A Comparative Assessment of knowledge management education across the United States department of defense Summer Bartczak (University of Central Arkansas)

The National Military Strategy (2004), the Capstone Concept for Joint Operations (2005), and the Quadrennial Defense Review (2006) specifically highlight a new focus by the Department of Defense (DoD) on knowledge in operations as opposed to traditional weapons platforms. As such, each of the military services have put into place KM programs to varying degrees. According to Stankosky’s (2005) four pillars of KM framework, managing an organization’s knowledge assets can be most effectively accomplished by addressing four key elements--leadership, organization, technology, and learning—the “learning” pillar including KM education. Given that research on KM education is sparse (Ruth et al, 2000) and that organizations that do not address KM education are more likely to fail with KM efforts (Koenig, 2004), this multiple-case study provides a first look at KM education across the DoD. The preliminary results indicate that nature and importance of programs vary across the services, and, despite some leadership support, the resources needed to execute them are not always available