Individual and social barriers to knowledge transfer

It is often stated that people use knowledge for their own benefit and that they share it only grudgingly. This may be partly true because our society has deep cultural traditions which tend to discourage knowledge sharing. Even memories from school confirm the picture of knowledge as a treasury that has to be protected and hidden. During examinations, the rise of shared potentials is castigated as a ´crib´ and as an attempt to deceive; what counts are the individually produced results. On the other hand, the necessity of sharing knowledge in a company in order to use the economic resource of knowledge efficiently and effectively is said to be one of the critical success factors nowadays. Through an analysis drawn from the literature and from my own research experiences and knowledge management projects, I discuss the various individual and social barriers that hinder people from sharing and transfering their knowledge. From this analysis, one can draw some suggestions how to overcome these impediments.