Information Technology-enabled Knowledge Sharing in Multinational Strategic Alliances: Media Richness – Task Relevance Fit

This paper reports on ongoing research investigating IT-enabled knowledge sharing mechanisms in multinational strategic alliances within construction. First, the concept of media richness is introduced, which argues that the characteristic of a communication medium significantly determines how successfully that medium can share knowledge between participants. Second, the importance of task relevance is identified, emphasising that the success of a knowledge sharing mechanism is determined by how relevant the content of the message is to the receiver’s work. These two themes are integrated to offer a media richness – task relevance fit model.