Virtuous Spiral or Vicious Circle?
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1) Universities are challenged to develop innovative solutions to complex problems through collaboration. This document examines bottom-up approaches where tacit knowledge is shared among faculty to create new knowledge. 2) The research studied a project at Maastricht University aimed at educational innovation across faculties using social network analysis and surveys of knowledge sharing attitudes. 3) Preliminary findings suggest educational innovators collaborate through sharing experiences and that knowledge sharing creates strong relationships and is seen as valuable, though more research is needed comparing other universities.
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Virtuous Spiral or Vicious Circle?
- 1. Virtuous Spiral or Vicious Circle? Creating and Distributing Innovative Knowledge within Universities Martin Rehm, Amber Dailey-Hebert, Katerina Bohle Carbonell & Karen D. Könings 20th International EDiNEB Conference, Milton Keynes (UK), June 2013
- 2. universities are challenged to tackle interconnected, ill-defined problems in need of innovative solutions
- 3. vs. Top-Down Approach Bottom-Up Approach
- 4. Bottom-Up Approach • make use of faculty’s tacit knowledge composed of their on-the-job experiences (e.g. Gherardi & Nicolini, 2000) • transforming individuals’ tacit knowledge into new explicit knowledge contribute to the process of (innovative) knowledge creation within organizations.
- 5. Tacit Explicit Knowledge Social Interaction & Innovative Knowledge Communities (IKC)
- 7. How do educational innovators collaborate and spread their newly gained knowledge throughout an organization in “bottom-up” initiatives?
- 9. Setting • Maastricht University – 3-year project: “Learning and Working” • all faculties • new target groups • innovative learning approaches
- 10. Instruments • Social Network Analysis – In- & Out-Degree Ties • The amount of connections sent / received • Knowledge Sharing Attitudes – Individuals’ knowledge sharing intentions (IKSI)(Bock, Zmund, Kim, & Lee, 2005)
- 12. all ties among members
- 13. only “frequent” out-degree connections
- 15. Question M SD My knowledge sharing does … strengthen the ties between existing members in the organization and myself. 4.60 0.52 get me well-acquainted with new members in the organization. 4.20 0.42 expand the scope of my association with other members in the organization. 4.60 0.52 draw smooth cooperation from outstanding members in the future. 4.20 0.79 create strong relationships with members who have common interests in the organization. 4.60 0.52 […] My knowledge sharing with other organizational members is … good. 4.10 0.57 harmful. 1.50 0.53 an enjoyable experience. 4.60 0.52 valuable to me. 4.80 0.42 a wise move. 4.60 0.52 […] I always provide my manuals, methodologies and models for members of my organization. 4.40 0.52 I intend to share my experience or know-how from work with other organizational members more frequently in the future. 3.90 0.32 Note: Group A; N = 10 (50%); Likert scale 1 (strong disagreement) – 5 (strong agreement)
- 16. Conclusion a first preliminary idea of how educational innovators collaborate and spread their newly gained knowledge throughout an organization in “bottom-up” initiatives
- 17. Outlook • expand the scope to include a broader group of individuals from within an entire organization Groups B & C • cross comparison of initiatives – Park University • 2-year project innovate faculty development
Editor's Notes
- SNA allows to determine:an individuals position within a larger network draw possible conclusion on influence / prestige / impact of an individual on the networkwhether a network consists of smaller subsets (cliques) that work toegtehr more closely KSA are a valuable measure, because:providing the possibility to share information does not necessarily equate into an active participation of individuals KSA can help to determine factors supporting or inhibiting individuals' knowledge sharing attitudes
- Project initiators and managers have been able to connect all relevant project members. This looks quite promising and can be considered a „solid basis“ for effective knowledge exchange within the context of IKC. However, at this stage, this merely takes into account whether there have been a connection between individuals, which can range from „once, or twice“ to „very frequently“. NOTE: The difference between in- and out-degree ties is limited. It has therefore been decided (for the moment) to report both measures in aggregation.
- This figure represent only connections that have been indicated as „frequent“ and might therefore be considered as an indication of how the network structure looks like for the daily operations of the project (IKC).As can be seen:existence of two cliquesInterstingly, these two cliques are also geographically dispersed across Maastricht (divided by the river Maas):Upper leht-hand side – Medicine & Health SciencesLower right-hand side – Social SciencesBoth cliques have access to / included a set of „support staff“Project initiators appear to have taken the role of „catalysts“ initiating the project, connecting the relevant team members, and then gradually withdrawing from the daily operations.
- The data clearly indicate that the “spirit of sharing knowledge and experience” is deeply embedded in the members of group A which is a positive finding for the underlying IKCTeam members share knowledge not only because they want to share existing ties, but also to possibly “reach out” to other colleagues within the university make themselves heard and recognizable. Similarly, team members apparently consider sharing knowledge to be positive for basically two reasons:they enjoy the experiencethey consider it valuable and a wise move to takeTeam members seem to operating at the peek of their knowledge sharing activities while they indicate that they always share their insights, they (to a lesser extent) are planning to increase their efforts in the future.