Suresh, R H and Egbu, C O (2004) Knowledge mapping: Concepts and benefits for a sustainable urban environment. In: Khosrowshahi, F (ed.) Proceedings of 20th Annual ARCOM Conference, 1-3 September 2004, Edinburgh, UK.
Abstract
Competition and globalisation are putting terrific pressure on organisations to provide a better quality service, to improve the speed to market, and to improve organisational agility and innovation. As organisations try to meet these challenges, they need to be innovative to produce the knowledge intensive services desired by their customers. As an organisation's knowledge base comes to light, it is valued as both organisational intellectual capital and a source of competitive advantage. However, as the amount and depth of organisational knowledge increases, it poses some challenges to an organisation. The key challenges for knowledge intensive organisations are how to identify, map, assimilate, disseminate, and apply knowledge; particularly the mapping of knowledge between different users with different perspectives and purposes. This is especially true with the move towards a sustainable built environment. The knowledge map is a picture of what exists in an organisation or a network. Therefore, it can be used as a tool to evaluate the organisation's knowledge stock; revealing strengths to be exploited and gaps that need to be filled. This paper is based, primarily, on a review of literature as part of an on-going study of Knowledge Management and Change Management within a Sustainable Urban Environment (SUE). It presents the concepts of knowledge mapping, some of its potential benefits, and the main challenges and issues associated with knowledge mapping initiatives within SUE. It also looks at the role of Information and Communication Technologies, which might be of assistance in this regard. The paper concludes that mapping and managing knowledge assets in SUE is an integrated and complex process. This involves social, cultural, financial, and technological considerations. The paper also notes that knowledge mapping can be of immense benefit in a wide range of activities in a sustainable urban environment. It is recommended that more research effort needs to be targeted on how to improve the process of mapping, communicating and using sustainability knowledge across and within organisations.
| Item Type: | Conference Paper (Paper) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | information technology; knowledge management; knowledge mapping; sustainable urban environment |
| Index terms: | knowledge base, competitive advantage, information and communication technology, change management, mapping, globalization, built environment, competition, information technology, knowledge management, urban environment |
| Subjects: | management, spatial and geospatial analysis, professional development, market analysis, infrastructure and transport systems, information systems, economic factors, urban sustainability, computing systems |
| Topics: | International Construction, Digital Applications, Urban Studies, Organizational Design, Research Practice, Information Management |
| Descriptive scope: | 2 PC |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here