The Knowledge Source and Recipient

Following Ermine et al. (2006) it is vital to determine the so-called knowledge domains in order to better explore the knowledge sources in a sustainable construction project. The repositories of knowledge in construction projects, i.e. the anticipant source, can be found on three levels, regardless of the type of knowledge. The first one is within the team, i.e. company working on one particular construction project. The second one is within other teams, i.e. other companies, engaged in the same construction project. The third source is outside of that specific construction project. Argote and Ingram (2000) state that there are three repositories for knowledge in organisations, i.e. members, tools, and tasks, and various possibilities formed by combining these. Members are the human components of organisations, tools are the technological components, and tasks

reflect the organisation’s processes. Therefore tools could represent any kind of printed or IT based resource. Human components are called actors in line with social network literature. As a result the anticipant sources of knowledge were defined as follows:

• Inside the team • Actors

• Printed/ online resources • Outside the team

• Actors

• Printed/ online resources • Organisation/ company

• Outside this specific construction project • Actors

• Printed/ online resources • Institutions

The recipient of knowledge is foremost considered as a human being (McDermott, 1999), in this case someone working on the sustainable construction project. Reagans and McEvily’s (2003) stress personal capacities of people involved in KT. They argue that participants must have a certain capability of knowledge combination, common knowledge, as well as individual ability, in terms of framing and translating knowledge. Other positive factors are e.g. common knowledge, which hereby refers to the common understanding of a subject area shared by those engaged in the KT process (Huang, Newell, 2003). As previously argued in section 3.3.2, every adult participating in a KT process in a work environment has his/her own individual set of knowledge, skills and interpretations (Gerber, 1998). Furthermore it has to be considered that each person is different in many ways, such as gender, age, cultural background and experience. These factors should be taken into account while examining KT, as they could influence the KT process. This is also in line with the second research objective, i.e. identifying factors that influence KT on how to build sustainably. As a result these potentially influencing factors are further explored and defined in the following sections.

3.4.1.1. Nationality and Hierarchical Levels

Wilkesmann et al. (2009) follow Hofstede (1994) in emphasizing the effect of four national cultural characteristics of KT participants on KT as power distance, performance orientation, in-group collectivism and uncertainty avoidance.

These characteristics might result into differences regarding the findings of the countries under examination, i.e. Germany and the UK. For instance in societies with high uncertainty avoidance, such as Germany, KT can be supported through

clear responsibilities for topics, tools or administration rights (Wilkesmann et al., 2009). This form of cultural awareness is also highlighted by Ruddy (2000).

Furthermore power distance seems to be not very dominant in Germany. However, power distance depends very much on the structure of an organisation, even if employees from the lower hierarchical levels transfer their knowledge bottom-up. Thus companies acknowledging the importance of KT tend to keep hierarchy differences rather low, and try to create an atmosphere of equality and openness between hierarchic levels (Wilkesmann et al., 2009). Therefore low power distance supports intrinsic motivation and a voluntary KT in a bottom-up direction. These disadvantages of hierarchical organisational structures for knowledge sharing are also supported by Rydin et al. (2007). If a culture is very performance oriented, achievement must be visible and measurable, because it involves a rewarding scheme for employees. In-group collectivism can enhance KT within groups, while high uncertainty avoidance rather inhibits it (Wilkesmann et al., 2009).

These national cultural characteristics are part of each individual participating in a KT process, whether as source or recipient, and thus are vital for its success. Therefore the cultural background is one of the so-called general actor attributes in the conceptual framework developed in the due course of this study and presented in Chapter 5. The term ‘nationality’ is used to express the cultural background of KT participants, though it has to be acknowledged that this might be limited to fully capture the multi-cultural backgrounds of some respondents. Findings on this issue can be found in Chapters 6 and 7.

3.4.1.2. ‘Who knows What?’

As team members become familiar with each other, they develop a trusting relationship, which determines the type of knowledge that they are comfortable in sharing with each other. A power struggle can arise especially in the early forming stage of a team, which can also be influenced by the organisational climate (Sun, Scott, 2005). Moreover Moreland and Myaskovsky (2000) name anxiety about acceptance, interpersonal conflicts and uncertainty about group norms as common problems of new teams. The perceived competency of individuals by the team determines the extent of KT by the team to the individual (Sun, Scott, 2005). Thus lack of perceived competency can be a significant barrier of KT.

However, over time and with experience of working together, teams improve their performance by acquiring knowledge of ‘who knows what’ (Berends, 2005), which was termed ‘transactive memory’ by Wegner et al. (1991), although more in the context of couples. Moreland and Myaskovsky (2000) investigate the creation of ‘transactive memory systems’, i.e. embed knowledge of who is good at performing which tasks, and who is good at operating which tools in work groups. Hereby

providing feedback about individual skills and communicating these were found to be even more effective than training individuals. The knowledge of ‘who knows what’ can be gained through e.g. being trained together. Furthermore, the performance of groups with well-developed ‘transactive memory systems’ seems to exceed that of groups lacking such systems (ibid). This aspect is very important in the context of a construction project, as it involves various teams performing different tasks. Hence, while the knowledge on ‘who knows what’ is probably possessed by the members of each team/company, it is unclear as to what scale each team possesses this knowledge of other participating teams/companies on the same project.

3.4.1.3. Motivation for Knowledge Transfer

An employee’s productivity is influenced by situational and motivational factors. Since tacit knowledge of individuals is an essential component of organizational success, the employee must be sufficiently motivated to share it (Egbu, 2004). Incentives for being active in the KT process vary from external rewards to intrinsic factors (Ragsdell, 2009). This involves good people management as well, where trust itself can already be an incentive (Egbu, 2004). Trust also matters in problem- framing interactions, i.e. willingness to expose lack of knowledge and explore alternative solutions (Borgatti, Cross, 2003). It can be assumed that construction teams have developed long-lasting trust-based relationships amidst working colleagues within their teams, while it is rather unlikely that they would expose a lack of knowledge to other teams/companies involved at the same project. Brookes et al. (2006) support this by emphasizing factors that enhance project KM as trust, respect, longevity of relationships and shared professional and educational experience.

Besides it is necessary to consider that knowledge workers, project staff and team members, should all be included in a dynamic KM process (Egbu, 2004). Hereby all employees should be encouraged to develop some kind of project awareness and emotional attachment through promoting the importance of cross-functional collaboration (Huang and Newell, 2003). This goes along with Rohrbacher’s (2001) approach of the so-called ‘integrative planning process’ in which all project participants are involved from project initiation onwards, as previously presented. Measurement and reward schemes are essential in such a performance oriented context (Wilkesmann et al., 2009). However, it has to be acknowledged in this context that practical ‘know-how’, which has been appreciated in e.g. craftsmanship, has not been financially rewarded to the same extent as cognitive education as a form of ‘know-that’ (Haldin-Herrgard, 2000).

Furthermore Wilkesmann et al. (2009) found out that the norm of reciprocity is another very important aspect, as often an employee provides knowledge to

another employee only if he/she can expect that in return the other person will provide knowledge to him/her in the future. This likelihood of reciprocity suggests again KT rather occurring inside each construction team than in between various participating teams/companies, as it is unlikely that people from different companies work together on other building projects.

Other dimensions with a rather low effect on KT are for instance assertiveness, gender, stable hierarchies, obedience and respect towards status, age, societal roles, and positions (Wilkesmann et al., 2009).

In keeping with the research objectives presented in Chapter 1, these general influencing KT factors were taken into account when developing the conceptual framework. The factors discussed in this section were categorised as so-called ‘general actor attributes’:

• Nationality/cultural background • Gender

• Age/ Experience

• Hierarchical levels/ job roles/ levels

Since the process of the actual KT can be very diverse and crucial for the success of it, the next section will explore this aspect further.