Tacit Knowledge

Introduction

The role of tacit and explicit knowledge in the workplace
Elizabeth A. Smith

The author
Elizabeth A. Smith is Vice President of Summit
Resources, Inc., Houston, Texas, USA, and Adjunct
Professor in Administrative Sciences, School of Business and Public Administration at the University of Houston
Clear Lake.
Keywords
Knowledge workers, Information resources management,
Motivation
Abstract
Knowledge plays a key role in the information revolution.
Major challenges are to select the ``right’’ information from numerous sources and transform it into useful knowledge. Tacit knowledge based on common sense, and explicit knowledge based on academic accomplishment are both underutilized. Ways knowledgeenabled organizations acquire, measure, teach, share and apply knowledge are discussed and illustrated. Methods to balance the use tacit and explicit knowledge at work and practical, proven ways to improve the understanding and use of knowledge are presented. Organizations must begin to create worker-centered environments to encourage the open sharing and use of all forms of knowledge. Electronic access
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at http://www.emerald-library.com/ft Journal of Knowledge Management
Volume 5 . Number 4 . 2001 . pp. 311±321
# MCB University Press . ISSN 1367-3270

People have always passed their accumulated knowledge and commercial wisdom on to future generations by telling stories about their thoughts, work and experiences. Now, as in the past, people use face-to-face and
’’ hands-on’’ methods to convey their ’’ know how’’ or tacit knowledge to others (Hansen et al., 1999). Throughout recorded history, some form of written language has been used to document their ’’ know-what’’ or explicit knowledge. Pursuits of tacit, explicit and selfknowledge, self-renewal and innovation are timeless, endless and relentless.
Historically, capital, raw materials and

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