A knowledge management framework for manufacturing firms in South Africa

Competitive advantage is the phrase of the day and manufacturing firms only have three things to compete with: people, processes and technology. All firms have similar access to all of these. Therefore the only things that can differentiate a firm or give a firm the competitive advantage are how they extract value from their people´s competencies and capabilities. Nonaka (1991) argues that the only source of competitive advantage is knowledge. It is therefore critical that companies know how to manage their knowledge. They should also not only manage their knowledge but they must have the tools and mechanisms to manage their knowledge effectively. Therefore the aim of this study is to develop a knowledge management framework that works in a manufacturing environment and identify which knowledge management activities promote knowledge creation, use and transfer. A questionnaire was used to determine if the proposed knowledge management framework can work in a manufacturing environment and which of the activities are best suited. The top ten activities were identified. It is also important to note that even though the knowledge management framework were supported by one manufacturing multi-firm group, the framework should be tested in other manufacturing environments to improve the generalization of this research.