Identifying and categorising knowledge reuse activities in electronic repositories

Abstract

Purpose Knowledge reuse using electronic repositories, while increasingly important, requires more thorough analysis. Service modularity has been recently applied in services research but has not been integrated into knowledge reuse studies. The purpose of this paper is to draw on both service modularity and knowledge reuse to develop and validate a framework that categorises forms of packaged knowledge in an electronic repository. Design/methodology/approach Drawing on knowledge reuse and service modularity research, a model is proposed. The model is empirically tested using a case study research design. Findings This research highlighted the value of including both context and process as key dimensions when packaging service knowledge for reuse. This study identifies knowledge types present in modular solutions and how they were configured and reconfigured in the knowledge repository. This research identified five ways modularised services were leveraged. In addition to the traditional scale and stretch approaches, already present, but conflated, in the service literature, three other configurations were identified; shrink, separate and segment. Research limitations/implications The findings are based on a single empirical case study which may limit the generalisability of the findings. There is a need for additional research to further validate the model in additional contexts. Practical implications This study provides managers with empirical examples of how a modular repository was used in practice and outlines five ways of recombining contextual and processual elements to enable service codification and reuse. It has implications for how knowledge is decomposed and recombined in repositories, suggesting an explicit separation of context and process knowledge while developing modular elements within both. Originality/value To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is the first study that explicitly uses context and process as dimensions and draws on service modularity to understand types of knowledge reuse in electronic repositories. In doing so, it adds value by developing and validating a model that identifies five types of reuse.