Knowledge Management Strategies for Virtual Organisations

Much has been written about the virtual organisation and the impact this will have on organisational forms, processes and tasks for the 21st Century. There has been little written about the practicalities of managing this virtual organisation and managing virtual change. The ability of the organisation to change or to extend itself as a virtual entity will reflect the extent to which an understanding of virtual concepts has been embedded into the knowledge management of the virtual organisation as a Virtual Organisational Change Model (VOCM). Managing these change factors is essential to gain and maintain strategic advantage and to derive virtual value. The authors expand these concepts by using the example of organisations using Information and Communications Technology (ICT) and illustrate the three levels of development mode – virtual work, virtual sourcing, and virtual encounters and their relationship to knowledge management, individually, organisationally and community wide through the exploitation of ICT.