| The transformation of organizations into knowledge-intensive and knowledgeaware organizations takes place at an ever-increasing pace. Knowledge as the key resource, not labor, raw material or capital, changes production functions in organizations significantly. Knowledge represents the key concept to explain the increasing velocity of the transformation of social life in general and the way businesses and social institutions work in particular (Drucker 1994). Estimates at leading research organizations suggest that up to 60% of the gross national product in the United States is based on information as opposed to physical goods and services (Delphi 1997, 10). In the last decade, this percentage is likely to have further increased which is reflected by a large number of studies that report similar or higher values. The big share is not surprising as it is estimated that the knowledgeintensive construction and development process of new products and services potentially determines 80 to 90% of the resulting production costs (Scherrer 1999, 131).
There is also a trend towards more complex problem-solving services where the majority of employees are well-educated and creative, self-motivated people. Employees’ roles and their relationships to organizations are changed dramatically as information or knowledge workers replace industrial workers as the largest group of the work force. Consequently, businesses should no longer be seen from an industrial, but from a knowledge perspective (Sveiby 1997, 26ff). This is reflected by a share of 60% of US organizations which think that between 60% and 100% of their employees are so-called knowledge workers (Delphi 1997, 10) and by the fact that in 2002, about 75% of workers were employed in the service sector in the United States (U.S. Department of Labor 2003) or about 65% in Germany respectively (Federal Republic of Germany, Common Statistics Portal 2003). The rise of knowledge work is not only visible in absolute numbers. Between 1990 and 2000, most jobs in the U.S. labor market have been created that can be character ized as knowledge work, followed by data work, whereas the number of services and goods job positions has declined, in the latter case a continuous decline since the 1950s (Wolff 2005). This scenario has been termed the information or knowledge economy (e.g., Kim/Mauborgne 1999). The transformation of society into a knowledge society has changed valuation of knowledge work dramatically. In the beginning of the twenty-first century, it is no longer natural resources (especially oil) that creates money, but knowledge. Today, for the first time in history, the world’s wealthiest person, Bill Gates, is a knowledge worker (Thurow 1997, 96). Knowledge work1 can be characterized by a high degree of variety and exceptions and requires a high level of skill and expertise. Knowledge work requires that knowledge is continuously revised, and considered permanently improvable, not as truth, but as a resource2. Knowledge workers gain more and more influence in organizations because businesses focus knowledge and their holders as key competitive factors. Knowledge workers are increasingly supported by advanced information and communication technology (ICT) systems. This is reflected by an increase in the amount of information technology (IT) capital invested per whitecollar worker from around US$4,000 in 1980 to US$9,000 in 1990 for the services industry (Quinn 1992, 421). Already in 1998, 20% of Fortune 500 organizations claimed to have established the role of a Chief Knowledge Officer (CKO) in their organization and 42% of these organizations said they would establish such a position within the next three years (see Bontis 2001, 30). |
