Towards a KM framework for e-business projects within SMEs

The need for taking a knowledge-based view (KBV) within the information systems (IS) field has received increasing attention. This ongoing research, by analyzing and synthesizing the literature on innovation-knowledge management and on e-Business adoption in SMEs as one IS problem, focuses on two things. Firstly, it highlights the need for taking a KBV to e-business projects within the SME sector. Secondly, by adopting a content-process-context model (Pettigrew & Whipp, 1991; Snowden 2002), it proposes an inter-organizational KM (IOKM) framework for further research. By analyzing the literature, this paper highlights that the IOKM framework needs to be dynamic to address the contingencies of each phase of e-business adoption. The originality of this research is on providing an exploratory discussion of KM issues within e-business project phases, combining theories of inter-organizational linkages, KM, innovation and e-business adoption and implementation, in order to provide a theoretical lens to study how we can facilitate IT innovation through the lens of the KBV.