Impact of Knowledge Management Practices on Competitive Advantage: Empirical Experiences from Telecommunication Sector in India

What is it about?

This study has investigated the impact of knowledge management on competitive advantage. The research sample comprised employees (N=331) of private telecommunication organizations. Two step procedure of Structural equation modeling has been followed. In the first step confirmatory factor analysis was conducted for scale validation and the second step included structural model for investigating the relationship between these three processes. The results revealed that all the practices of knowledge management are being practised by the telecommunication organizations.

Featured Image

Why is it important?

Knowledge management is an organisational method that utilises the strategic resource knowledge more deliberately and more effi ciently to increase the skill and capabilities of employees (Julia and Rog 2008 ). Many organisations are launching knowledge management initiatives with a view to improve business processes, make fi nancial savings, generate greater revenues, enhance user acceptance and increase the competitiveness (Chua and Lam 2005 ). In this context, the literature review on KM has indicated that the presence of a specifi c culture in an organisation is necessary for effective performance of knowledge management processes (Allameh et al. 2011 ; Donate and Guadamillas 2010 ). The culture component is prominently present in research on knowledge management, knowledge economy and the knowledge-based view of the fi rm (Grant 1996 ) and has been repeatedly usedby numerous authors through different expressions like “knowledge sharing culture” or “knowledge culture” (Ardichvili et al. 2006 ; Bock et al. 2005 ; Smith 2003 ; Damodaran and Olphert 2000 ; Davenport et al. 1998 ), “knowledge-centred culture” (Janz and Prasarnphanich 2003 ) or “knowledge-friendly culture” (Davenport et al. 1998 ). In respect of KM strategies development (Earl 2001 ; Garavelli et al. 2004 ), “knowledge culture” is an essential factor, which makes implementation easier, along with other elements such as leadership, human resources practices or the organisational structure. It is an indication of an organisational life method, which uses people in the process of creation and exchange of information to accomplish organisational goals and attain success (Oliver and Kandadi 2006 ; King 2007 ). Further, effective and cooperative organisational culture makes KM implementation easier by establishing a shared organisational vision, commitment in terms of common projects, teamwork, autonomy in decision making and a stimulus to continuous innovation (Davenport and Grover 2001 ; Gold et al. 2001 ; Leidner et al. 2006 ). So, an important condition for successfully carrying out such an assessment is to recognise that the relationship between culture and knowledge sharing is fundamental: culture is linked in the organisational knowledge itself (Hendriks 2004 ).So, the aim of this paper is to assess the culture induced KM practices on CA.