Exploring narrative variety: Narrative-based knowledge sharing in the oil exploration industry

This study extends theory and research on narrative-based knowledge sharing in organizational communities. An emperical case study examines the role of narrative and knowledge sharing in a virtual community of practice at Shell Int. Exploration and Production. The focus on analysis is on how engineers facing urgent drilling problems make use of narritives provided by peers in order to find solutions. Finding confirm on the one hand the impotance of narritives for problem solving in this highly sophisticated and virtual context (former studies focused exclusively on face to face interaction on the shop floor level). On the other hand, the results indicated that the narritives told do not represent a coherent entity but rather a complex varity which is likely to irritate and confuse users. the conclusions drawn is that organizations cannot refrain from qualifying narritves generated in their communities. It is necessary in order to get orientation out of narritive varitey. Finally suggestions for establishing evaluation procedures are provided. More generally, the findings of the paper stress the importance of reflecting on narritves.