The basic challenge in knowledge management is learning how to design an organization's strategy, structure, and systems so that the organization can use what it knows to innovate and adapt. Although the field of knowledge management is still evolving, its terrain may be surveyed by focusing on two themes: the structure of organizational knowledge (i.e., the nature of knowledge in organizations and what makes it distinct from other forms of knowledge) and the processes by which organizations turn knowledge into action and results (i.e., how organizations create, share, and use knowledge).

Data, Information, Knowledge

Information and knowledge are the outcomes of human action and cognition that engage signs, signals, and artifacts in social and physical settings. Knowledge builds on an accumulation of experience. Information depends on an aggregation of data. Consider a document that contains a table of numbers that indicate product sales for...