Those who attempt to hang on to their expertise will soon find themselves supplanted by competitors who are willing and able to make their clients more knowledgeable. This definition includes a wide variety of industries, such as consulting, investment banking, advertising, and research and development. Knowledge transfer is especially relevant in these industries, by their nature. The common theme of knowledge specialization underlying professional services means that all industries within the field have much to learn from each other, and that indeed almost all organizations can use their approaches as a model. There are powerful competitive forces at play across the field of professional services, however, which are making it increasingly difficult for firms to differentiate themselves from their competitors.
Knowledge transfer is a key source of that vital differentiation.
This chapter also examines in detail the nature of professional service firms, and looks at the examples of several professional service industries to illustrate how the principles of knowledge transfer apply. Since knowledge is the capacity to act, it is only an attribute of people. Information, which is what can be contained in documents and databases, can be stored, duplicated, processed, and communicated, but its real value comes when it is internalized by people as their personal knowledge and capacity to act more effectively. Information can have a high or low value, depending on the context, and the primary function of many organizations is adding to the value of information from the perspective of their clients. Finally a framework for developing organizational information and knowledge capabilities is presented, using both technology and the skills of people.