KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT APPROACH TO UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES: LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE MANAGEMENT OF FERDOWSI UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

As libraries at Ferdowsi University of Mashhad in Iran experienced the transition from traditional libraries to modern electronic libraries, knowledge management (KM) was employed as an approach in managing these libraries from 1999-2004. This approach is explained under four headings: organizational knowledge, knowledge presentation, knowledge dissemination, and knowledge application and the outcomes are described from the perspective of the development of a KM culture, organizational learning and a learning organization. The experience shows that this framework is a suitable model for practice. It also proves that although this approach is a workable approach, some administrative obstacles may prevent it from achieving the same results in all libraries.