As shown in the figure, in order for knowledge to have wide organizational impact, it usually
must be either transferred or shared. Transfer and sharing may be conceptualized as two
ends of a continuum. Transfer involves the focused and purposeful communication of knowledge
from a sender to a known receiver (King, 2006a) . Sharing is less-focused dissemination, such
as through a repository, to people who are often unknown to the contributor (King, 2006b) .
Many of the points on the hypothetical continuum involve some combination of the two processes
and both processes may involve individuals, groups or organizations as either senders or
receivers, or both.