Tacit to explicit: an interplay shaping organization knowledge

Purpose – Aims to study the role tacit knowledge plays in shaping the knowledge base of the knowledge-intensive growing organizations using the storytelling method. Design/methodology/approach – Stories were collected from eight human resource professionals working in eight different knowledge-intensive growing organizations in New Zealand. Interviews containing loosely structured questions were used for collecting stories. These stories were deconstructed on the knowledge grid. This grid attempted to depict a complex interplay of tacit knowledge with the important subsystems (referred to as threads) of organization. Findings – Tacit knowledge seemed to be a major concern for the human resource professionals in knowledge-intensive growing organizations. It plays a significant role in shaping the knowledge base of an organization by interacting with the important subsystems of organization. Research limitations/implications – There is a need to study ways of reducing the risk of being dependent on tacit knowledge of a few employees. Technology is needed that would be able to effectively capture the multidimensional interplay of tacit knowledge with important subsystems of organization. Practical implications – Knowledge being a strategic input in knowledge-intensive growing organizations, there is a need to address major concerns related to tacit knowledge that these organizations specifically face due to their knowledge-intensive nature. Originality/value – Tacit knowledge interacts with the important subsystems of an organization, thereby shaping its knowledge base. This paper attempts to demonstrate that tacit knowledge operates in multidimensional contexts.