Saturday, August 12, 2006

Aspiring together

by Rich on Thu 10 Aug 2006 09:55 AM PDT Permanent Link
A short summary of "ba" in organizational knowledge creation
1) Knowledge creation as key to success
In order to do well in an economy driven by high technology and innovation, business leaders will have to develop and deploy the capacity to sense and seize emerging market opportunities.
2) Knowledge is context dependent (ba)
“Knowledge is context specific as it depends on a particular time and space “(Hayek 1945). “Without a specific context knowledge is only mere information. Knowledge creation always depends on situated perception, cognition, and action–on a ba, the Japanese word for place” (Nonaka 2000) (1) .
The word ba (place) derives from the concept of “basho” (emptiness). In this sense the meaning of place does not refer to a substance, but rather to the void or empty space in which place is contained. The void of ba does not denote mere nothingness, but rather a charged sphere or generative field which makes knowledge transparent. One might say that “ba” refers to the processes which creates place. Just as the useful part of the tea cup lay in the emptiness at its center, in which the drink is contained and consumed, a useful ba is found within the reflective spaces which are contextualized by a proper atmosphere and spirit. A good ba is a shared meditative place of knowledge creation which inspires creative imagination and crystallizes intention.
The key element of ba is to provide a phenomenal place for the precensing of knowledge, one way that this is done is by providing an environment where a clear distinction can be made between those places where ordinary daily activities are performed and those where accessing creative imagination through interrelationship is facilitated. The quality of place has long been crucial for an artist to fully realize her artistic vision. Similarly, in a good ba, an organization utilizes a creative space to further its pursuit of excellence and innovation. (2)
But ba is more than simply a physical location, rather it is an enabling context for the process of creating new knowledge. Ba facilitates the creative interaction of all those who participate in its shared spaces. The utility of a ba can be measured in the quality of conversations which emerge within it and how those who participate simultaneously evolve their own perspectives, while transcending themselves in the creative process of knowledge making. (3)
“Ba is a place where information is given meaning to become knowledge and new knowledge is created out of existing knowledge through the transformations of context” (Nonaka, Toymata, Nagata 2001).
The transformation of context involves the evolving sphere of organizational learning and innovation which must be deployed to adapt to an ever changing global marketplace. The metaphor of a sphere is often used to describe a ba, in that a sphere has maximum surface area and minimal volume, it provides maximum external interface and variety. Just as each point in a sphere is equidistant to the center, in a ba anyone has the potential to be the center, and because ba is a shared context in motion, the center can change as the context evolves. Therefore, rather than being a stable place, ba is a constantly moving sphere of organization.
3) Knowledge creation requires care and trust
Because each individual can be both periphery and center in a ba, each person has the potential to serve as a “hinge” for the creative movement of the group. The ability for each individual to be fully valued in the activity of knowledge creation invest the process with a quality of affective inter-subjectivity and deep mutual respect which inspires all participants to achieve optimal performance. Along with the proper setting or “basho” the key factor which enables the fragile process of knowledge creation are care and trust. Just as a person requires care from birth to develop into the fullness of their human potential, the process which seeks to achieve knowledge and innovation requires care and trust for its full realization.
4) Satsang or aspiring together
Because the process of knowledge creation requires mutual care and trust while aspiring to create new forms of knowledge, we introduce the notion of the Sanskrit word “satsang” in its interpretation as “aspiring together” (Patel 2005). In this context “satsang” is used to denote the process by which equal participants come together in an atmosphere of care and trust to transcend themselves as individuals in an aspiration toward truth and wisdom. In a community which aspires together towards wisdom, each individual begins to delve into deeper sources of their own personal knowledge. In this manner knowledge which was locked up within individuals is tapped for serving the common good. In the context of organizational knowledge creation, “satsang” involves cross-disciplinary teams – who may not otherwise communicate openly and freely with each other – aspiring together toward a goal of shared wisdom and instant execution.
5) Tacit knowledge
The deeper sources of knowledge within the individual are often referred to as “tacit knowledge”. Tacit knowledge refers “to what we know, but can not say” (Polyani 1966), or to those activities we perform which no longer require making the task explicit by articulated instruction. Tacit knowledge refers to a quality of knowing or “cybernetic epistemology” (Bateson 1972) (4) in which we perform an activity through sensing, feeling, or intuition. Tacit knowing is embodied knowing; that is, it is a way of knowing through experience which we can not easily put into words. For instance, the ability to walk or ride a bicycle are tacit forms of knowing which are difficult to articulate, or to put into words, if one tried to describe how they are done. Similarly, most skilled workers gather knowledge through experience which is often difficult to articulate. For instance, a mechanic who knows there is a problem with a particular part of the engine just by hearing the sound it makes would be hard pressed to describe this intuition to an apprentice simply by writing it down.
The formulation of a good ba taps into the tacit knowledge of the skilled worker who articulates it in a manner in which it can be converted to explicit knowledge and shared throughout the entire organization. In this manner ba provides a context for collective knowledge. This cintext facilitates the creative process, through four aspects of “knowledge conversion”, which transforms tacit into explicit knowledge forms. Collective knowledge conversion is a function of social relationship and is not an individual achievement.

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