The 1970s
The early development of knowledge management came as a result of
the work of a number of management theorists and practitioners. Among these
early works were the papers published by Peter Drucker and Paul Strassman.
In these papers they observed the growing importance of information and
explicit knowledge as valuable assets of organizations. The work of Peter Senge,
on the other hand, focused on the “learning organization” and emphasized
the cultural dimension of managing knowledge. Other management
experts and practitioners like Chris Argyris, Christoper Bartlett and Dorothy
Leonard-Barton of Harvard Business School contributed significantly to the
development of the theory of knowledge management and the growth of
its practice by examining in their various works and publications the many
facets of managing knowledge. In 1995, Leonard-Barton’s book Wellsprings of
Knowledge – Building and Sustaining Sources of Innovation was published by
the Harvard Business School. In this book, she documented her case study of
Chaparral Steel, a company which had an effective knowledge management
strategy in place since the mid-1970s.