Premium
Mastering tacit corridors for competitive advantage: Cross‐cultural knowledge creation and sharing at four international firms
Author(s) -
Glisby Martin,
Holden Nigel J.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
global business and organizational excellence
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.227
H-Index - 16
eISSN - 1932-2062
pISSN - 1932-2054
DOI - 10.1002/joe.20396
Subject(s) - tacit knowledge , competitive advantage , knowledge management , context (archaeology) , explicit knowledge , asset (computer security) , process (computing) , business , resource (disambiguation) , dimension (graph theory) , imperfect , computer science , marketing , paleontology , computer network , computer security , mathematics , pure mathematics , biology , linguistics , philosophy , operating system
In today's business world, knowledge is shaped in corporate relationships and diffused in networks. A major mode of knowledge is the tacit dimension, which refers to the elusive, uncodified knowledge that comes from experience, is hard to quantify, but gives an all‐important mood and tone to explicit knowledge. Tacit knowledge is traditionally viewed as an important though hazily conceived organizational asset; however, here it is treated as something that is co‐created in cross‐cultural business relationships and as a knowledge resource of immense significance. Tacit knowledge is prone to serious misappreciation by managers, but understanding it for what it is can give firms a key edge that the authors term knowledge advantage . Here, they use case‐study data from four international firms to introduce a model that makes use of the concepts of tacit corridors and coupling. Tacit corridors are the metaphorical spaces in cross‐cultural interactions where managers' thoughts and actions are constrained—often inexplicably—by uncertainty and imperfect sense‐making. Coupling is the process of reflexivity‐based action for facilitating knowledge flows connecting individuals, organizations, and networks. Knowledge advantage is the art of mastering tacit corridors through the context‐sensitive application of coupling. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.