This page looks at Communities of Practice as Distributed Collaborative Work and asks (a) are CoPs collaborative and (b) can they be distributed? (Selected and reviwed links to papers on CoPs)
As work becomes more knowledge-intensive, multidisciplinary and collaborative, educators must employ Knowledge Management (KM) to improve decision-making and bring about improvement within their organizations.
This paper examines learning among museum staff involved in exhibition development in four European natural history museums. It draws upon a larger body of research undertaken for the Mirror project, a European Commission Framework Programme 5 Information
This paper demonstrates a systematic approach to modelling and designing KBSs in a purely object-oriented fashion through the use of profile mechanism. The profile is constructed using compliant standards of modelling software systems by adopting the XMF
In order to sustain their competitive advantage, knowledge-companies need to harness knowledge and to analyse knowledge sharing mechanisms and learning in the whole organisation.
Review of "WHERE DID THAT COMMUNITY GO? - COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE THAT DISAPPEAR" by Patricia Gongla and Christine R. Rizzuto Chapter 24 in Knowledge Networks: Innovation through Communities of Practice
Design methods in information systems frequently create software descriptions using formal languages. Nonetheless, most software designers prefer to describe software using natural languages ...
Although Communities of Practice have become a core concept in understanding how knowledge is managed within organizations, there have been few studies of the praxis of formation of Communities of Practice. In this article, we report on a Grounded Theory study of the members of a previously identified Community of Practice within the UK Higher Education Academy Psychology Network. In addition to providing data on the functioning of the community, the study also revealed a hitherto unrecognized form of community that exhibits all of the characteristics of CoPs yet has only a transient existence that seems to nucleate around an existing core community. Drawing on the metaphor of quantum behaviour, we termed these communities Quantum Communities of Practice. We describe a theory to explain this phenomenon that is grounded in the data from the study. We conclude by discussing the value and validity of our findings and methodology and indicating the next steps we will take in our research.
Systemic reform often involves partnerships between multiple communities of practice (CoP). In order to understand the strengths and challenges of a partnership, it is necessary to examine the objectives and practices of the constituent communities and th
The group memory of a project is an information space storing the documents produced and exchanged by members of the group, which may include the electronic discussions that took place during the life of the project.
Many students face the prospect of working in teams with apprehension. This feeling is further magnified when most or all of the sensory cues are removed in the virtual environment.
This paper outlines the basic concepts of knowledge management and e-learning and how they can be integrated and leveraged for effective online education.
This paper examines the nature of virtual teams and their place in the networked economy. It presents a framework for categorising virtual teams and argues that fundamental changes have taken place in the business environment which force people and organi
NGOs need to tackle the problems of effective communication that arise from their local-global nature. This paper examines Knowledge Management (KM) practices for use with portal technologies in order to promote Communities of Practice in both local and
Design methods in information systems frequently create software descriptions using formal languages. Nonetheless, most software designers prefer to describe software using natural languages ...
This paper presents a critical review of some of the claims made for CoPs. It will address questions such as "Are CoPs really suitable for use in a business setting?" and "Can a CoP ever be truly virtual?"
This is main web page for Computers In Society course (CIS) at the University of York. This page provides links to material for the topics in the course.
Virtual Teams are seen as project or task focused groups. Team membership may be relatively stable (e.g. in an established sales team) or change on a regular basis (e.g. in project teams). Members may be drawn from the same organization or from several di
A guide by English speaking francophiles to help promote the city of Marseille in 2013 - Shops, Museums, Music, Theatres, Galleries, Food and Drink and all the events for its year as European Capital of Culture.
The workshop focuses on current research trends in technology enhanced learning solutions that aim at addressing the multiplicity and complexity of needs of Communities of Practice all along their lifecycle.
ELISA is a successful professional community in Edinburgh, but where does it go next? Wendy Ball suggests that the next stage of development for such groups involves defining your purpose and continuing to question motives.
Review of "UNDERSTANDING THE BENEFITS AND IMPACT OF COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE" by Michael A. Fontaine and David R. Millen, Chapter 1 in Knowledge Networks: Innovation through Communities of Practice
This Working Paper is the outcome of a short study commissioned by Intercooperation on existing communities of practice (CoPs) in the development sector in India.
This paper provides an overview of virtual teams in the information age, focussing on the definition of virtual teams, their salient characteristics, the communication issues they face (including information overload, geographic and social distance), th
The recently developed knowledge-based view of the firm argues that knowledge is the firm’s most valuable resource. Within this field of study, informal social networks are rapidly gaining attention as mechanisms which facilitate knowledge flows. Electr
This study tries to identify the cultural patterns in Knowledge Management. Focusing on the case of Turkish SMEs in Sweden the authors of this research shows the relation between national culture, SMEs and Knowledge Management.
Contains links to papers on KM/CoPs that are all:(a) examples of research undertaken in the MIS Group (b) refereed as part of a book, journal or refereed conference (c) available on line
The MIRROR project explores the mirroring of the learning interactions of individuals within communities of practice (CoP) through the use of technologies. The specific context explored within the project is that of museum natural scientists.
A paper presented at the Second Workshop on Understanding Work and Designing Artefacts: Design for Collaboration. Communities Constructing Technology at King's Manor, University of York (March 1999).
paper is concerned with proposing a model for software experience knowledge. our model aims to strike a delicate balance between explicit and tacit knowledge
This paper aims at giving a more detailed description and discussion of two concepts of “community” developed in the research areas of text production/writing and social learning / information management / knowledge sharing and comparing them with ea
Communities of Practice: Creating Learning Environments for Educators: Vol. 1 - contains links to authors and a full introductory chapter - deals with co-located CoPs
A selection of films in English (or with English subtitles) about or based in Marseille. Each includes a brief plot outline and a link to the IMD database for those who want to know more.
This is the sister blog to the website Marseille City of Culture. Here you'll find information about our selection single performances and short exhibitions in Marseille.
The aim of this section of the module is to introduce (a) the background and motivation behind this move and (b) some basic concepts for understanding the type of work that can be found in this new environment.
The immensely rich culture and heritage of a country needs to be stored for posterity. But very little has been done, especially for countries in Asia and the Far East, all of whom have significant artefacts ven to this day. Unfortunately, modern society
In this article we want to underline the fact that standardization is only one of the most important coordination processes within organizations, and two other processes are needed: coordination by plan and coordination by mutual adaptation.
This paper will describe the initiatives undertaken by the ENO Project to initially establish an information and knowledge-sharing environment as an initiative towards a nuclear knowledge management system within the RCA community.
This study draws on the observations of five instructional designers who discuss their professional identities, their communities of practice and their roles as agents of social and institutional change.
Overzicht ontwikkelingen ICT in (medische) onderwijs - Onderzoek naar de informatie en communicatie en de inzet van ICT bij de opleidingen Geneeskunde en Biomedische Wetenschappen
This paper presents the results of a case study of a (perceived) problem of information overload from e-mail in a large firm. We argue that for CMCs to be effective there is a need to establish a ‘context’ in which the message can be interpreted.
The state of the open source movement and the activities that arise from it have shifted and continue to shift before me as I write these essays. While these ideas seem to be constantly reshaping, they are no less interesting to me than they were at the b
This paper provides a review of the published literature in terms of how knowledge is used, represented, defined and applied within Information Systems.
Many perspectives have been offered to explain open source software development but most do not social complexity of the communities found at the heart of such projects
This paper examines the nature of virtual teams and their place in the networked economy. Using the evidence from two recent sets of studies, it highlights some of the barriers to effective virtual team working and demonstrates the critical importance of
This study reports the perspectives of students from an online graduate program regarding what teaching strategies were used by their most exemplary online teachers.
People used to be able to interrupt you at work only by phoning or walking into your office. Now they can do so by e-mail, instant messaging, mobile phones and BlackBerries or personal digital assistants.
This paper presents a taxonomy of facilitation tasks that have to be carried out to support various COP processes that take place during the different stages in a COP’s life-cycle.
This paper describes a novel approach that combines data from direct observation, user surveys and server logs to analyse users' browsing behaviour. It is based on a longitudinal study of university students' use of a course related website.
This study will lead to empirically based categories concerning organisational knowledge and based on this an elaboration of a socio-pragmatic perspective on organisational knowledge.
L’objectif de cet article est d’apporter une contribution à la compréhension des facteurs clés de succès des systèmes de gestion des connaissances (SGC), à travers une étude qualitative menée auprès de sept grandes entreprises françaises du
Communities of Practice are conceptually positioned as a very important and successful element of corporate Knowledge Management. By utilizing IT platforms they enable a direct connection of knowledge workers and the transfer and reuse of tacit expertise
In this paper, we argue that this approach is flawed and some knowledge simply cannot be captured. A method is needed which recognises that knowledge resides in people: not in machines or documents ...
Links to Chris Kimble's, research (CMC, CSCW, Knowledge Management, Distributed Teams); teaching (MIS, CIS HI2), and administration (Computer Science, Management)
Directing their discussion at a general audience, Hildreth and Kimble present 24 separately authored chapters exploring the application of the concept of "Communities of Practice" to knowledge management in business or commerce organizations.
This paper reports the findings from a longitudinal case study at University of York, UK. The findings from this study suggest that students and tutors in this programme employed different types and exhibited different degree of social presence when commu
Our society has focus on life-long learning, both formal and informal, and this might mean new challenges to the librarians. How do we facilitate knowledge sharing and knowledge creation among the users?
This paper discusses existing research and develops a theoretical model of factors that affect knowledge sharing in OLCs. The aim is to increase our understanding of the antecedents to knowledge-sharing in OLCs.
In this study the global Information Systems academic community is viewed as a community of practice in which knowledge is resident but inadequately shared.