To Share or Not to Share? Risks and Benefits of the External Knowledge Transfer

Knowledge management research has extensively covered the benefits of the availability and sharing of knowledge, which include efficiency gains, improved quality, and knowledge as the source to strategic advantages over competitors. However, knowledge management research usually takes a biased view, as disadvantages of knowledge transfer are often ignored. For example, competitive advantages are mostly based on advanced knowledge, which per se relies on knowledge asymmetries and therefore forbids the availability of knowledge. We therefore introduce two opposing approaches for the design of knowledge transfer, highlighting different practices and interpretations and introducing possible benefits and risks.