Readiness for Knowledge Management, Methods and Environments for Innovation

Knowledge is the key for all organisations and the success of many of them depends on the effective deployment and continual enhancement of their knowledge base so as to be innovative and to remain/become competitive (Hamburg & Widmaier, 2004). As great challenges loom large for the world economy the need to manage company knowledge becomes more acute. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are socially and economically important, since they represent 99% of all enterprises in the EU, provide around 65 million jobs and contribute to entrepreneurship and innovation. But many European SMEs are not ready for significant international social and economic changes (European Comission, 2003; Amtsblatt, 2003; Attwell et al., 2003; abstraCt