The book addresses the concept of knowledge in a work and
organizational context, professional or knowledge work, and
knowledge-intensive firms. It provides a critical, moderate social
constructivist understanding of these themes and the current interest
in knowledge management, organization and the "knowledge economy".
Professional service as well as science and high-tech work and firms
are treated, reporting case studies of IT and management consultancy
firms, advertising agencies and life science based companies. The
concepts of knowledge and knowledge management are discussed and
dominant functionalist thinking debunked. The ambiguity of knowledge
in the input, process and output of professional work is emphasized.
It is suggested that we should be careful in assuming too much about
the nature, role and effects of "knowledge" in business life and
instead take the constructed nature of knowledge seriously and
scrutinize knowledge claims. Knowledge talk and claims may frequently
be key elements in marketing and identity work as much as they inform
us about key activities of professionals and knowledge-intensive
firms. The book covers a fairly broad set of management, organization
and working life aspects are addressed, including HRM themes and
different forms of control including client control and regulation of
identity. From a perspective emphasizing the ambiguity of social and
business life, rhetoric, symbolism, image, politics of knowledge
claims, identity and identity work are viewed as crucial for the
understanding and management of professional/knowledge work and
organizations. The book is provocative and challenges key assumptions
in dominant knowledge and organization thinking, suggesting a novel
theoretical approach. The book is intended for third year level
undergraduates upwards, and aims to say things also of relevance for
scholars. It mixes textbook and research ambitions. As a (moderately)
constructivist text with a relatively broad focus, the book may have
some potential as a text complementing more conventional textbooks
also in general organization and management courses.
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Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9780191514982
Publisert
2020
Utgiver
Vendor
OUP Oxford
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter