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Introduction
The advent of communications networks and internet access brought greater speed and agility, knowledge sharing, collaboration, lower costs and greater satisfaction through customer and supplier integration and self-services. In its natural progression technology moves from supporting functional systems to process oriented systems. This helped to lead a technology-enabled revolution dominated by the perceived efficiencies of process reengineering.
The role of information technology (IT) in sharing knowledge has been a center of debate. Many investigators insisted that knowledge management (KM) initiatives could be successful without using IT tools ([29] McDermott and O'Dell, 2001; [20] Hibbard and Carillo, 1998), and IT should be adopted only when it is necessary. Others argued that IT is strategically essential for global reach when organizations are geographically distributed ([13] Duffy, 2000; [25] Lang, 2001).
The KM conceptual framework developed by [6] Stankosky and Baldanza (2000) has considered technology equally important as any of the other three pillars of KM (Figure 1 [Figure omitted. See Article Image.]), i.e. organization, learning and leadership. These four pillars form the "foundation" of any KM system. Without all of them in some kind of harmony, a knowledge management system (KMS) does not exist.
[7] Borghoff and Pareschi (1998) reported that the Nonaka and Takeuchi model tackles issues directly related to IT infrastructure. Knowledge itself is an integral part of technology definition as explained by [35] Pérez-Bustamante (1999) who defines technology itself as any applied knowledge that fulfils market expectations or market needs. Linguistically technology refers to the combination of technical expertise (technos ) and knowledge bases (logos ).
In its development life cycle, a majority of investigators considered knowledge itself as a superior phase that is proceeded by data and information. However, historically there has been no commonsense argument sited in the literature concerning the trivial role of IT in either of these two forms. Although there are differences on how knowledge and information or data are obtained, interpreted and managed, these differences do not offer a coherent rationale for alienating IT's role in KM. Recently, the vividness and immediacy of the role of collaborative computing and virtual spaces role in sharing knowledge and shaping the decision have become even more compelling.
Well-managed knowledge technologies can provide an enterprise with an invaluable asset:...