Knowledge Management:a Tool For Efficient Product Development

Paper Summary:

This paper takes an in-depth look at knowledge management, a relatively new business concept that is attracting the attention of informed and global-oriented companies because of its promise to introduce new elements of flexibility and efficiency in the entire business spectrum - from management, plant and production to front line activities. This paper attempts to answer many questions related to knowledge management, which a growing number of management scholars present as a newly discovered key to unlock the productive powers of all people in a company and to bind them in one neat package towards achieving organizational success.

This paper has chosen to focus on three examples of companies in the automotive industry, implementing knowledge management.


Table of Contents
List of Tables
List of Figures

Acknowledgement

Chapter I - Introduction

Chapter II - Literature Review
I.1. Knowledge Management
II.1a. Knowledge as Business Asset
II.1b. Types of Knowledge
II.1c. Key Players in KM
II.1d. Transfer of Knowledge
II.1e. Holistic Approach
II.1f. Primacy of People
II.2. The Automotive Industry
II.2a. Technology and Innovation
II.2b. Control Systems
II.3. Product Development
II.3a. Development Stages
II.3b. New Imperatives
II.3c. KM Strategies
II.3d. KM Terms and Concepts
II.4. Conceptual Framework
II.5. Information and KM Concepts

Chapter III - Industry, Country & Company Review
III.1. Industry Trends
III.2. Country Perspectives
III.3. Company Reports

Chapter IV - Research Methodology
III.1. Observation and Direct Communication
III.2. Quantitative vs. Qualitative Research

Chapter V - Results

Chapter VI - Discussion and Conclusion

From the Paper:

"There are as many definitions of knowledge management as there are long-cherished ideas of how to run a business. If there is a common ground in the divergent perceptions of knowledge management, it is the generally accepted proposition that KM aims to transform knowledge into new levels of organizational capabilities and competences (Sanchez, R., 2006). The debate revolves around the question of how to implement it in the most effective manner. This study thus fixes its attention on the different KM strategies adopted by organizations, closing in on the international automotive industry because it is identified as among the sectors that especially needs and stand to derive enormous benefits from the new management technique. The focus shifts from there to the development process for new vehicles, where KM is said to be most helpful, and which calls for synthesizing all kinds of knowledge and specialization - the whole rationale for KM. As setting of the study, we pick out India for the simple reason that it now serves as manufacturing base for the internationalization efforts of many automotive companies."

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