Group Learning Processes and Properties of Tacit and Explicit Knowledge

This paper examines how the properties of tacit and explicit knowledge can affect group learning processes of knowledge workers. Two types of knowledge (tacit and explicit knowledge) have different characteristics based on the four dimensions (codifiability, complexity, context specificity and consciousness). I explain how these properties of knowledge induce disparate group learning processes (sharing, storage, and retrieval). This consideration reveals the dilemma of knowledge workers facing in their group learning: Whereas tacit knowledge held by knowledge workers may lie at the heart of their group learning, the properties of tacit knowledge impedes sharing, storing and retrieving it among knowledge workers. I propose transactive memory as an intervention that eases the dilemma of knowledge workers in group learning.