6. Conclusions
This paper has reviewed existing empirical papers on knowledge management in SMEs. In a
knowledge-driven economy the effective management of information is one of the main
challenges faced by SMEs. Yet, often founders or managers of SMEs are captured by
day-to-day business operations (Hofer and Charan, 1984) and thus prevented from actually
tackling this challenge. Prior research in the field of knowledge management has tended to
emphasise large firms. Assuming that SMEs are the drivers of most nations all over the
world, this situation is unsatisfactory.
The reviews conducted reveal that the body of knowledge regarding knowledge
management in SMEs is still limited. The analysis of papers has shown that three areas of
KM seem to be relatively well researched in SMEs. These are KM implementation, KM
perception, and knowledge transfer. Yet, the body of knowledge regarding the topics of
knowledge identification, knowledge storage/retention, and knowledge utilisation is rather
poor.
It can be thus concluded that the existing empirical literature provides only fragmented
insights into KM in SMEs. Given the importance of knowledge to company studies, the field
of knowledge management in small businesses is highly important. The present study
clearly underlines that the topic still calls for more research, which in turn offers scholars a
variety of research avenues.