Knowledge capture in small and medium enterprises in the construction industry: Challenges and opportunities

There is now a great deal of interest among researchers and practitioners regarding the importance of knowledge management (KM) in an organisational context. Few large construction organisations have implemented and reaped the benefits of formal KM approaches. However, there are very few empirical studies on KM geared towards small and medium enterprises (< 250 employees). This paper is part of on-going PhD research on small and medium enterprises (SMEs), focusing on KM. A pilot study was conducted, involving twelve professionals from eleven organisations, prior to the main study. The pilot study revealed that, for SMEs, knowledge capture was the most challenging process in the 'knowledge management cycle'. Hence, this paper discusses the importance and challenges of knowledge capture from a social and technological perspective. It will also discuss appropriate methodology for knowledge capture. In addition, the paper documents the nature of training provisions that will benefit SMEs through their knowledge capture initiatives. It also notes that SMEs can benefit from effective knowledge capture practices. Capturing knowledge within an organisation helps in problem solving, managing change, organisational learning, succession planning and innovation, to name a few. The paper concludes that capturing knowledge in SMEs is not easy. It is an integrated and complex social process, which has culture, people, technology, communication, leadership and organisational structures at its core. The paper recommends that more research effort needs to be targeted at improving knowledge capture practices in SMEs, and that there is ample scope for empirical research in this area.