Strategy as Patrice and Leadership - Coursework Example

Strategy as Patrice and Leadership Name Student Number Institution Course Code Instructor Date Introduction Human activities and their capacities within an organisational context play critical roles in the overall strategic operations and management of the business activities. According to Checkland (1999, p.115), there are various examples of human activities laid out, that are related to each other in order to be viewed as one unit. Thus, organisations can effectively utilize human attributes with respect to their intellectual capacity and skills to develop effective organisational intellectual capital. Strategic operations have gained prominence in the organisational context with respect to ensuring effective management and overall realization of better results. Johnson, Scholes and Whittington (2011) identifies strategy as the direction and scope of a given organisation in the long term bring about advantage for the organisation via its configuration of resources in a changing environment to meet market needs as well as fulfil stakeholders expectations. Strategic management has become a tenet of every organisational context in the current era of globalization. It is a living and continuously developing discipline that can be captured in a group or class settings to lay down a framework plan and implementation measures. Key themes to be addressed in this essay involves knowledge management and environment, intellectual capital and social capital; communities of practice and soft systems thinking. Knowledge Management/Environment Knowledge management (KM) involves the management and analysis of complex information to come up with intelligent strategic and operational decisions (Grover and Davenport 2001). Knowledge plays a critical role in the realization of market strategies towards customer satisfaction, increasing productivity and enhancing customer satisfaction at reduced operation costs. These attributes are relied with improved and effective use of knowledge and employment effective knowledge management strategies (Henry 2013). The current business entities are increasingly transiting to become knowledge-based business operations to achieve global knowledge economies. According to Johnson (2007), the transition shows a paradigm shift from the traditional factors of production basically characterized by energy-based economies to information-based economies backed by intellectual and knowledge assets. Through effective application of KM, it turns out as an organisational asset utilized in building scientific and business models resulting to better decisions, effective strategic measures and enhanced return on investment (ROI) (Adelman 2010). Knowledge management has come up as a crucial field for practice and research within information systems. Knowledge base refers to the centralized repository for information in the like of library or database of information that is related to a given subject (Wang and Li 2005). In respect to business operations, knowledge base forms an integral part of knowledge management systems in the optimization of available information collection, organisation and retrieval for a given organisation of the general public. The advantage of embracing knowledge base is that an effective and well-organized knowledge base can result into decreased time by employee to find critical information for business operations (Nahapiet and Ghoshal 1998). This results to decreased costs in respect to time translation to effectiveness and efficiency. To the customers, it offers the opportunity to access information that would have required contact with an employee of the organisation, and this translates into improved interactions between the customer and the organisation (Cheuk 2007). Generally, the aspect of knowledge base is not a static group of information, but rather a flexible resource that may have inherent capacity to learning as part of the artificial intelligence. A good example is the internet which has increasingly grown to become a vast and complex global knowledge base termed as the Semantic Web. The operations within an organisational context greatly rely on a management system to enhance efficiency and facilitate work (McDonald and Star 2008). To effectively improve efficiency and overall work performance within an organisational context, there is need for specific guidelines and procedures to effectively manage organisational knowledge. With effective management systems and knowledge based systems, departments within an organisational context will end up being managed effectively (Alwis and Hartmann 2008). Business organisations have increasingly embraced the concept of knowledge management as primary source of competitive advantage. Knowledge management experts have employed various techniques within the social network analysis, system analysis, processing mapping, conducting focus group sessions and one-on-one interviews with key workers as well as other methods to reuse knowledge or come up with new form of knowledge (Henry, 2013). The emergence of knowledge management systems engineering has turned the state of various enterprises bringing new insights to comprehending knowledge management and its application. The concepts as theoretical frameworks lay a firm foundation towards effective solving of challenges arising and provide friendly environment for operation towards increased performance (Grover and Davenport 2001). Sound planning strategies, savvy marketing and high quality product and services, increased attention to customers, efficient structuring of work, as well as the attentive management of resources in an organisation is enhanced by knowledge management. In general, the increased competition in the global business operations results to increased utilization of knowledge management strategies to enhance operations (Zexian and Xuhui 2010). Theories and empirical studies evaluating the concept of knowledge management have been faced by changing insights and outcomes. According to Baltzan and Phillips (2009), great debates and confusion arise as to the specific situations of KM in majority of business organisations. Further, of great concern involves issues preceding concerns as to how to implement knowledge management effectively as well as efficiently within business organisations. The main concept surrounding great incorporation of knowledge management among business managers involves getting automated solutions to realize great achievements within the organisational context (Borgatti and Cross 2003). Effective communication strategies and sharing of information also plays a critical role in the overall implementation of strategic moves towards better results and improved performance in the market segment. Due to the fact that majority of KM systems that have been adopted by most business organisations are independent lacking a common portal, they lack effective communication channels with other stakeholders in the market segment (Ahuja 2000). This makes it impossible to share knowledge resources with other collaborators to exceedingly utilize the advantage of effective knowledge management use resulting to insufficiency in the overall outcome. To effectively understand the tenets of knowledge management and components of knowledge base, effective analysis of the intellectual capital and social capital are paramount. Intellectual Capital and Social Capital The term intellectual capital refers to the all resources as a whole that determine the value of a given organisation, as well as its competitiveness as an enterprise (Alden 2010). From a human resource perspective, the concept of intellectual capital is not easily translatable into monetary terms and thus, is well categorized as a non-financial asset. Human capital is very critical within organisational settings. According to Johannessen, Oslen and Olaisen (2005), it is entrenched in the workers in form of knowledge and competencies with organisational capital being termed as the collective knowhow that surpasses the capabilities of given people within an organisation that contribute directly to the organisations operations (Alden 2010). Social capital is termed as the actual and potential resources that are embedded within and present via networks of relationships within an organisation. The concept of social capital is not a unitary unit as it incorporates various units which all consist of a number of social structures and facilitate actions of players in the organisational structure (Alder and Kwon 2002). The capacity of organisations to foster increased and dense networks of social interactions makes them unique players within an organisational setting and identifies them from other institutional structures like markets. Intellectual capital incorporates skills and knowledge that has been developed by companies in respect to how effective to make its goods and services (Henry 2013). Further, it also incorporates insights concerning company’s history information, customers’ data, vendors, processes and stakeholders’ information as well as other critical information for the business operation to compete effectively. Thus, intellectual capital can be termed as a combination of both cognitive and intuitive-related knowledge, and is not only organisational knowledge, but also industry knowledge (Adelman 2010). Considering the three dimensions of social capital, they constitute the structural dimension which is measured by the position of companies bridging structural gaps. The second dimension involves the relational dimension which is gauged by the level of trust and friendship with every relationship and finally the cognitive dimension that is estimated by the presence of a common culture (Vandaie 2007). A good example involves the social network analysis utilized in the Madrid Science Park in Spain by Diez-Val and Motoro-Sanchez (2014). The findings indicated the three dimensions of social capital play a critical role in the enhancement of knowledge exchange within the network, whereas human and organisational capital disparities are only considerable for a sub-sample. Figure Showing View of intellectual capital (Source: Nonaka and Takeuchi, 1995; Spender, 1996 cited in Vandaie, 2007). Model of organisationalinteraction among social and intellectual capital (Source: Vandaie, 2007). The structural dimensions of social capital involve properties of the network as well as depicts the overall pattern of connections among individuals directing towards who individuals reach for social resources and the process of reaching them. By adopting network closure analogy by Coleman’s (1988) cited in Vandaie (2007), this brings about norms of action based on mutual and collective trust, as well as promotes every given person towards playing an active role in the network. The capabilities of organisations towards creating and sharing knowledge effectively emanate from various factors like the specific facilities within the organisation for creation and transfer of tacit knowledge, principles for organizing where employees and functional expertise are structured, coordinated and communicated as well as the channel through which individual cooperate (Alwis and Hartmann, 2008). Thus, effective social attributes in respect to intellectual capital and social capital greatly impacts on the organisational knowledge which in turn has a great impact to the overall outputs. Further, the social attributes involves processes of learning termed as communities of practice where common interests are collaborated with the aim of improving production and achieving the best in the organisation (Adelman 2010). Communities of Practice Communities of practice consists of a process of social learning occurring whenever people having common interests in a given subject or area work together for longer periods of time, sharing ideas and strategies, establish solutions and create innovations (Wenger, McDermott and Snyder 2002). In context, communities of practice involve groups of people created with common interests and expertise to provide the ideal process to drive knowledge management strategies, as well as come up with lasting competitive advantage. From the initial concepts by Wenger on the ethnographic study of insurance claims (Wenger 1998), the communities of practice has evolved to be associated with knowledge management due to their capacity to enhance social capital, nurture knowledge, stimulate innovation and share existing tacit knowledge within the organisational settings for change and development. Communities of practice is basically premised on the idea that learning is process that occurs within social contexts emerging and evolving whenever people come together with common goals aimed at achieving the set goals (Nahapiet and Ghoshal 1998). Communities of practice have been effectively utilized in the health sector to facilitate quality improvements as well as generate great heights of satisfaction among the leadership and knowledge translation within the practitioners. The benefits entrenched in the utilization of community of practice as part of knowledge management has increased the focus within the corporate context studies (Wenger, McDermott and Snyder 2002). The earliest approaches to knowledge management treated knowledge as an object, that is explicit knowledge, but communities of practice brings about a way of theorizing tacit knowledge that cannot be easily confined, codified and stored. Challenges surrounding effective utilization of communities of practice within organisational environments involve leadership changes in respect to communities of practice (McDonald and Star 2008). Thus, to effectively address the challenge of leadership within communities of practice, employing effective thinking strategies and methods to promote operations are imperative. The next section outlines the aspect of soft systems thinking to outline the methods involved in the effective thinking and system development for improved performance. Soft Systems Thinking Checkland has continuously developed the system of thinking and system developing with the greatest of the achievements being the System Methodology (SSM) (Zexian and Xuhui 2010). Soft system thinking can be viewed as a strategy for analysis of complex problem situations as well as identifying acceptable improvements that could be incorporated in the situations. Through qualitative methods of study, organisations carefully identify, observe and come up with critical information for change and development within the organisational context (Baltzan and Phillips 2009). In context, the aspect of SSM tries to enhance learning and appreciation of a problem situation between groups of stakeholders instead of setting out to solve pre-defined problem. The system of thinking identifies prevailing problem within the environment and subsequently provides an effective framework for tackling such circumstances (Borgatti and Cross 2003). Explicit roles that come up with this method of thinking involves clients who make the study to come up, probable problem solving strategy, and subjects owning the problem in the sense who are greatly affected and have to take action. Effective learning processes to improve on the intellectual capital which directly relates to the organisational and human capital are imperative in the organisational context (Grover and Davenport 2001). These processes impacts positively to thinking strategies and this context touches on the soft social thinking strategies. The emergence of system engineering brings up the aspect of methodologies aimed at addressing prevailing organisational problems hindering effective performance (Henry 2013). The main point of consideration prior to embracing specific system engineering involves having a consensus objective. Failure to identify consensus on the objectives results to confusion in the implementation and eventual dissatisfaction on the part of those having the view of the objectives as not implemented (McDonald and Star 2008). Organisations that have continuously held tightly to their traditional way of operation especially the building, construction and engineering industries have been under great pressure to review their practices of operations. This is due to the fact that SSM have the capacity to stimulate change and ensure the achievement of set goals and objectives within an organisation (Resiman and Oral 2005). For example, the construction industry involves highly complex, multi-disciplinary practices and there is need to integrate the kind of design and management processes in respect to the skill and knowledge that individuals bring about. Thus, by utilizing system thinking methods, responsible actors, crucial transformations and knowledge resources are identified based on their appropriateness to the specific needs of the given construction company (McDonald and Star 2008). (Source: Reisman and Oral 2005) The compliments pertaining to hard system thinking and soft system thinking of brings about the aspect of SST being conceptual in nature whereas HST is formal. Nevertheless, both models have the major goal of realizing effective and strategic ways to solve prevailing organisational problems (Zexian and Xuhui 2010). In general, the two models bring about good systems of thinking to enhance organisational growth through change and development. Checkland (1999) evaluated the aspect of system engineer (SE) approach trying to establish the effectiveness and success of technical problems that managers can utilize to cope with prevailing and upcoming challenges in the organisational context. It was evident from analysis of the input the systems bring about to improve operations within complex organisational environments (Alwis and Hartmann 2008). Specific examples of SSM involves pre-tendering processes in the Australian construction companies coupled with having effective histories on the projects, bridge projects in respect to designs and road projects. Another example involves the Bamtec innovation and diffusion which is a process that has been enhanced to come up with a high notch innovation strategy (Henry 2013). Issues surrounding innovation adoption, as well as its diffusion in the entire organisation are paramount to realize better results from the strategic innovation. Organisations are open adaptive systems that incorporate strategic measures to achieve better results within their business operations. To effectively realize the potential entrenched in the human capital of any organisation, effective strategies have to be put in place (Cheuk 2007). It is evident from the aspect of social capital and intellectual capital that structural dimensions coupled with positions of firms in respect to bridging structural holes enhance networking strategies. The human capital involving knowledge and skills possessed by employees goes a long way in the eventual transformation of the organisational operations to realize better results (McDonald and Star 2008). Knowledge and skills act as the inputs to bring about aspects like innovativeness and strategic management which play a critical role in the productions processes as well as marketing to bring about better products and sales as the outputs. Effective performance within an organisational context requires effective frameworks of operation (Henry 2013). (Source: Kaplan and Norton 1996) The improvement of operations can be realized through effective and strategic frameworks within the operations. Balanced scorecard framework is one aspect that gives an overview with respect to various attributes surrounding the business operations (Kaplan and Norton 1996). In context, the framework outlines the objectives, measures, targets and initiatives with respect to the financial status, customer, internal business as well as learning and growth. In summary, the utilization of the various aspects of knowledge management enhances strategy as practice and raises the level of management through strategic measures. From analysis, it is evident that effective knowledge management improves both individual and organisational intellectual capitals for effective overall performance of the organisation. Creation of knowledge attributes is a core competence to business organisation as well as information technology projects bringing best solutions for majority of the practitioners where knowledge management is widely utilized to enhance competitive advantage within the business operations. 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