The mysterious art and science of knowledge-worker performance

MIT Sloan Management Review

Volumn 44, Issue 1, 2002, Pages 23-30

  Davenport, Thomas H ^a,b   Thomas, Robert J ^a   Cantrell, Susan ^a  

^a ACCENTURE   (United States)

^b BABSON COLLEGE   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 4444282947     PISSN: 15329194     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (27)

1. P. Drucker, "Knowledge-Worker Productivity: The Biggest Challenge," California Management Review 41 (winter 1999): 79-94.
2. For the impact of work-space design, information technology and organizational factors on knowledge-work processes, see T.H. Davenport, S.L. Jarvenpaa and M.C. Beers,"Improving Knowledge Work Processes," Sloan Management Review 37 (summer 1996): 53-65;
3. for more on knowledge workers, see "The Knowledge Workplace," Gartner, Feb. 29, 2000, www.gartner.com, and related Gartner reports;
4. for more on group knowledge-worker creativity, see D. Leonard and W. Swap, "When Sparks Fly: Igniting Creativity in Groups" (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1999).
5. The conference was cohosted in March 2001 by the Accenture Institute for Strategic Change and the Stanford Center on Work, Technology and Organization.
6. Autonomy has long been viewed as a critical variable in job satisfaction for many types of workers. See, for example, J.R. Hackman and G.R. Oldham, "Work Redesign" (Boston: Addison-Wesley, 1980);
7. and B.D. Janz, J.A. Colquitt and R.A. Noe, "Knowledge Worker Team Effectiveness: The Role of Autonomy, Interdependence, Team Development and Contextual Support Variables," Personnel Psychology 50 (winter 1997): 877-904.
8. D. Cohen and L. Prusak, "In Good Company: How Social Capital Makes Organizations Work" (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 2001).
9. Two studies show the impact of work relationships on the development of new ideas: T.L. Albrecht and D.T. Hall, "Facilitating Talk About New Ideas: The Role of Personal Relationships in Organizational Innovation," Communication Monographs 58 (1991): 273-288;
10. and P.R. Monge, M.D. Cozzens and N.S. Contractor, "Communication and Motivational Predictors of the Dynamics of Organizational Innovation," Organizational Science 3 (1992): 250-274.
11. This phenomenon has been widely documented in articles such as R. Cross and L. Baird, "Technology Is Not Enough: Improving Performance by Building Organizational Memory," Sloan Management Review 41 (spring 2000): 68-78;
12. and R. McDermott, "Why Information Technology Inspired but Cannot Deliver Knowledge Management," California Management Review 41 (summer 1999): 103-117.
13. Much has been written about groupware and other technology to support virtual teams. Early work is best summarized in R. Johansen, "Groupware: Computer Support for Business Teams" (New York: Free Press, 1998);
14. D.L. Duarte and N.T. Snyder, "Mastering Virtual Teams: Strategies, Tools and Techniques That Succeed" (New York: Jossey-Bass, 2000);
15. J. Lipnack and J. Stamps, "Virtual Teams: Reaching Across Space, Time and Organizations With Technology" (New York: Wiley, 1997);
16. J.S. Olson and S. Teasley, "Groupware in the Wild: Lessons Learned From a Year of Virtual Collocation," Proceedings of the Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (November 1996): 419-427.
17. T.G. Gill, "Early Expert Systems: Where Are They Now?" MIS Quarterly 19 (March 1995): 51-81.
18. See, for example, M.L. Markus and M. Keil, "If We Build It, They Will Come: Designing Information Systems That People Want To Use," Sloan Management Review 35 (summer 1994): 11-25.
19. T.H. Davenport and J. Glaser, "Just-in-Time Delivery Comes to Knowledge Management," Harvard Business Review 80 (July 2002): 107-111.
20. J.S. Brown and P. Duguid, "Creativity Versus Structure: A Useful Tension," MIT Sloan Management Review 42 (summer 2001): 93-94.
21. Microsoft, for example, pays considerable attention to recruiting processes but has no central approach for improving knowledge-worker effectiveness once people are hired. See R.W. Selby and M.A. Cusumano, "Microsoft Secrets" (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1998) for a discussion of recruiting processes.
22. Many aspects of IDEO's culture, including its work-space design, are described in T. Kelley, "The Art of Innovation: Lessons in Creativity From IDEO, America's Leading Design Firm" (New York: Doubleday, 2001).
23. M. Schrage has explored the importance of prototyping in his book "Serious Play: How the World's Best Companies Simulate To Innovate" (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1999).
24. Davenport, "Improving Knowledge Work Processes."
25. Cohen, "In Good Company"; and R.J. Thomas, "What Machines Can't Do: Politics and Technology in the Industrial Enterprise" (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1994).
26. R. Buchanan, "Brave New Work," Details, February 1995, 94-99;
27. and F. Anderton, "Virtual Officing Comes in From the Cold," New York Times, Dec. 17, 1998, sec. F. p. 1.