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Knowledge management in development projects

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conference contribution
posted on 2008-11-07, 16:49 authored by Chimay J. Anumba, M. Sohail (Khan)
The effective management of knowledge is now recognised as a vehicle through which the construction industry can address its need for innovation and improved business performance. The failure to capture and transfer project knowledge, which is usually buried in unread reports and arcane filing systems, or lost because people move on, leads to the increased risk of ‘reinventing the wheel’, wasted activity, and impaired project performance. Knowledge is therefore considered vital in creating competitive advantage in the new economy. Much of the growth in many global firms has been credited to knowledge, as new technologies and innovations are applied to the market and workplace. Knowledge management is therefore increasingly seen as an integral part of an organization’s competitive strategy as it facilitates continuous improvement through learning and innovation. This is now increasingly recognised by most sectors of industry, with many organisations appointing a Knowledge Manager or Business Improvement Manager, with responsibility for articulating and implementing the organisation’s knowledge management strategy. This paper argues that knowledge management is equally important in development projects and advocates the application of knowledge management practices to these projects. It introduces the key phases in knowledge management (creation, storage, sharing, modification, etc.) and explores how these can be implemented in development projects. The application of knowledge management to development projects is expected to result in numerous benefits including the transfer of lessons learned from one project to another, improved transfer of knowledge between developed countries and developing countries, and better management of human resources. This paper starts with a review of key knowledge management concepts, and outlines some of the characteristics of development projects. It then discusses the potential for knowledge management in development projects and concludes with a summary of the practical benefits to be gained.

History

School

  • Architecture, Building and Civil Engineering

Research Unit

  • Water, Engineering and Development Centre (WEDC)

Published in

WEDC Conference

Citation

ANUMBA, C.J. and SOHAIL (KHAN), M., 2003. Knowledge management in development projects. IN: Harvey, P. (ed.). Towards the millennium development goals : actions for water and environmental sanitation : proceedings of the 29th WEDC Conference, Abuja, Nigeria, 22-26 September. Loughborough : WEDC, Loughborough University, pp. 319-322

Publisher

© WEDC, Loughborough University

Publisher statement

This work is made available according to the conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) licence. Full details of this licence are available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Publication date

2003

Notes

This is a conference paper.

ISBN

9781843800507;1843800500

Other identifier

WEDC_ID:11951

Language

  • en

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    WEDC 29th International Conference

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