| dc.description.abstract | With competition increasing in the market, companies are seeking new ways to sustain and enhance
their effeciency and competitiveness. In this regard, companies have recently been focusing on
knowledge as a competitive resource, and it has become a challenge for organisations to locate and
share their knowledge. Many different approaches to managing knowledge exist, but the two extreme
points are facial interaction and the use of information technology (IT). When people in an organisation
are co-located, they can interact on a frequent basis to learn from each other. This is by
\citet{REF52} referred to as Communities-of-Practice (CoP), where knowledge is shared in its
natural context, for example through story telling. In large organisations where people are
geographically spread out however, IT is considered to be helpful for connecting people and
spreading knowledge.In Statoil, professional networks are established to enable experience transfer between network
members. Network members can both be co-located in the organisation or geographically spread out,
and I have therefore looked at how experiences are transferred between network members. Special
attention has been paid to the value of IT for connecting network members who are
spread out geographically. Throughout this report I have argued that professional networks are
similar to CoPs, and they are continuously being compared. To find information about
professional networks, I conducted an empirical study where network members and leaders from
three professional networks were interviewed. | |
