In this inter-session break, the Knowledge Management Research Center at the Faculty of Information has organized two interesting sessions to which the community is invited.

On April 20th (1100h-1230h) Rivadávia (Riva) C. Drummond a visiting scholar from Brazil will speak about The Management Of Knowledge In The Brazilian Organizational Context: A Shift Towards The Management Of "Ba".

On May 4th (1100h-1230h) Dr Hazel Hall, Reader in Social Informatics, Centre for Social Informatics, Edinburgh Napier University will speak about Information sharing as social exchange in online environments.

These sessions will be held in room 728. These sessions are open to members and friends of the Faculty of Information and KMDI communities.

More details on these two presentations are below:

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April 20th, 2009: The Management Of Knowledge In The Brazilian Organizational Context: A Shift Towards The Management Of "Ba"

Dr. Rivadávia Correa Drummond de Alvarenga Neto is Professor at Fundação Dom Cabral, a Brazilian business school ranked the 16th best business school in the world and the best one in Latin America according to the Financial Times Executive Education ranking 2008. He holds a PhD in Information Science from Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais Federal - UFMG, Brazil.

Rivadávia speaks regularly on the subject of knowledge management and he conducted the first in depth qualitative study within the Brazilian organizational context in 2005. The results of this study will be presented and discussed along with case studies conducted in the last 8 years of research.

Since 2001 he's been working with many international firms, such as Petrobras, Embrapa, ONS, Astra Zeneca, Linde, ABN Amro Bank, Anglo American, among others.

His newest book has just been released in Brazil (Knowledge Management in Organizations, Editora Saraiva, São Paulo, Brazil, 2008).

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May 4th, 2009: Information sharing as social exchange in online environments

Dr Hazel Hall, Reader in Social Informatics, Centre for Social Informatics, Edinburgh Napier University, EH10 5DT, UK 

[address removed]

@hazelh 

Abstract

In 2001 Hall suggested that social exchange theory might provide a suitable theoretical framework to account for information sharing behavior in online environments (Hall, 2001; Hall, 2003). However, empirical work undertaken in a large multinational, where an intranet was deployed as the main channel for information and knowledge sharing, offered only limited evidence to support this view. Here elements of exchange theory, as drawn directly from the domain of economics, were deemed more appropriate (Hall, 2002).

Two further studies of online information sharing behavior were conducted to investigate whether exchanges might be motivated differently in environments where participants are not salaried staff. Blogging tools were provided to students in a university setting as the main locale for the discussion of theoretical class content. Analysis of a range of data collected from the two most recent cohorts of students (including patterns of their online exchanges) supports the view that social exchange theory can explain non-economic transactions between actors (Bignoux, 2006, p. 619). From these findings it is evident that established social connections, as well as proximity in the physical world, translate to a greater willingness for individuals to share information with others online. For example, students in established friendship pairs at the start of the course were more likely to reciprocate comments on one another's blog entries than those who were not. Added to this there was evidence of the development of a gift economy across the class blogosphere as students made decisions as to with whom they would discuss the theoretical content of the class.

As well as providing an opportunity to consider the role of social exchange theory as an explanatory factor for information sharing practice, the paper prompts consideration of the conditions conducive to the encouragement of participation in online learning environments with reference to both external interventions as incentives, and the internal management of social capital.

References

Bignoux, S. (2006). Short-term strategic alliances: a social exchange perspective. Management Decision, 44(5), 615-627.

Hall, H. (2001). Social exchange for knowledge exchange. Paper presented at the International Conference on Managing Knowledge, University of Leicester, April 10-11 2001.

Hall, H. (2002). Sharing capability: the development of a framework to investigate knowledge sharing in distributed organizations. In Proceedings of the Third European Conference on Organizational Knowledge, Learning and Capabilities, 5-6 April, Athens, Greece (CD ROM). Athens: Alba.