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This paper aims to shift the unit of analysis in the study of organisational knowledge from individuals and their actions to practices and their relationships. It introduces the concept of \"site\" to help advance an understanding of the relationship between practice and knowing. The notion of site supports the intuition that knowing is both sustained in practice and manifests itself through practice. It also evokes the idea of knowledge as being rooted in an extended pattern of interconnected activities that only when taken in its living and pulsating entirety constitutes the site of knowing. In this paper, I review the different ways to conceptualise the relationships between knowing and practice, and I show how the idea of site adds to the existing body of work. Building on the results of a longitudinal study in the field of telemedicine, I then offer suggestions on aspects of practice where knowing manifests itself, and I use the concepts of \"translation by contact\" and \"at distance\" to explain how dispersed knowings are woven together and the power effect that can derive from these. I conclude by reflecting on the implications of this radical view and the direction for future research.

How should digital platforms engage with and invest in their online communities to shape innovation and knowledge contributions from members in their platform ecosystems? This is an important question because user contributions are important drivers of technological progress and business value. We examine the effect of platform sponsors’ investments in online communities on user knowledge contributions, using fine-grained longitudinal data from a leading enterprise software vendor’s community network. We focus on the sponsor practice of knowledge seeding, in which its employees provide free technical support by answering questions posted in discussion forums. We define user knowledge contribution as peer-evaluated, quality-weighted solutions that community members provide to help resolve the questions their peers raise. We show that the platform sponsor’s investments in knowledge seeding have a positive, significant association with user knowledge contribution. We also find temporal and geographical variations in returns on the sponsor’s knowledge investments. Specifically, returns (i.e., amount of user contribution that is stimulated) decrease with the age of the community, consistent with the observation that the most active contributors are lead users who tend to join the community early. In addition, returns vary across different countries, such that greater returns are realized when the investment is made in countries with higher levels of information technology (IT) infrastructure, partly because country-level IT infrastructure may be associated with greater absorptive capacity of these countries. We discuss the implications for research and practice.

Purpose The purpose of this study is to address the problematic yet under-researched issue of the disconnectedness of the temporary and permanent levels of organisation in project-based firms in terms of learning and innovation diffusion. Design/methodology/approach The paper is based on a longitudinal case study of a pioneering French construction firm introducing the partnering method in France. Based on an abductive approach, the analytical framework combines insights of the literature on community and networks of practice to investigate the processes and mechanisms of diffusion of innovation in project-based firms. Findings The function of semi-permanent organisational levels in connecting the temporary and permanent levels of the firm – the communities of practice (CoPs) and network of practice (NoP) exists besides the formal organization of the firm. As a social learning process, innovation diffusion involves both formal (i.e. vertical) and informal (i.e. horizontal) forms of organising and learning. Intermediary and informal ways of organising enables the embedding of innovation both in terms of content and connections. Foremost, CoPs/NoPs contribute to relational embeddedness. Boundary actors and objects are essential in crossing the different levels of embeddedness to overcome the learning boundaries between temporary projects and the permanent firm. Research limitations/implications The investigation is built on a single case study and further empirical research is needed, preferably longitudinal case studies, as this allows greater capture of the diffusion process. The authors suggest further studies using practice-based perspectives to capture the formal and informal ways of organising innovation diffusion. Practical implications Managerial interventions should favour the development of the informal dynamics of community and networks to foster both innovation and its diffusion. The managerial challenge lies in creating the right prerequisites for the existence of both the informal community logics of organising and the formal top management decision-making, and to orchestrate their timing in the diffusion process. Social implications The study reveals the importance of both formal and informal networks in driving innovation. As such, project-based firms should be aware of these dynamics when striving for change. Originality/value The study contributes to the literatures on diffusion of innovation, project marketing and construction management. It includes new insights related to the function of intermediary and informal organisational levels of project-based organisations, the dynamics and connection between the temporary and permanent levels of the project-based firm related to communities and networks of practice, and the boundary spanning activities that are involved between the formal and informal levels of the firm.

Using longitudinal data of IT professionals’ activities in the SAP Community Network, and the career histories of these professionals obtained from LinkedIn, we investigate the relationship between an individual’s participation in Internet-enabled open knowledge communities and a major event of his/her career development: jobhopping. We measure individual participation in open knowledge communities by two dimensions of related activities: contribution and learning. We provide empirical evidence that contribution to knowledge communities leads to a higher likelihood of job-hopping, yet a greater amount of learning is associated with a higher probability of retention. We argue that the effect of contribution can be attributed to job market signaling and the effect of learning is primarily driven by enhanced job performance and career advancement within the current organization. A series of robustness tests were conducted to address the self-selection bias and to rule out some possible alternative explanations to these mechanisms. Our work contributes to the existing body of literature on networks of practice and provides supporting evidence that participation in these networks indeed leads to career benefits and status advancements. Additionally, our study takes the first step to fill the gap in the current literature on voluntary employee turnover that has so far ignored the impacts of employee participation in external knowledge communities, thus providing both theoretical and practical insights in the area of organizational research.

This paper investigates the practice-based learning dynamics that emerge among peers who share occupational practices but do not necessarily work with each other or even know each other because of geographical or organizational distance. To do so, it draws on the literatures on situated learning, networks of practice, and information infrastructures, and on insights from a longitudinal case study of the implementation of a Web-based information system used by people working in the field of environmental health. The system was deeply involved in the transformations of local practices as well as relationships between peers. Based on a dialogue between existing literatures and observations from the case study, this research extends the practice-based perspective on learning to the computer-mediated context of a network of practice. To that effect, it proposes a model of what we call trans-situated learning that is supported by the local universality of an information infrastructure whose use becomes embedded with other infrastructures.

Electronic networks of practice and research around this social web 2.0 platform has gained traction within the last few years with the advances in social media technologies and their proliferated use. Therefore, this article examined the types of interactions within an electronic network of practice open to those within the software engineering field. This research found that narrative posts, with certain aesthetically appealing qualities, can allow better social learning and interaction in network discussion forums, thereby enabling richness of knowledge constructed. The use of dimensional analysis a qualitative framework enabled this research to develop a model to gain a comprehensive insight into various factors that contributed to social learning within networks of practice.

Many studies have focused on the motivation of knowledge contributions in virtual communities. However, one of the most fundamental ways in which people present their knowledge contributions is through the use of language, and its effect on social identification and impression management has not been thoroughly examined. The goal of this study is to better understand language use in regards to reputation management in virtual practice networks. The study recognizes why participants on virtual communities, in the pursuit of higher status reputations, will generate better content, more specific to the collective and display better commitment. The research will also address how to evoke these social engagement and commitment behaviors, so that the network community is sustained. This research is valuable for academics and practitioners who seek to understand why people participate and commit to providing knowledge contributions in virtual practice networks.

Organizational knowledge is one of the most important assets of an enterprise. Therefore, many organizations invest in enterprise social media (ESM) to establish electronic networks of practice and to foster knowledge exchange among employees. ESM improves interaction transparency and can be regarded as a sociotechnical system that provides a language for communication and symbolic action as well as a better sense of others’ social identity. Accordingly, the individual characteristics of knowledge seekers and contributors determine why and how interactions occur. However, existing studies tend to focus only on knowledge contributors’ characteristics and to treat knowledge as an object that needs to be transferred. To address this gap, this study conceptualizes and empirically tests a multilevel model of knowledge exchange in electronic networks of practice (ENoP) that includes the characteristics of knowledge seekers and knowledge contributors as well as their dyadic relationship from an activity-centered language/action point of view. A dataset of 15,505 enterprise microblogging messages reveals that knowledge seekers’ characteristics and relational factors drive knowledge exchanges in social media-enabled ENoP. Focusing on organizations with knowledge exchanges supported by information technology, our research extends prior findings by providing the first evidence that the communicative act expressed by question–answer pairs impacts the quality of knowledge exchanged.

SYNOPSIS: Using a multi-method approach, we explore accounting academics’ knowledge-sharing practices in an Electronic Network of Practice (ENOP)—the Accounting Education using Computers and Multimedia (AECM) email list. Established in 1996, the AECM email list serves the global accounting academic community. A review of postings to AECM for the period January–June 2006 indicates that members use this network to post questions, replies, and opinions covering a variety of topics, but focusing on financial accounting practice and education. Sixty-nine AECM members constituting 9.2 percent of the AECM membership base responded to a survey that measured their self-perceptions about altruism, reciprocation, reputation, commitment, and participation in AECM. The results suggest that altruism is a significant predictor of posting frequency, but neither reputation nor commitment significantly relate to posting frequency. These findings imply that designers and administrators of the recently launched AAA Commons platform should seek ways of capitalizing on the altruistic tendencies of accounting academics. The study’s limitations include low statistical power and potential inconsistencies in coding the large number of postings.

Electronic networks of practice are computer-mediated discussion forums focused on problems of practice that enable individuals to exchange advice and ideas with others based on common interests. However, why individuals help strangers in these electronic networks is not well understood: there is no immediate benefit to the contributor, and free-riders are able to acquire the same knowledge as everyone else. To understand this paradox, we apply theories of collective action to examine how individual motivations and social capital influence knowledge contribution in electronic networks. This study reports on the activities of one electronic network supporting a professional legal association. Using archival, network, survey, and content analysis data, we empirically test a model of knowledge contribution. We find that people contribute their knowledge when they perceive that it enhances their professional reputations, when they have the experience to share, and when they are structurally embedded in the network. Surprisingly, contributions occur without regard to expectations of reciprocity from others or high levels of commitment to the network.