The Use of Tacit Knowledge to Create Organizational Value

This article reviews, explains, compares, and synthesizes the foundational theories in knowledge management. Its central theme is that knowledge management and knowledge creation are two crucial aspects of strategic management in modern organizations. The identification of the unique properties of knowledge is a starting point for its successful creation and management in organizations. The article briefly examines the context of knowledge management by looking into the originating disciplines and related theories as well as outlines the life and achievements of the most influential scholar in the field - Michael Polanyi. Next, the article discusses the various characteristics of knowledge important for its further successful application, specifically 'tacit knowledge'. It then looks into the main theories that involve application of tacit knowledge to modern business organizations. Although several disciplines and theories include some aspects of knowledge management, due to the limited scope of this article, only the two that specifically develop the 'tacit knowledge' concept are studied here. Additionally, while some theories discussed in this article are applicable to various levels of analysis, such as individual, group, organization, and inter-organizational, this review is limited to knowledge management and creation within a business organization. The methodology for this research article consisted of secondary research on the influential works on knowledge management. It involved primary sources, when discussing the properties of knowledge and the foundational theories, and secondary sources that provided researchers' opinion on the importance of the subject. The research on the knowledge management in organizations demonstrated the uniqueness of the qualities of knowledge that puzzled scholars since the Ancient Greeks, the importance of the personal component in any successful knowledge related process, the magnitude of the topic that undoubtedly warrants further research.