(2) Use CKOs and other knowledge champions to facilitate knowledge sharing and the effective use of an organizational memory by working with opinion leaders throughout the organization to codify and institutionalize new knowledge.
In their classic paper on absorptive capacity, Cohen and Levinthal (1990) contend that an organization's capacity to exploit external information effectively once inside the organization depends heavily on prior experience with that knowledge. Crosson et al. (1999) further assert that once knowledge enters an organization, it must also be transformed or institutionalized, enabling interpretation and shared meaning by members of the organization. They also suggest that context within each organization further plays a role in how knowledge is transferred and institutionalized. We propose in this model that knowledge champions work with opinion leaders to provide the final link from acquisition of knowledge from outside sources to successful assimilation, institutionalization, and dissemination within the organization. Once inside the organization, the knowledge champions would work with opinion leaders to codify this new knowledge.
Rogers states that adoption and diffusion occur within social systems, "which constitute the boundary within which the innovation diffuses". The effect of norms, opinion leaders, and change agents can exert a profound influence on the adoption and diffusion of an innovation throughout a social system. Opinion leaders often serve as social models whose behaviors are imitated by other members of the social system. Thus, they can also have a huge impact on the adoption or rejection of an innovation as well as its rate of diffusion throughout the social system and its continued and effective use.
In the second phase, the issue is how to assimilate this new knowledge. Rogers proposes that the effective adoption and diffusion of innovations (knowledge) is influenced by a number of factors. One factor is "compatibility" or how well an innovation (or knowledge) is compatible with existing work routines, norms, or prior experience. Cohen and Levinthal (1990) support this theory when they propose that "the premise of a notion of absorptive capacity is that the organization needs prior related knowledge to assimilate and use new knowledge". Opinion leaders represent an important link in helping potential users understand the new innovation, facilitating compatibility with existing norms and routines.
Opinion leaders, who are well respected and integrated within their social system, can also codify the tacit knowledge acquired by innovators to make it meaningful to their peers. In addition, given their prominence within the social network, they can play an important role in influencing people within the social network to adopt and effectively use the organizational memory and knowledge centers.
Crosson et al. (1999) supports the need for opinion leaders to codify the new knowledge: "True innovators have a problem akin to a child. They have a sensation - an insight into a possibility - but they do not have literal language to describe it. Unfortunately, they do not have a `parent' to provide that language; indeed none exists if the insight is truly novel". Thus, knowledge champions can help facilitate the codification of this new knowledge by acting as the "parent" by transferring it to opinion leaders who transform this tacit knowledge into institutionalized knowledge that can be shared in the organizational memory.