the organization.
- Increase faster development as well as deployment of business intelligence applications.
- Utilize standard web-based technologies to satisfy the growing demands for information.
Knowledge management
Knowledge increasingly has recognition as a new and strategic imperative for enterprises (Rasula, 2012). There is the most established paradigm that has it that knowledge is power. Information delivery is vital but if people are not able to derive knowledge from that information, then it is meaningless to deliver that information. Because of the lack of proper derivation of knowledge from the information, many managers and knowledge workers can have good information but use it wrongly. An organization that shares critical knowledge with its staff has high chances of growing stronger and becoming more competitive (Moffett et al., S2003). Information if merely a collection of data and the understand ding the relationships that exist between those pieces of data, but knowledge management goes beyond.
After further processing of information, it becomes knowledge (Rasula, 2012). The further processing of information place when one derives knowledge from it through the recognition of the pattern relations among data and information. There two types of knowledge, which are, tacit knowledge and explicit knowledge. The latter one contains in documents, information systems, or other storage media while tacit knowledge is in storage in the human brain. There can be the production of these types of knowledge during interactions or innovations. They also permeate into the daily functioning of enterprises and highly contribute to the achievement of their objectives. Both types of knowledge help organizations to respond to emerging challenges and novel situations. As defined earlier, KM is the process through which enterprises generate value from their knowledge-based as well as intellectual assets. With that definition, it is apparent that the concern of KM is to identify, acquire, distribute and maintain knowledge that is paramount to an organization (Kiessling et al., 2009).
Knowledge management has results, process and technology orientation. For KM to be results oriented, it means to have the right knowledge at the right time, the right place and in the right format (Moffett et al., S2003). Process orientation says that KM is the systematic management or the process of identifying, creating, gathering, sharing, and applying knowledge. Definition of KM from technology orientation says that it is BI plus collaboration plus search engines plus intelligent agents. The main aspects of KM are information management as well as people management. When we view KM from this perspective, we find out that KM concerns information one hand and people on the other hand. Among other things, KM entails identification and mapping the intellectual assets within an enterprise, meaning auditing those assets and focusing on their uniqueness to an organization’s crucial functions. But KM goes beyond that level of mapping. It also entails the creation of knowledge for competitive advantage, plus the conversion of big data into readily accessible information (Kiessling et al., 2009).
KM helps in the identification of latent points of congestion that can hamper knowledge flow towards decisions and then identifying actions (Rasula, 2012). ICT is helping in the functioning of all the aspects of KM in a coordinated and seamless manner. When there is good management of knowledge, organizations can reduce the time required to complete tasks, and they can also minimize unnecessary duplications if they cannot avoid them. The second aspect is the management of people which entails the management of tacit knowledge present in the heads of people. “Effective management of people requires that organizations consider people’s cultural and social values, likes and dislikes attitudes and aspirations. If organizations can do that successfully, it can lead to the creation of new knowledge that cannot have accomplishment by information delivery alone” (Chen et al., 2009). Although many organizations understand both aspects of knowledge managed, there is no realization of the full potential for KM. both aspects of KM have the aim of making the knowledge or organizations more productive and to offer benefits that are greater than those envisioned.
Which one should take priority?
As mentioned earlier on, KM needs to take priority because it provides more value to an organization compared to information delivery. While information delivery entails mere dissemination of information that otherwise may not have high productivity, KM helps in through the scrutiny of information to make it more productive. KM provides an excellent opportunity for any organization to adopt new business strategies that were previously impossible (Moffett et al., S2003). For instance, it can open a way to the creation of an unlimited network that can enhance the alliances between the organization and its customers and suppliers. It makes it possible for from those enterprises to discover new issues and opportunities via then the optimum use of knowledge assets like records, contract sales, and data and customer demographics.
It is precisely in that manner that KM can complement as well as enhance the influence of other initiates of an organization like business process re-engineering, total quality management, and organizational learning. The discussion reveals that KM managers can have application in different domains to help in the realization of superior results within almost any company. It makes it possible to realize those results regardless of the level of technology that is available or the market sector concerned. It has four pillars that make it deliver maximum value to organizations as opposed to information delivery. The four pillars include a) organization and management, b) infrastructure, c) content management systems, d) people and culture (Chen et al., 2009). All those pillars are indispensable elements for the success of any organization.
Conclusion
Information delivery is making the information available to people when they need it, where they need it and the time they need the information. On the other hand, KM concerns making use of knowledge in an enterprise to and apply it to the business problem; tapping into what the enterprise knows to help deliver business results. KM consists of never making a mistake and making every decision based on the full knowledge base of the company (Rasula, 2012). KM needs to be part of the business practices similar to the management of the finances and safety management. It has always been helping in the delivery of business value and improving competence wherever applied appropriately. That is why it should take priority as compared to information delivery.
References
Rasula, J. (2012). The impact of knowledge management on organizational performance. Economic and business review, 14(2), 147-168.
Kiessling, S. et al. (2009). Exploring knowledge management to organizational performance outcomes in a transitional economy. Journal of World Business, (44), 421-433.
Chen, M., Huang, M. & Cheng, Y. (2009). Measuring knowledge management performance using a competitive perspective: An empirical study. Expert Systems with Applications, (36), 8449–8459.
Moffett, S., McAdam, R. & Parkinson, S. (2003). An empirical analysis of knowledge management applications. Journal of Knowledge Management, 7 (3), 6–26.
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Diso, I. (2005). Information production, transfer, and delivery: Mass information work and television journalisms dilemma in Nigeria. The International Information and Library Review, 37, 285-294.
Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in custom essay paper writing if you need a similar paper you can place your order from custom research paper services.
