Establishing an Operational Approach to Knowledge Management in Small to Medium Sized Software Enterprises (SMEs) - Building a Typology of Knowledge Scenarios

The relevance and importance of studying knowledge management (KM) at the level of the organisation should not be underestimated, as the success of KM is largely reliant on the organisation's ability to learn and remember. Small to medium sized enterprises (SMEs) differ from multinational enterprises (MNEs) and as a result, the KM approach for SMEs differs from that implemented by larger organisations. SMEs are multifaceted in nature and extant research acknowledges the absence of empirical research in terms of how SMEs manage their valuable knowledge. In an SME, the characteristics and attitude of the founder/manager are the primary influence on organisational decision making, this means the founders' understanding of KM and the value of the associated benefits, directly impact the KM approach operationalised. Using multiple cases, this study pursued a qualitative analysis approach across five small to medium sized software enterprises (SMEs), with the objective of developing ways to illustrate the knowledge approach pursued in a small software company. The Typology of Knowledge of Scenarios presents three types, Type: 1 Hybrid, Type 2: Human-mediated and Type 3: Techno-oriented. This typology provides an actionable mechanism for supporting software SMEs to evaluate their dependency on external knowledge resources, management involvement, mode usage and the volume of knowledge activity generated by the organisation. The merit in establishing this Typology of Knowledge Scenarios lies in further leveraging the vocabulary and iconisation to uncover additional types in other organisations dealing with different knowledge domains.