From data to knowledge and back - Some implications for knowledge management

Rooted in seminal works like Argyris and Schon's, Nonaka and Takeuchi's, coined by Peter Drucker, and Davenport and Prusak, Knowledge Management has become one of the hottest topic in management and information systems research. Hundreds of web sites and thousands of articles, magazines and books are dedicated to this subject. Many contributors argue that KM could have a similar fate as Business Process Reengineering, failing from grace to misery, if today tremendous interest will be convert into hysteria. In this context, a question like what is, actually, knowledge could be considered strange. Fortunately or not, knowledge is a really difficult concept. This paper tries to outline some major perspectives of knowledge not only as process or state of mind, but also viewing it in relation with data and information, which is quite relevant for information systems approach.