**3.3 International standard ISO 30401:2018**

Finally, we introduce the last International Standard ISO 30401:2018 (November 2018) [39] entitled "Knowledge Management Systems Requirements." This document sets out the requirements for the knowledge management systems of organizations, leading to the successful implementation of knowledge management. However, the document preserves a certain latitude in the application of these requirements, which allows each organization to comply with them in accordance with characteristics and needs.

In the introduction of this standard, knowledge management is envisaged in the following way: Knowledge management is a discipline focused on the ways in

**41**

to information systems" (p. 27).

*Toward Management Based on Knowledge DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86757*

**3.4 Outcomes**

founded.

which organizations create and use knowledge. Knowledge management has no recognized single definition and no international standard predates this management system standard. There are many known barriers to successful knowledge management. Similarly, there are many confusions with other disciplines such as information management and many widespread misconceptions about how to achieve knowledge management [39], for example, the misconception that simple acquisition of technological means can be enough. From our point of view, this standard should be very useful for a management based on knowledge operation.

At the end of this section devoted to KM, it appears that this discipline has followed developments strongly rooted in two contradictory and complementary paradigms: the positivist paradigm and the constructivist paradigm. Although not always leading to expected results, the KM positivist paradigm remains the implicit

From our point of view, this paradigm needs to be expanded to a more general point of view based on a constructivist paradigm. We refer to this approach as "the managerial and socio-technical approach to KM" (Section 2.4). This perspective brings together the elements on which the "management based on knowledge" is

In this section, opting for a socio-technical approach to the organization, we introduce the concept of "organization's information and knowledge system."

The socio-technical approach of organization is to consider the organization as a system consisting of a social system interacting with a technical system [40]. The following reflections are essentially based on the book *Knowledge Management in the Sociotechnical World*. Coakes [40] states that the term "socio-technical" is commonly used in systems studies, particularly in the design of organizations. Based on numerous writings, some dating back to 1920, she says that the best incarnation of this paradigm is found in the work of Fred Emery and Eric Trist at the Tavistock Institute, London, and in the study of Trist and Bamford (1951) in which the researchers identified the need for a socio-technical approach to develop a social system appropriate for the establishment of a new technical system. Elayne Coakes defines the term "socio-technical" as "The study of the relationships and interrelationships between the social and technical parts of any system" (p. 5). Thus, this term describes a broader view of the role of technology in an organization: "technology should be considered, discussed and developed not only as a technical artifact but in the light of the social environment in which it is exploited" (p. 4). She suggests that "Knowledge management from a socio-technical perspective requires managing the organization through continuous change and a continuous learning process supported by appropriate technologies" (p. 10). In addition, [41] consider that "adopting a socio-technical perspective avoids a purely technological approach

Thus, an information and knowledge system of an organization could be considered as a subset of the organization in which the technical system would be the digital information system (DIS). This system interacts with the members of

paradigm most recognized by KM researchers and practitioners.

**4. Organization's information and knowledge system**

**4.1 Socio-technical approach to the organization**
