ABSTRACT:
New business models in the area of network organisations or virtual enterprises are all highly dependent on interaction and collaboration between geographically distributed individuals and groups. Distributed groups will form essential elements in future business models and they will be important for organisational innovation. Their functioning is the glue that keeps network organisations together, they are the places where essential knowledge is exchanged and new knowledge is created.
In the context of the research project "Knowledge Sharing in Telematics Supported Distributed Teams and Communities of Networked Organisations (COMMSHARE)." study is made of the above mentioned topics. In this report we first analyse the concept of 'knowledge sharing communities' (also called 'communities of practice') from a theoretical and a practical perspective. It appears that both in theory and practice widely divergent perspectives concerning these communities can be found. The concept of communities is applied to groups that differ strongly in terms of size, composition, purpose and role.
Conditions for success of knowledge sharing communities are derived on the one hand from comparing communities to taskteams and on the other hand from a few case studies.
In the conclusion some questions concerning communities are highlighted and suggestions are made for research in this field. In the coming period we will explore this topic further within the COMMSHARE project, which is part of the Telematics Institute sponsored program 'Telematics Innovation in the Networked Economy'.
