Academic Context
Knowledge workers create the innovations and strategies that keep their firms competitive and the economy healthy. Yet companies continue to manage this new breed of employee with techniques designed for the Industrial Age. Davenport (2005) argues that knowledge workers are vastly different from other types of workers in their motivations, attitudes, and need for autonomy, hence, they require different management techniques to improve their performance and productivity. His extensive research involving over one hundred companies and more than six hundred knowledge workers, provides insights into how knowledge workers think, how they accomplish tasks, and what motivates them to excel. Davenport identifies major categories of knowledge workers and presents a unique framework for matching specific types of workers with the management strategies that yield the greatest performance.
Walgreen et all (2005) also analyzed importance of motivators (e.g. responsibility, recognition, achievement, possibility of growth) among IT-professionals in the job stress and performance framework, while Tampoe (2002) analyzed challenges in motivating knowledge workers.
The growing intensity and dynamism of competition has forced firms to focus their long term strategies on resources and capabilities, and exploiting intellectual capital its has emerged as one of the firm's most strategically significant capability. Jordan et all (1997) argue that any attempt to exploit intellectual capital for competitive advantage needs to be based on a sound understanding of an organization's current approach to acquiring, sharing and utilizing knowledge. Hatten et all (2001) 3C model speaks of the collective co-ordination of expertise, a fundamental point ...