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American Journal of Computer Science and Engineering
American Journal of Computer Science and EngineeringAmerican Journal of Computer Science and Engineering
American Journal of Computer Science and Engineering
2016; 3(2): 6-19
http://www.openscienceonline.com/journal/ajcse
Sharing of Tacit Knowledge in Organizations:
A Review
Haradhan Kumar Mohajan
Faculty of Business Studies, Premier University, Chittagong, Bangladesh
Email address
haradhan1971@gmail.com
To cite this article
Haradhan Kumar Mohajan. Sharing of Tacit Knowledge in Organizations: A Review. American Journal of Computer Science and
Engineering. Vol. 3, No. 2, 2016, pp. 6-19.
Received: June 5, 2016; Accepted: June 15, 2016; Published: July 1, 2016
Abstract
Knowledge is regarded as a strategic factor in knowledge management implementation. It is mainly divided into two types:
tacit and explicit. Tacit knowledge is created in the human mind as individual know-how and can be expressed as innovation. It
is unwritten, unspoken and hidden vast storehouse of knowledge of a person. It is obtained as a result of the direct interaction
between individuals and their peers in the organization. For the sustainable development of the modern global economy tacit
knowledge can play an important role. Acquire and extract of tacit knowledge is not a very easy task, since it is very complex
in its nature. The success and well-being of humankind is an essential issue in the twenty first century and use of tacit
knowledge makes the job easier. Management of tacit knowledge effectively and efficiently is a key success factor for the
organizations. The paper tries to discuss sharing of tacit knowledge for the sustaining of the long-term capabilities and
performance in organizations. It analyzes the importance and difficulties of sharing tacit knowledge. This paper also makes an
effort to explore the properties and characteristic of tacit knowledge thinking for the new readers.
Keywords
Explicit and Tacit Knowledge, Knowledge Sharing and Transfer, Polanyi, Nonaka
1. Introductions
Often we think that knowledge is a very simple theme. It is
as something that we can record it in words, visualized and
easily teach to other, but it is not always the case. In the 21
st
century knowledge becomes the most important resource and
vital part for organizations to sustain their competitive
advantages. For this, it is required to leverage knowledge
resources to develop strategic plans for economics and
business [112]. It is a changing method which interacts
among experiences, skills, facts, relations, values, and
thinking [71].
Ikujiro Nonaka and Hirotaka Takeuchi demanded that
knowledge is initiated from interaction among employees in
organizations [84]. Knowledge helps to create innovation
which in turn inspires economic growth and development. It
also contributes to establish sustainable long-term
capabilities and performance of organizations by enhancing
the success and well-being of individuals and communities
[42].
In organizations, knowledge is divided into two types:
explicit and tacit knowledge [79]. Although knowledge could
be classified into personal, internal and external, practical
and theoretical, shared and public, hard and soft, foreground
and background; the classification of tacit and explicit
knowledge remains the most common [90].
Data and information encoded, stored and disseminated are
known as content component of the explicit knowledge [64].
Explicit knowledge is know-what, which is easily coded,
transferred and shared within an organization [80]. It can be
expressed in words, sentences, and it includes theoretical
approaches, and easily articulated, communicated
information or reduced to writing. It is often impersonal and
formal in nature and frequently takes the form of documents,
memoranda, speeches, books, reports, white papers,
catalogues, presentations, patents, manuals, numbers and
formulas, process diagrams, mathematical expressions,
pictures and non-book media such as videos and software
among others, etc. It is easily captured, transferred and
shared with others without difficulties and can be stored in a
database or computer and disseminated with technology
American Journal of Computer Science and Engineering 2016; 3(2): 6-19 7
[79,80,81].
In brief, tacit knowledge is a knowledge that is not
explicated [15]. Tacit knowledge is highly personal, context-
specific, and is difficult to formalize and communicate or
transfer from one person to another by the process of writing
or verbal expression and is not captured by language or
mathematics and also difficult to reduce to writing and is
made up of mental models, values, beliefs, perceptions,
insights and assumptions [18,79,83,94]. It is rooted in an
individual’s experience and values. It is difficult to codify,
communicate, describe, replicate or imitate, because it is the
result of human experience and human senses. The skills of a
master cannot be learned from a textbook or even in a class,
but only through years of experience and apprenticeship
[1,79,81]. It frequently takes the form of analogies,
metaphors, stories, or personal strategies that reveal insight
into the how and why underlying an employee’s approach to
tasks or problems. It is unwritten, unspoken and hidden vast
storehouse of knowledge of a person and is based on one’s
observations, experience, emotions, intuition and internal
information. It is transferred and shared by observing
behavior, communicating or coordinating among employees
[1,79,81,83,84,105,106].
The experience, situation, conditions as perceived by
owner of the knowledge is the context component of tacit
knowledge [64]. It is a cornerstone in organizational
knowledge creation theory and covers knowledge that is
unarticulated and tied to the senses, movement skills,
physical experiences, intuition, or implicit rules of thumb.
Knowledge of wine tasting and crafting a violin are two
examples of tacit knowledge [85]. Other examples of tacit
knowledge are, speaking our own language; manage to ride a
bicycle, cook dishes without seeing a recipe [94]. Knowing
the right feel of bread dough before it goes into the oven is
another example of tacit knowledge [84].
Tacit knowledge is not just about experiences learned on
the job; it also comprises beliefs, values, attitudes, ideals, and
elements that are related to the culture of the individual. It is
much easier to understand and to remember than explicit
knowledge. People use metaphors, analogies, demonstrations
and stories to convey their tacit knowledge [43]. There are
many scopes of researches on explicit knowledge, but there
are very few scopes of researches on tacit knowledge. But,
tacit knowledge is the necessary component of all knowledge
[114].
Tacit knowledge may play an important role in the
strategic planning performance of managers and professional
staffs [7,13]. It is also important for the study of knowledge
management and provides competitive advantage [78].
The present economy is knowledge-based. Knowledge is
widely considered as the most important organizational
resource for the long-term sustainable competitive advantage
and success of any organization [84]. At present the scholars
have realized the importance of tacit knowledge to the
organizations and they observed that greater efforts must be
taken to influence on its huge prospective [6].
2. Literature Review
Tacit knowledge is first defined by philosopher, physician
and chemist Michael Polanyi as knowledge that cannot be
articulated or verbalized: ‘We know more than we can tell’
[94]. Tacit knowledge, in this sense, is a form of knowing that
is inseparable from action and cannot be communicated,
understood or used without the knowing subject. The
individual knower is the principal agent of knowledge
creation and application [87]. Tacit knowledge is made
visible through its application and can then be utilized in the
innovation process [57].
Ikujiro Nonaka, Ryoko Totama and Akiya Nagata
expressed that tacit knowledge is derived from personal
experience; it is subjective and difficult to formalize [82]. On
the other hand, Nonaka and Hirotaka Takeuchi confirmed
that tacit knowledge is often learned via shared and
collaborative experiences. They brought the concept closer to
business management by writing about knowledge creating
company in 1995 [84]. They argued that knowledge is
initiated from interaction among employees in organizations.
The Knowledge Creating Company of Nonaka and Takeuchi
in management is that when communication is conducted
from a person to a group, inside an organization and among
organizations, tacit knowledge and explicit knowledge
interact with each other. But this seems to be a little different
from Polanyi’s tacit knowledge [67]. Nonaka and Takeuchi
[84] have developed the knowledge spiral model in 1995 to
show interaction between tacit and explicit knowledge in an
organization for socialization, externalization, combination
and internalization (SECI), which helps synthesize subjective
knowledge and values into objective and socially shared
organizational knowledge.
I. L. Wu [123] showed that tacit knowledge of employees’
is consisted of their ideas, experience, and competencies. K.
Kreiner [54] demonstrates that tacit knowledge is the
antithesis of explicit knowledge, in that it is not easily
codified and transferred by more conventional mechanisms
such as documents, blueprints and procedures.
Osaki Masaru [67] reveals that tacit knowledge itself is
difficult to research, but it is essential to know as much as
possible about it. He also tries to make clear the structure of
tacit knowledge. Individual’s tacit knowledge is unique to
each person, and impossible to transmit and share with others.
J. C. Spender [107] classified knowledge to an individual
and a collective ways. He also classified knowledge in
different types used in organizations as: conscious knowledge
(explicit knowledge held by the individual), objectified
knowledge (explicit knowledge held by the organization),
automatic knowledge (preconscious individual knowledge),
collective knowledge (context dependent knowledge visible
in the practices of the organization).
Sirous Panahi, Jason Watson and Helen Partridge provided
that there are five major requirements to present tacit
knowledge sharing: i) observation, ii) experience sharing, iii)
social interaction, iv) informal relationship/networking, and v)
mutual trust [89].
8 Haradhan Kumar Mohajan: Sharing of Tacit Knowledge in Organizations: A Review
G. Hedlund and Nonaka [36] defined knowledge as being
constructed from ‘Cognitive perceptions as well as skills and
expertise embodied in products or services.’ They made the
distinction between the tacit, intuitive, non-verbalized
knowledge and the articulated as, ‘Specified either verbally
or in writing, computer programs and the like.’
B. Kogut and U. Zander [51] divided knowledge into two
categories: information and know-how. Information includes
facts, axiomatic propositions and symbols. Know-how is
accumulated practical skill or expertise that allows one to do
something smoothly and efficiently.
3. Objectives of the Study
The objective of the study is to discuss aspects of tacit
knowledge for the development of an organization. The
purpose of the research approach is to discuss:
meaning and aspects of tacit knowledge,
importance and problems of sharing of tacit knowledge,
and
properties and characteristics of tacit knowledge.
The aim of the present study is to improve the practices of
knowledge sharing activities in the organizations of
Bangladesh. A country will progress in quick development
when its citizens are cooperative in sharing knowledge. We
hope this article will be benefited the people of Bangladesh
as well as other nations of the world.
4. Methodology of the Study
Methodology of the study is the systematic procedure that
maps out the processes, approaches, techniques, research
procedures and instruments [53]. This is a review article. It is
prepared on the basis of secondary data. Helpful information
from different magazines, and articles published in different
journals were used in this research work. We have also used
websites, books, and various research reports to prepare the
paper. We have taken the help of different case studies to
make the study interesting to the readers. The study focuses
on how tacit knowledge can be captured, shared and
transferred in organizations.
5. Etymology and Historical
Perspectives on Tacit Knowing
The word tacit comes from the Latin word tacitus which
means silent. In common usage, most of the words which are
synonyms of tacit relate to ineffability are unsaid, unspoken,
unuttered, wordless, silent, undeclared, unexpressed and
unvoiced. They are also related to indirectness, such as,
implicit, implied, inferred, and understood. Tacit knowledge
is a qualifier of knowledge which means for something to be
silent in a linguistic sense, and what it means ‘to know
silently’ [99]. Hence, tacit knowledge implies that there is
knowledge within us that we act on but cannot explicitly
describe it and which is highly personal and context specific
and deeply rooted in individual experiences, values and
emotions.
Although Polanyi worked dominantly on tacit knowledge
in the 1950s, the concept of tacit knowledge has been
actively discussed since at least the time of the ancient
Greeks. The psychoanalytical concept of tacit knowledge
originates in the ideas of the philosophers Plato and Aristotle.
Aristotle is perhaps the first philosopher in the western
tradition to develop a theory about tacit knowledge [47].
In Nicomachean Ethics Aristotle manifested the relationship
of human ability and experience. He defined practical wisdom
as a virtue concerned with using experience to determine how
to best act in particular situations. Distinguishing between
practical and philosophic wisdom, he argues that ‘Each is a
virtue of a different part of the soul’ [3].
6. Tacit Knowledge
Tacit knowledge is difficult to write down, visualize or
transfer from one person to another [63]. It collects all those
things that we know-how to do but perhaps do not know-how
to explain. It is messy, job specific, difficult to study,
regarded as being of negligible epistemic worth. It is rooted
in context, experience, practice and values, and hard to
communicate, as it resides in the mind of the practitioner. It
is the best source of long-term competitive advantage and
innovation, and passes through socialization and is not
handled by well information technology (IT).
The concept of tacit knowledge in organizations has given
by many scholars [15]. Tacit knowledge plays an important
role in the knowledge-oriented research in management [92].
It is connected with terms such as skills, know-how, know-
why, working knowledge, high level of expertise [16]. It
embodies an individual’s education, natural talent, experience
and judgment [49].
The term tacit knowledge was first introduced into
philosophy by the Hungarian philosopher; physician and
chemist Michael Polanyi (1891–1976) in 1958 in his
magnum opus Personal Knowledge. He was born in
Budapest into an upper class Jewish family [93]. He
conducted research in Germany, England, the USA and
Canada. He famously summarizes the idea of tacit
knowledge in his book The Tacit Dimension with the
assertion that ‘We can know more than we can tell.’ He
strongly believes that creative acts are shot-through with
strong personal feelings and commitments [94]. He was
interested in the layers of knowledge which he called the tacit
dimension of knowledge. His concept of tacit knowledge is
an important contribution to the field of epistemology and
cognitive psychology [26]. He also expressed that it is the
‘Knowledge of untold portions which supports what is told.’
Tacit knowledge is unexternalizable and intransmittable
body knowledge, experience knowledge, subjective
knowledge or personal knowledge that a living person, not a
machine or a computer, has acquired inside the body [67]. It
consists of a range of conceptual and sensory information
and images that can be brought to bear in an attempt to make
American Journal of Computer Science and Engineering 2016; 3(2): 6-19 9
sense of something [38]. For example, how to drive a car
well is usually unconscious and quite hard to explain in detail.
Physicians can identify diseases by tacit knowledge.
Tacit knowledge is also technical or cognitive and is made
up of mental models, values, beliefs, perceptions, insights
and assumptions. Moreover it is demonstrated when someone
masters a specific body of knowledge or uses skills like those
gradually developed by master craftsmen [117]. Workplace
knowledge that we do not get from being taught, or from
books, paper, magazine, etc. but get from personal
experience [105]. Tacit knowledge is subdivided into two
categories [79]: i) expressible tacit knowledge, and ii)
inexpressible tacit knowledge.
Expressible tacit knowledge can be documented, but
certain factors commonly prevent documentation from
happening. Protecting individuals and organizations is often a
key factor in preventing documentation of expressible tacit
knowledge. Examples of expressible tacit knowledge include
personal information about staffs, colleagues and customers,
competitors, recipes and formulas, trade secrets, rules of
thumb, and tricks of the trade [79].
Inexpressible tacit knowledge is complex, intuitive, and
impossible to articulate fully in any form. Examples include a
masterful piano performance, Olympic cycling, expert animal
training and green-thumb gardening [79].
Tacit knowledge makes speakers fluent, lets scientists
understand each other, is the crucial part of what teachers
teach, makes bureaucratic life seem ordered, comprises the
skill in most sports and other physical activities, etc. It
currently lives a varied life in a range of academic disciplines,
including philosophy, psychology, sociology, management,
and economics; and by right, it ought to play a large part in
the world of artificial intelligence [15].
The definitions of tacit knowledge are given by the various
scholars as follows:
Tacit knowledge is highly personal and hard to formalize,
making it difficult to communicate or share with others. It is
deeply rooted in an individual’s actions and experience as
well as in the ideals, values or emotions he or she embraces
[81]. It represents knowledge based on the experience of
individuals, expressed in human actions in the form of
evaluation, attitudes, points of view, commitment and
motivation [82]. It consists of mental models, beliefs and
persuasions of each individual employee that are so ingrained
as to be taken for granted. It resides within the individual and
is difficult to express in words [70].
Tacit knowing describes the form in which we hold our
least communicable knowledge assets in the E-space [12]. It
has a personal quality that makes it hard to formalize and
communicate [120]. It is not easy to see or express, it is
highly personal and hard to formalize. It may well be rooted
in the individual’s experience, attitude, values and behavior
patterns [33].
Tacit knowledge includes the intuition, perspectives,
beliefs and values that peoples form as a result of their
experiences [100]. It entails information that is difficult to
express, formalize or share and it is unconsciously acquired
from the experiences one has while immersed in an
environment [60].
6.1. Michael Polanyi’s Tacit Knowledge
Polanyi gave concept of tacit knowledge in facial
recognition as, ‘We know a person’s face, and can recognize
it among a thousand, indeed a million. Yet we usually cannot
tell how we recognize a face we know, so most of this cannot
be put into words’ [94]. He invented the term tacit knowledge
to describe knowledge that has been embodied, embedded,
and is difficult to express [80,109]. Hence, all knowledge is
acquired by the knower by means of physical and mental
processes [26]. Polanyi says that the physical body is the
basis of our knowledge, intellectual as well as practical.
Polanyi [94] views tacit knowledge as the backdrop against
which actions are understood. He determined, ‘All knowing is
personal knowing’ [94]. Polanyi also states that every piece
of knowledge contains explicit and tacit dimensions and that
they are inseparable [94].
Polanyi [93] finds that tacit knowledge is a personal form
of knowledge, which individuals can only obtain from direct
experience in a given domain. Tacit knowing is an elusive
and subjective awareness of the individual cannot be
expressed in words. It is from Polanyi’s argument that
tacitness was evidently different from implicitness [90].
Polanyi [93] emphasizes the concepts of knowing what
and knowing how, and he indicates every bit of knowing
contains both of these aspects. In this respect, knowing what
describes something that is knowable, and knowing how
describes something that is only realizable in action. They are
two different things; one can be transferred discursively and
the other only through action. Polanyi wrote of tacit knowing
as a process focusing on the operationalization or how to of
tacit knowledge, rather than emphasizing what is tacit
knowledge. He emphasized that tacit knowing can provide a
useful structure for conceptual and empirical work
specifically in relation to developing understanding and
sharing of tacit knowledge [31]. Tacit knowing is a tacit
power, which is a fundamental power of the mind [95].
Hence, Polanyi has drawn attention to knowing, an activity,
which other writers also suggest should be the focus of tacit
knowledge studies [10].
Polanyi [94] believes that a large part of human knowledge
is tacit in nature and accessing it can present challenges. The
ineffable nature of knowledge was given by Socrates and
Plato [21]. The concept of tacit knowledge did not gain
widespread attention until the writings of Michael Polanyi
[94]. Polanyi observed that individuals in an array of settings
such as, arts, craftsmanship, manufacturing, medicine, sports,
often had a difficult time describing the principles on which
their actions were based. Specifically, Polanyi noted that it is
common for individuals to do something and simultaneously
be unable to explain how they did it [24]. For example,
swimmers stay afloat by regulating their breathing, yet most
swimmers are not aware of this nor can explain how they
alter their breathing to stay afloat. Polanyi wants to say that
individuals often ‘Know more than they can tell’ [94].
10 Haradhan Kumar Mohajan: Sharing of Tacit Knowledge in Organizations: A Review
Polanyi’s insights regarding the notion of tacit knowledge
was first introduced to the management literature by Nelson
and Winter [77] and later popularized by the promoters of the
knowledge-based view [84]. Polanyi also distinguished
between explicit and tacit knowledge [94]. The tacit
knowledge of Polanyi is called intuition by his collaborators
and students [67].
The main way to acquire it is through experience. Without
some form of shared experience, it is extremely difficult for
persons to share each other’s thinking processes [55]. For
example, riding a bike is a tacit knowledge. We may know
explicitly how to ride a bike but you cannot simultaneously
focus on the handle and at the same time orient yourself in
traffic [94].
Based on Polanyi’s approach, Collins classified tacit
knowledge [15] as; i) relational tacit knowledge, ii) somatic
tacit knowledge and iii) collective tacit knowledge.
Relational tacit knowledge is knowledge that can easily be
turned into explicit knowledge by social interaction with the
knower. Somatic tacit knowledge is knowledge that is
emblazoned in the substance of body and brain. Collective or
strong tacit knowledge is knowledge that can be attained by
individuals only if they are embedded in a group or society.
6.2. Know-how Type Tacit Knowledge
Many authors equate tacit knowledge with know-how,
which contrasts with knowing about something [21]. It could
be classified into two dimensions: i) the cognitive, and ii) the
technical dimension [35]. The technical dimension indicates
information and expertise in relation to know-how [33]. The
cognitive dimension is consist of mental models, beliefs,
ideals, values, schemata, and mental models that are deeply
ingrained in us, and that we often take for granted which
shapes the way we perceive the world. The technical
dimension encompasses the kind of informal personal skills
of crafts often referred to as know-how [86].
Lundvall and Johnson [62] defined it into four categories
of tacit knowledge as; know-how, know-what, know-who,
and know-why.
Know-what refers to knowledge about facts especially
things that we can actually call information. It is the
consistent set of design basics and indicates the meaning,
classification, design specifications, design tasks, and design
attributes. The experts must have a big quantity of this
knowledge in order to fulfill their job. It is useful to extract
the declarative knowledge. Doctors and lawyers possess to
this category of knowledge [5,62].
Know-why refers to scientific knowledge of the principles
and laws of nature. It is useful in justification. Here
knowledge is the core ingredient that underlies technological
development and product and process advances in most
industries. This knowledge can be developed through the
university and industry collaboration [5].
Know-how is the capability of doing something. It refers
to the software designer expertise and the software design
standards. Business environment relies on the individual
knowledge to make the right decision. Know-how is typically
a kind of knowledge developed and kept within the border of
an individual firm. Know-how requires some know-what
(networking) and sometimes some know-why (science),
which is the understanding of basic principles and laws of
nature. It is important to extract the procedural knowledge.
‘How to make a curry’ is an example of know-how type
knowledge [5,62].
Finally, know-who refers to the specific social relations
held by an individual; it is knowledge about who knows what
and can do what. This kind of knowledge is internal to the
organization to a higher degree than any other kind of
knowledge. It is significant in economies where skills are
widely dispersed because of a highly developed division of
labor among organizations and experts. Know-what and
know-why are similar in the sense that they can be stored,
reproduced, and exchanged fairly easily. But this is not the
case for know-who and know-how [5,62].
6.3. The Importance of Tacit Knowledge
From the ancient period it is believed that capital, raw
material and labor are the main source for creating and
applying knowledge. At present knowledge is considered as
an exceptional fund of indescribable economic resources and
the dominant source of long-term competitive advantage [43].
It is true that knowledge has been of decisive importance in
the development of humankind [121]. Knowledge is an
important asset for countries as it provides potential for
economic and social development by providing low cost and
effective ways for service provision and production of goods
while leading to globalization and competitiveness
internationally [122].
It is essential for making the right business decisions as
well as for innovation and expertise plays a vital role in
innovative processes [48].
Tacit knowledge is an intangible asset that is not subject to
the law of diminishing returns and its value increases as more
people share it [56]. The importance of tacit knowledge has
been pointed out in relation to decision-making, time-
management, quality and competitiveness in organizations.
Tacit knowledge is the most strategically important resource
of an organization. It is renewable and sustainable base for an
organization’s activities and competitiveness [81]. It is
important because expertise rests on it and it is a source of
competitive advantage as well as being critical to daily
management [82]. About 90% of the knowledge in any
organization is embedded and synthesized in tacit form. It
plays a key role in influencing the overall effectiveness of
knowledge in organizations [117]. The importance of tacit
knowledge is not only as a form of competitive advantage
and as strategy but also as related to learning, innovation and
product development [44,54,55].
That value creating capability resides in the tacit
knowledge of the engineers, managers and marketing staff
and this dynamic tacit knowledge capability creates
sustainable competitive advantage [20].
Processing, sharing and using tacit knowledge is an
essential and unavoidable issue of every organization. It is
American Journal of Computer Science and Engineering 2016; 3(2): 6-19 11
very difficult for an organization to capture, share and store
tacit knowledge than explicit knowledge [65]. Due to global
economic growth many organizations gave importance of
maintaining tacit knowledge sharing environment. The aim
of tacit knowledge sharing is to exchange existing personal
knowledge in order to create new knowledge [74]. The
systematic process for acquiring, organizing, sustaining and
renewing tacit knowledge of employees has enabled
organizations to survive in a robust economy [75].
Tacit knowledge is the main body of organizational
knowledge with a priority and is the key to form the
individual and organizational innovation capability [59]. It is
the most valuable and significant part of human knowledge
existed. It plays an important role to improve individual and
organizational productivity and competitive advantage. In
organizations it is considered as an important asset for
efficient production of goods, smoothness in productivity,
improving quality of work, decision making, organization
learning, productivity, competitiveness, serving customers,
producing goods, accuracy of task performance and major
time saving for individuals and organizations [1, 35,102].
The efficiency of making decisions, production capacity,
customer serving and the accuracy of task performance can
be improved by the use of tacit knowledge. It increases the
smoothness of work and increases the quality of the work
[13].
Tacit knowledge is valuable, heterogeneous among firms,
and difficult to imitate, it has the potential to provide firms
with a sustained competitive advantage [24].
7. Properties and Characteristic of
Tacit Knowledge
Properties of tacit knowledge can be written as follows
[17,35,49,68,72,91]:
it resides in human minds and also in relations,
it is unstructured, difficult to see, codify, estimate,
investigate, formalize, write down, capture and
communicate accurately,
it is acquired by sharing experiences, observation,
imitation and face-to-face discussion,
it is difficult to learn: learnt through personal experience,
practice, apprenticeship, observation, imitation, and
reflection,
it has ability to adapt and collaborate,
it is rooted in action, procedures, commitment, values
and emotions, etc.,
coaching and mentoring is necessary to transfer it,
it is rarely documented, highly individual, personal and
hard to formalize,
it is less familiar, unconventional form of knowledge,
learnt through experiences, skills, observation, intuitive
feeling, mental modes, beliefs, and values,
it can deal with new and exceptional situations
it is experience based (knowledge-inaction),
it is mostly unconscious and invisible knowledge (both
known and unknown to the holder),
it is non-communicable in a language,
it is transferred through conversation, storytelling,
discussions, analogies, and demonstrations, and,
it is subjective, know-how, know-why, care-why,
practical, job specific, experience-based, context-
specific, here and now, and expert’s knowledge.
The main characteristic of tacit knowledge is the
elementary belief that knowledge is personal in its nature
[108]. Tacit knowledge is sometimes called useful knowledge
by social scientists. R. J. Sternberg and J. A. Horvath define
it as practical intelligence. They believe that it has the
following three characteristics [110]:
you acquire it mostly by yourself,
it is about how to do things, and
it is practically useful.
Polanyi [94] and McInerney [69] represented the
characteristic of tacit knowledge as follows: Tacit knowledge
is subconscious, personal, difficult to articulate, perceived,
unaware, experienced based, shared through conversation,
embedded in stories, escapes observation. It is based on
insights and understandings, judgments, assumptions,
relationships, norms and values and organizational culture.
Davenport and Prusak [18] describe some of the
characteristics of tacit knowledge that make it a challenge to
transfer.
1. It is difficult to encode in a document or database.
2. It is developed and internalized over a long period of
time within a specific cultural environment.
3. Often the knower is not aware they know it or that it is
valuable to others.
4. Some knowledge cannot be represented outside the
human mind.
According to W. H. A. Johnson the characteristics of tacit
knowledge are as follows [45]:
Personal knowledge: Tacit knowledge is part of an
individual’s understanding and it is tied to other personal
understandings and it can also be shared with others. This
shared tacit knowledge is often conceptualized as being
organizational knowledge [84].
Tacit qualities: Tacit knowledge constitutes knowledge
that is unarticulated and implicit. When talking about the
tacit qualities of tacit knowledge we also have to take into
consideration the subconscious nature of tacit knowledge.
Path dependency: Tacit knowledge depends on personal
experience. The accumulation of tacit knowledge requires
time, but its usage depends on the propensity to utilize
intuition.
Context dependency: This characteristic is closely related
to the path dependency, but context is more related to a place,
a destination.
Embeddedness: Skills like riding a bike is only learned by
practice. The tacit knowledge of an expert can be passed on
through apprenticeship. The apprentice uses both observation
and imitative behavior.
12 Haradhan Kumar Mohajan: Sharing of Tacit Knowledge in Organizations: A Review
8. Sharing and Transferring of Tacit
Knowledge
The terms knowledge sharing and knowledge transfer are
often used interchangeably in the literature to refer to aspects
of a larger tacit knowledge conversion process [22].
Knowledge sharing is the process by which knowledge held
by an individual is converted into a form that can be
understood, absorbed and used by other individuals through
channels or networks between knowledge providers and
seekers [40].
Tacit knowledge is more difficult to transfer rather than
explicit knowledge, because explicit knowledge is theory-
based and transmitted in formal, systematic language [80].
Nonaka and Konno [81] stated that converting tacit
knowledge to explicit knowledge using a process of
externalization before sharing can take place. On the other
hand, Polanyi [94] suggest that to be able to share tacit
knowledge the possessor of it must first become conscious of
the knowledge he possesses and then find a way to express
the knowledge. Only after this occurs can a sharing of
knowledge take place.
Tacit knowledge is rarely shared and communicated
because it is subjective and intuitive in nature and it is lost
when the employee possessing it leaves the organization [88].
As the tacit knowledge is always stored in peoples’ brains,
sharing of tacit knowledge is difficult, complex, time
consuming and one of the biggest challenges of KM [37,71].
For example, the ability to speak a language, knead dough,
play a musical instrument or design and use complex
equipment require all sorts of knowledge that is not always
known explicitly, even by expert practitioners, and which is
difficult or impossible to explicitly transfer to other users
[119].
About two-thirds of the information received at work is
transformed into tacit knowledge through the face-to-face
interaction such as informal conversations, direct interaction,
stories, mentoring, networking, internships and
apprenticeships [43,84,113].
Tacit Knowledge is transferred through observing behavior,
communicating or coordinating among employees. Hence, it
is a complex procedure which requires communication
among coworkers to capture knowledge [74].
To transfer tacit knowledge we require extensive personal
contact, regular interaction and trust. It is sometimes captured
when the knowledge holder joins a network or a community
practice [32]. It can only be revealed through practice in a
particular context and transmitted through social networks
[101].
It is important to create and shape relationships among
coworkers and various social networks that assist tacit
knowledge exchange among the individuals within a project
[28]. There are two processes of sharing tacit knowledge [11]:
i) directly by personal contacts with other employees, and ii)
indirectly through information and communication
technology (ICT).
The direct interaction of tacit knowledge is performed
through the collaborative of knowledge sharing among the
members of the organization. It also shared through
apprenticeship, face-to-face meetings, initiating meetings
among employees who need to cooperate and direct
observation [27,65]. Tacit Knowledge is implanted in social
relations and is transferred through direct contact and
observation of behavior [9].
ICT facilitates sharing of tacit knowledge. For example, it
is shared through expert systems, extranets and intranets, e-
mail, databases, videoconferences, teleconferences, real or
virtual bulletin boards and collaboration software like
groupware, but is not able to replace direct contact and
mutual relations among employees [50,65]. Social
networking and online discussion forums can share, critique
and validate their collective empirical knowledge easily
among individuals and organizations. Wikis and blogs have
been used by successful organizations as effective tools to
transfer tacit knowledge [2,56].
Tacit knowledge sharing can be performed by the
following methods and practices [65]:
1) Employees and management meetings, where current
problems and ways of solving them are discussed.
2) Different types of mentoring and coaching.
3) Reports from projects that failed and presenting them to
the board meetings or other employee groups.
4) Developing and providing best practices databases to
employees.
5) Sharing of knowledge accumulated on previous work
stations.
6) Rotation of staff in various workstations.
7) Pursuit of training a successor.
8) Participation in task teams.
9) Visits by employees in other departments in order to
learn.
10) Education system of managerial staffs by the practice
in various company units.
11) Teams of individual learning managers.
12) Transfer of knowledge by employees who took part in
training other staff members.
13) Analysis of the reports prepared by the sellers and the
people involved in client services.
14) Organizing knowledge fairs.
15) Boxes of submitting rationalization projects and ideas
of employees.
8.1. Tacit Knowledge Sharing in Education
University teachers can improve their teaching skill and
researching knowledge by the sharing of tacit knowledge.
The reasonability of a university teacher reflects not only the
specialization and research but also the teaching and
cultivating talents [103]. The tacit knowledge is naturally
reflected in the process of teaching and researching, is
valuable as well as competitive for the university teachers
[115].
In the decision-making process of tacit knowledge sharing,
university teachers would weigh the potential risks and
values when they share their own knowledge with others [96].
American Journal of Computer Science and Engineering 2016; 3(2): 6-19 13
Tacit knowledge sharing processes in education are four
types as [124]: i) peer review, ii) learning community, iii)
thumb-a-lift, and iv) academic conference.
Peer review: It is a standard practice of tacit knowledge
sharing that would encounter teachers when they submit
journal articles, case studies, books and apply for sponsorship
of scientific foundation or evaluate the quality of teaching,
etc. It is a necessary process for the continuing development
of teacher at working on research or teaching [104]. The peer
reviewers can read and share others’ teaching skills which are
important for improving skills and innovativeness. On the
other hand, the peer-reviewed teachers can gain feed-back
suggestions and advices to improve their teaching and
research. But the process of peer review is highly risky. The
unreasonable criticism, advices and suggestions from some
impertinent peer reviewers may mislead the research
orientations of scholars [124].
Learning community: This is formed by a group of
teachers who share academic ideas, skills, methods,
experience and attitudes through tacit knowledge sharing
[97]. The cooperation among teachers with different
characters can share properly and motivate creative ideas and
solve the problems. Teachers can construct emotional
connections with who own different knowledge, capability
and skills and can build academic reputation in the research
field to fulfill self-worth and social value by contributing
knowledge. The dynamic scale and scope of learning
community guarantee the quality, efficiency, stability and
continuity of tacit knowledge sharing among teachers.
Teachers also may face low risks in learning community in
terms of culture, mechanism, platform, tool and organization
when the learning community is only shaped but not
connected [124].
Thumb-a-lift: It exists in the tacit knowledge sharing
activities of teachers. Academic forum, teaching blogs and
discussion space are example of thumb-a-lift. When many
teachers log on some online learning and discussion webs to
gain information and knowledge, but most of them do not
contribute their own knowledge. The distrust and reservation
of teachers make individual tacit knowledge sharing difficult.
The members who have a lot of knowledge and strong
willingness to share knowledge would leave the organization
and the lower level teachers would fill the organization [124].
Academic conference: It is a popular mode of tacit
knowledge sharing for teachers [111]. Many teachers prefer to
communicate through international or national academic
conferences to know other teacher’s new views and opinions.
But they always cannot find proper research achievements that
match with their interests. Sometimes the standard of the
academic papers published in conferences is always not as
good as the papers published in journals. Many researchers
would introduce their achievements, but they would not expect
to gain many suggestions and advices. As a result there are
problems about quality, depth and scope of the tacit knowledge
sharing in academic conferences. The risk with tacit
knowledge sharing through academic conference is low [124].
8.2. Tacit Knowledge Sharing in
Construction Industry
The construction industry is considered as one of the
knowledge-based value creating sectors of the modern
economy. Sharing of tacit knowledge helps to solve the
knowledge management (KM) problems in construction
organizations [90].
In a construction project, Architecture, Engineering and
Construction (AEC) firms rely on their experiences,
professional intuition, and other forms of tacit knowledge to
complete the work satisfactorily. The experienced workers
share their tacit knowledge and experiences with apprentices
through a form of storytelling and communities of practice
[14].
The importance of tacit knowledge within the construction
industry can be expressed as: i) due to intrinsic
characteristics of the construction industry, and ii) the
popularization of the ‘knowledge worker’ concept [90]. Most
cases the tacit knowledge of construction employees has
often been ignored or gave less importance and inadequate
empirical studies conducted in the construction industry [25].
Kolb’s four-stage cognitive model explains the learning is
cyclical, which closely resembles tacit knowledge generation
and utilization in construction employees. The model is
represented as [52]:
Experience: It provides the basis for the tacit knowledge
generation process such as, active involvement.
Reflection: It gains an understanding of the current
experiences and processes it in a way that makes sense of the
experience.
Exploration: It assimilates and distils the observations and
reflections into theory.
Action: It is based upon knowledge gained, develops a way
to use and start to put into action.
8.3. Difficulties of Sharing Tacit Knowledge
The difficulties of sharing tacit knowledge can be related
to perception and language, time, value, and distance [81].
Perception and language: It is considered as the main
difficulties in sharing tacit knowledge. Staffs may be
unaware of what they have learned from a project and what
aspects of their learning could be useful to others. Perception
is the characteristic of unconsciousness about a problem for
not being aware of the full range of the knowledge. Another
difficulty with language lies in the fact that intangible tacit
knowledge is held in a non-verbal form [93].
Time: Time increases challenges for sharing tacit
knowledge. Staffs do not have the time to make knowledge
available, to share it with others, teach and mentor others, or
to use their information and innovate. The speed of present
business world increases and time becomes a scarce resource.
The internalization of tacit knowledge requires a long time
both for individual and organization, which causes
difficulties of sharing tacit knowledge [8].
Value: It creates difficulties in sharing tacit knowledge. In
the globalized world knowledge has become a valuable asset
14 Haradhan Kumar Mohajan: Sharing of Tacit Knowledge in Organizations: A Review
for the development of an organization. But unfortunately
many forms of tacit knowledge, such as intuition and rule-of-
thumb, have not been considered valuable [125].
Distance: At present distance raises difficulties in
workplace. The need for face-to-face interaction into more
distant is often creates difficulties for sharing of tacit
knowledge [57].
8.4. Problems of Sharing of Tacit Knowledge
The capture, transfer and sharing of tacit knowledge is not
an easy task [56]. Employees in an organization know
valuable information of that organization but sharing of this
information throughout the organization is a great challenge.
Sharing of tacit knowledge may cause risks to an individual.
For example, for this an individual may loss of competitive
advantage over peers or it may provide incomplete or having
a questionable track record [109]. To reduce these risks,
Nahapiet and Ghoshal [76] provided a theoretical model
linking trust and knowledge exchange. They suggested that
trust may be a multi-dimensional construct that includes
distinct cognitive and relationship based components. Lucas
[61] observed that both interpersonal trust and reputation of
knowledge recipients and sources explained variance in
employee knowledge transfer.
Capturing tacit knowledge is not a straight forward routine
and requires an extensive time commitment, tools and
methods [4]. Three key areas that challenge the application
and management of tacit knowledge in organizations are
identified as: i) the individual, ii) organizational, and iii)
technological barriers [39, 46, 56].
Individual barrier: We have mentioned that tacit
knowledge is individualist. At the individual level,
individual’s personality, temperament, attitude, interpersonal
skills and pride of ownership by an individual as factors that
hindered the management of tacit knowledge. In some cases
individuals shy away from sharing their knowledge at the
risk of exposing their knowledge [4]. Lack of time to identify
colleagues and share knowledge, low awareness of the
benefits of possessed knowledge to others, poor interpersonal
skills, fender, lack of social networking and differences in
culture, race and value system as some of the individual
barriers to tacit knowledge sharing [98].
Organizational barrier: Leadership in any organization is
worked for the development of processes and strategies in
that organization to succeed in the business environment. But
leaders in some organizations are barriers to tacit knowledge
sharing, because they create bureaucratic and hierarchical
organizational structures that are inflexible and hence hinders
the transfer of knowledge within the organizations [46].
Trust creates relationships among employees in an
organization in order for tacit knowledge to be shared. But in
most organizations trust is broken where individuals take
credit without acknowledging the source of the knowledge
[4,39].
Restructuring and downsizing also leads to loss of valuable
tacit knowledge in organizations. Valuable tacit knowledge is
lost when skill and expert members exit the organization
without having their knowledge documented [41].
Other organizational barriers are; internal competitiveness
amongst employees business in units or functional areas,
high turnover, limited company resources that do not
encourage knowledge sharing, top down communication,
lack of transparency within the organization, lack of highly
skilled and experienced staff, inflexible organizational
structures a top-down communication and knowledge flow
[39,98].
Technological barrier: Technology has changed the way
organizations operate as it has provided means to instant
access to information and data over long distances. But
technology does not operate in a vacuum and organizations
today are adapting the use of hybrid solutions to facilitate
knowledge sharing [98].
Sometimes technology is a challenge that obstructs the
application and management of tacit knowledge.
Organizations have simply invested ICT systems and
processes that are a mismatch with the intended users, heavy
reliance on technology by employees that are unrealistic,
little or no training of employees on ICT systems and
processes, reluctance by the same employees to use
technology due to lack of familiarity, and maintenance of the
said ICT systems [4,56].
8.5. Benefits of Sharing Tacit Knowledge
The transfer of tacit knowledge is beneficial for all
organizations. Basis of KM is transfer of individual or
collective skill into codified form [19].
Tacit knowledge sharing provides sustainable competitive
advantage to develop tangible assets as an intellectual capital
[58].
Knowledge sharing can be characterized by the transfer of
a total of knowledge from one person to another. For the
maximum benefits the employees of the organizations should
share knowledge with each other. Sharing of tacit knowledge
among the employees is beneficial for the organizations.
Hence tacit knowledge sharing is vital both for individuals
and organizations.
Tacit knowledge is credited for substantial and measurable
increase of organizational efficiency [30]. Wagner and
Sternberg [116] asserted that the ability to acquire and
manage tacit knowledge is hallmarks of managerial success.
9. Management of Tacit Knowledge
The concept of knowledge management (KM) is relatively
new and highlights how the management of knowledge is
just as important as managing resources. It is a new area of
management in the era of knowledge economy. KM is the
management of information and knowledge and their usage
in organizational business processes within the organization.
KM indicates strategies and processes designed to identify,
capture, structure, value, leverage, and share an
organization’s intellectual assets to enhance its performance
and competitiveness [73].
KM deals with the creation, use, reuse, dissemination of
American Journal of Computer Science and Engineering 2016; 3(2): 6-19 15
Knowledge. For effective KM in competition agencies, both
tacit and explicit knowledge approaches should be
considered. S. Gueldenberg and H. Helting expressed that
both tacit and explicit knowledge are complementary and
they are interrelated and play parallel role in knowledge
process and creation [34].
The tacit knowledge approach to KM focuses on
understanding the kinds of knowledge that individuals have
within a competition agency, moving individuals to transfer
knowledge within a competition agency, and managing
knowledge creators and carriers [105].
Tacit KM is a fruitful step to improve human capital in
organizations. But many organizations do not have a clear
idea of how to improve human capital with local and global
competitors [66]. KM techniques by tacit knowledge are,
personalization, knowledge sharing networks, communities
of practice, brainstorming, action learning, post-project
reviews, etc. [23,118]
.
In recent years tacit knowledge has been used by theorists
as an important part in the process of KM [29].
The main causes of loss of tacit knowledge by individual
level are: lay-off and termination, amnesia, retirement or
death.
10. Conclusion
In this study we have discussed various sides of tacit
knowledge. Tacit knowledge is a dynamic process as it
depends on individuals’ attributes and social relationships.
The theoretical findings in the study show that tacit
knowledge strategy seems more appropriate for the
organizations, but explicit knowledge should not be ignored.
Organizations should emphasize on tacit knowledge and use
explicit knowledge in a supporting role. We have shown that
sharing and transferring of tacit knowledge is essential for
the local and global economical development. We also
discuss the difficulties of sharing tacit knowledge. In the 21
st
century knowledge becomes an important asset of an
organization. Hence, we should be conscious about the
sharing of tacit knowledge properly in the organizations.
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