Japanese Way, Western Way: Two Narratives of KnowledgeManagement

The paper is based on a study of the KM literature. It looks at Nonaka’s, Takeuchi’s, and Konno’s notions about knowledge creation, BA, and the SECI model as grounded in Zen Buddhism. The paper discusses Polanyi’s idea of tacit knowledge, central to the Japanese way and to the Western way of understanding knowledge management. The paper also discusses Davenport’s and Prusak’s concepts of knowledge and knowledge markets. The paper argues that both the Japanese way and the Western way are grounded in, present deep themes of the nature of knowledge and knowing.