Spring 1998: Learning & Knowledge Management in the Information Age

Speaker:

Maryam Alavi, Professor and Chairperson of the Information Systems Dept. at the University of Maryland

Synopsis

Recently, there has been a growing interest in learning and knowledge management in organizations. Knowledge management refers to systematically creating, extracting, accumulating, and deploying knowledge (distinct from data and information) as a corporate asset. In many large firms, major knowledge management initiatives headed by senior management have been launched. Learning is the process by which information is transferred into knowledge.

The presentation starts by defining the term knowledge and by making a distinction between knowledge and information. Next, it examines the relationship between learning and knowledge creation and the relationship between learning and knowledge management and information technology. IT architecture and tools used to support knowledge management are characterized and described. Specific case examples of IT applications for knowledge management and distance learning are described and video demonstrations are presented and discussed.

Speaker: Maryam Alavi 

Maryam Alavi is a Professor and Chairperson of the Information Systems Department in the College of Business and Management at the University of Maryland at College Park. Dr. Alavi holds a PhD in Information Systems and a M.S. in Computer Science from the Ohio State University, and a B.A. in Computer Science and Mathematics from the State University of New York at Buffalo. She has authored over fifty papers published in several journals including the Academy of Management Journal, Management Science, MIS Quarterly, Communications of the ACM, IEEE Software, and Journal of Management Information Systems. Dr. Alavi serves as an associate editor of several information systems journals and is the elected Vice President of Education of the Association of Information Systems (AIS). She is the recipient of two Allen Krowe Teaching Awards and the Distinguished Scholar Teacher Award from the University of Maryland at College Park. Dr. Alavi was a Marvin Bower Fellow and a visiting faculty at the Harvard Business School in 1996-1997.