Knowledge Management: Psychological Aspects of the Loss of the Sense of Touch (Essay Sample)

Psychological aspects of the loss of the sense of touch
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September 29, 2015
Knowledge Management
Deloitte Touché Tohmatsu Limited (DTTL) is a UK-based private company offering professional services. With a presence in more than 150 countries, Deloitte provides financial advisory, audit services, enterprise risk, and tax consulting. The organization was founded by William Welch Deloitte in 1845 and has extended its boundaries worldwide. In 1989, the original company named Deloitte Haskins & Sells merged with USA-based Touché Ross to form Deloitte & Touché. The international firm had no exclusive access to their expected names, Deloitte or Touché Ross. Its current name, Deloitte Touché Tohmatsu was chosen in 1993.
Initially, Deloitte member firms in various countries were legally organized similar to an unincorporated association. In 2010, each member firm remained an independent legal entity but became part of DTTL. Deloitte & Touché Consulting Group, an affiliate created by partners of Deloitte & Touché, was founded in 1995. It was later renamed to its current name, Deloitte Consulting. Eclipse, an internet solutions company was acquired in 2000 by Deloitte. It was later separated into Deloitte Digital and Deloitte Online. The North American Public Service practice of Bearing Point was acquired by Deloitte in 2009. Clear Carbon Consulting and DOMANI Sustainability Consulting were purchased in 2011 by Deloitte. Übermind Inc. and Recombinant Data Corporation became part of Deloitte in 2012.
Consulting services account for 33% of the organization’s services. Short-term outsourcing, technology integration, human capital, strategy & operations, and enterprise applications are all listed under the consultancy service areas. Enterprise risk makes up 9% of risk services. Under this area, information security, information privacy, data quality and integrity, business continuity management, project risk, and enterprise risk management are covered. Tax services including tax liability minimization, tax implications advisories, transfer pricing, and net asset value cover 9% of Deloitte’s industry-related services (SCM, 2011).
Internal auditing, traditional accounting, and IT control assurance are services under auditing making up 30% of Deloitte’s services. Financial Advisory including personal and commercial bankruptcy forensics, document review, valuation services, e-discovery, corporate finance services, and capital projects consulting cover 9% of the services (SCM, 2011). Besides the professional services, Deloitte provides sponsorship with the UK member firm sponsoring the Royal Opera House and the London 2012 Olympics.
"Knowledge management is a discipline that promotes an integrated approach to identifying, capturing, evaluating, retrieving, and sharing all of an enterprise's information assets. These assets may include databases, documents, policies, procedures, and previously un-captured expertise and experience in individual workers" (Duhon 1998). A stark definition is knowledge management is the understanding of the forms of knowledge existent and where they exist. It ensures organizational initiatives are passed, accepted and supported by members. Processes spanning organizational functions are created. New knowledge is created and focus is made on knowledge storage, sharing, and refinement (Davenport & Prusak, 2000).
The consulting community is understood to be the breeding grounds for the operational origin of knowledge management. Consulting organizations had realized the internet for its Intranet concept in linking their knowledge-based organizations spread widely geographically (Davenport & Prusak, 2000).. With this acquired expertise in sharing and managing knowledge and information, knowledge management was introduced to other organizations as a product. The timing coincided with the recognition of knowledge and information as intellectual assets for any organization.
Competition is involved in the ability to create or acquire new knowledge. Though the competitive advantage may lean towards innovation, knowledge creation focuses on conversion, combination, continuous transfer of the various types of knowledge. The driving force to knowledge creation lies between the act of knowing and knowledge possession. Action, practice, and interaction then follow suit. Knowledge acquisition relates to knowledge obtained from external sources. These sources include partners, external experts, competitors, customers, and suppliers.
Just like a picture paints a thousand words, a good framework for knowledge creation integrates multiple elements and represents the in-built relationships. The frameworks or models are prototypes of knowledge management creation. In building the models, several steps are followed. These are:
* Identification of needs
* Identification of knowledge resources
* Acquisition, creation, or elimination of knowledge related resources/processes/environments
* Retrieval, application and sharing of knowledge
* Storage of knowledge (Davenport & Prusak, 2000).
In as far as knowledge creation and acquisition is concerned, Deloitte has been at the forefront in establishing new waves of Human Resource, organization priorities, and talent. Business challenges have driven the trend. Analytics, research, and industry insights have contributed to the design and execution of business driven practices to change programs. Deloitte’s vast experience with organizations has resulted in the development and enhancement of Talent Management practices. Areas relating to employee value proposition, diversity and inclusion, talent strategy, employee engagement, and retention have been covered.
An annual survey of Deloitte’s business units across 150 countries and involving 12,000 employees discovered a disconnection between baby boomers and the new generation (SCM, 2011). Baby boomers refer to employees attaining retirement age in that year. Strategies, knowledge management practices, and tools that worked for baby boom generation were changing. In addressing this issue, Rosemary Amato, the annual survey program director affirmed the use of knowledge sharing as a concept in all organizational processes (SCM, 2011). The concept would be the root to knowledge acquisition with new employees learning from the boom generation experiences.
Deloitte’s vision on knowledge management is one that relates to market experiences, competencies, expertise, and know-how. Under the vision, knowledge creation is based on the ability to find subject matter expert and obtaining a solution through assistance derived from sharing. Deloitte suggests a phased approach that is based on 6 major life-cycle elements that allow the creation of a sustainable knowledge-sharing culture. Collect, use, and enrich are the major components (SCM, 2011).
In meeting business objectives and inventing full-proof client strategies, DTTP has expanded its services to handle issues arising from inadequate knowledge management creation practices (SCM, 2011). Issues such as staff turnover, retiring boomers, and decreased supply of talent have led to companies reinventing the wheel. Services such as the assessment of the knowledge management maturity and assistance in the selection and implementation of knowledge management solutions are provided. Development of a plan for culture change and the definition of a knowledge management roadmap are also listed as services. By capturing knowledge from experience and assessment of successes and failures, DTTP has built knowledge required for streamlined operations.
Previous information systems handled day-to-day operations. Millions are spent on data warehousing solutions with more being spent on extracting actionable and truly useful information (Davenport & Prusak, 2000). Deloitte has designed an information system that produces operational analysis and insight. The Deloitte business intelligence and data warehousing (BI/DW) system is effective in managing data from disparate sources and its conversion to strategically relevant information required for competitive advantage. These systems include the Enterprise information management architecture, assessments and strategy (EIMS), Enterprise data warehouses and DataMart (EDW/DM) implementation, and the Beyond ERP reporting—BI, analytics and reporting roadmap. Others are the Transformational fact-based business intelligence and decision enablement, Business intelligence (BI) assessments, strategy and implementation, and the Offshore centers of BI/DW excellence systems (SCM, 2011).
Knowledge retention entails the capture of knowledge for future use or reference. Ungson and Walsh (1991) identified five knowledge repositories namely structures (formal and informal networks), culture, individuals, transformations (formalized systems and procedures), and external activities. These are the main areas where knowledge van be retained. Knowledge retention strategies define and identify the key knowledge resources that are at risk. Doan et al (2011) recommends the use of three basic questions before considering knowledge retention. These are:
1. What knowledge may be lost?2. What are the organizational consequences of losing that knowledge?3. What actions can be taken to retain that knowledge? (Davenport & Prusak, 2000).
Specific initiatives are then implemented in order to keep these resources within the firm. Such strategies are implemented before primary employees exit their positions.
In a bid to retain knowledge, Deloitte employs the use of certain tools and techniques for knowledge sharing. These include reward structures encouraging sharing of key kno...