**4. Case study: Part 1**

The next section presents the first part of a case study. Part 1 of the study comprises the phase 1 concerning the knowledge management diagnosis according to our implementation process model (chapter 3.1). The aim of the knowledge management diagnosis is to identify possible needs concerning knowledge management to gather potential interventions to consciously introduce and improve knowledge management processes within the company. The case study took place in the Research and Development (R&D) department of an international biotechnological company. The R&D department was widely distributed geographically with two R&D sites in Germany, one in Switzerland, two in the United States and one in Australia.

#### **4.1 Phase 1: Knowledge management diagnosis**

Concerning the knowledge management diagnosis, 163 employees from different sites of the R&D department took part in an online questionnaire study to analyze specific knowledge

Implementation Process of a Knowledge Management Initiative: Yellow Pages 319

Expert finding systems (a.k.a. corporate "corporate yellow pages") are considered to be an effective and less time-consuming instrument, mainly used to support knowledge

Corporate yellow pages aim to assist users in finding experts with specific knowledge, competencies, or experiences within the company. They cover the specific knowledge of all relevant organizational members, independent of their position. The goal of yellow pages is to foster knowledge communication between employees through the strategic finding of experts (Conway, 2004). The communication between the person searching for knowledge and the knowledge owner is made easier by making it transparent who knows what (Kukat, 1999). The system does not maintain the knowledge itself, but only the meta-knowledge pertaining to the available knowledge of employees (Lehner, 2008). Information about employees is saved in directories, indicating expertise such as competencies, experiences and further information about the person (Ehrlich, 2003). They are expected to help members of large, often widely geographically dispersed organizations in finding out who has specific expertise in a problem area. This is essential for finding support in complex problem-solving situations, or for obtaining critical knowledge for making decisions. Expert finding systems can stimulate learning and exchange processes in the organization (Lehner, 2009). Other potential advantages mentioned in the literature are that expert knowledge is made visible to all employees, that communities of experts can emerge, and that novice employees can find support from relevant experts more quickly. Accordingly, expert finding systems are expected to improve information searches for work processes and

In general, yellow pages are based on a digital, Intranet-based database (Heinrich & Stelzer, 2009). The further technical components are a user interface and a search engine (Idinopulos & Kempler, 2006). The user interface can be provided through a browser and allow the employee to access the underlying yellow page database. Entries can be made and search requests can be entered with the help of the search engine (Gray & Tehrani, 2004). The results of the search are then presented through the browser. The contents of the database are the employee profiles. The main components are information about their expertise (Debitz, 2007) and options on how to contact them (Kilian et al., 2007). A profile can also be expanded in a number of ways, for example through photos, videos or other personal

There are three different approaches for filling the yellow pages with content: manual entry, automatic generation (Conway, 2004) and importing data from existing sources (Becks et al. 2004). Manual entry requires that employees create their own profile into which they enter their own relevant data through the user interface (Becks, et al., 2004). The second approach follows the basic principle that data already exists that provides information about the expertise of the individual employees, such as sent emails, presentations they have created, or project reports. Specifically designed algorithms then filter out the expert areas of the author of the data, which then become the contents of the yellow pages (Idinopulos & Kempler, 2006). Becks et al. (2004) describe the third way as importing existing data. For example, this could be from entries in the human resource databases such as contact

**5.1 Definition of yellow pages** 

knowledge development.

information (Davenport & Prusak, 1998).

information and other master file data.

communication in organizations (Probst et al., 2010).

**5.2 Appearance, functionalities and creation of yellow pages** 

management needs. The study showed highly differentiated results concerning knowledge documentation, knowledge communication, knowledge generation and knowledge utilization.

With regard to **knowledge documentation**, 50.3% of the respondents indicated a need for general improvements in this area. Specifically, the biggest need was identified for improving documentation on the specific expertise of individual employees (47.3%) and on product-specific regulatory strategies (41.8%). Moreover, respondents identified a number of needs for improving the documentation of experiences with projects (45.9%), or with external cooperation partners (42.5%). Referring to **knowledge communication**, 54.1% of respondents identified that there is an overall need for improvements in this domain. Respondents indicated that knowledge relevant for the whole site is not always made available to all colleagues (34.2%) and that there are no appropriate opportunities for knowledge communication (38.2%). Moreover there were no appropriate opportunities for networking with relevant colleagues (38.1%) and no sufficient knowledge exchange (36.7%). Concerning **knowledge generation** respondent mentioned that there are no sufficient opportunities to acquire new knowledge by job rotation. In regard to **knowledge utilization**  there could be identified an overall need for improvements (47.3%). Especially respondent indicated that there are no standard operating procedures for using existing experiences (50.4%) and no standard operating procedures for using existing knowledge (45.9%).

Due to the highly differentiated needs assessment very specific needs of employees to improve knowledge management could be determined. In particular, the specific analysis of needs with regard to different knowledge management dimensions revealed that there is an explicit need for improving documentation of specific expertise and of experiences with projects. Moreover there is a need for improving the communication and availability of knowledge as well as standard operating procedures for using existing knowledge and experiences within the company and its different R&D sites**.** To meet these needs, the company decided to develop and implement a "corporate yellow pages" expert finding system as an initial improvement project. Corporate yellow pages are an optimal knowledge management intervention to encourage aspects of knowledge documentation and, above all, *knowledge about the specific expertise of individual employees* and *experiences with projects and external cooperation partners* by creating profiles of employees and documenting their expert knowledge, experiences or networks. In terms of knowledge communication, especially regarding *opportunities for exchanging and networking with employees from other R&D sites*, corporate yellow pages provide the opportunity to search for experts and for employees to interact by exchanging knowledge and experiences. Knowledge utilization, such as the *use of knowledge and experiences in new projects* is supported by corporate yellow pages, while exchanging knowledge between experts, expert knowledge and experiences can be transferred into new projects. The next chapter outlines the topic of yellow pages in detail.
