Title: Knowledge management in Indian SMEs: tool for sustainability

Authors: Sujata Mukherjee; Gita A. Kumta

Addresses: Area of Business Environment and Strategy, Centre for Social Entrepreneurship, School of Business Management, SVKM's NMIMS, V.L. Mehta Road, Vile Parle (W), Mumbai, 400 056, India ' Area of Information Systems, School of Business Management, SVKM's NMIMS V.L. Mehta Road, Vile Parle (W), Mumbai, 400 056, India

Abstract: The importance and contribution of the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) sector to the economic growth and prosperity of India is well established. Their role in terms of employment creation, upholding the entrepreneurial spirit and innovation has been crucial in fostering competitiveness in the economy. The SMEs focus on running the business on a day-to-day basis and find no time to manage the knowledge which is perceived as an 'overhead'. SMEs experience a rapid rate of change as they move through their organisational life cycles. This paper attempts to understand how SMEs in India are managing knowledge for organisational sustainability and propose a KM model focusing on sustainability with reference to SMEs in India. The findings of the study show that SMEs had functional departments similar to any professionally managed organisations but did not have specific support functions like information technology or knowledge management as knowledge generated is immediately put into practice, rather than being stored in an electronic repository.

Keywords: small and medium-sized enterprises; SMEs; knowledge management; organisational sustainability; sustainable development; India.

DOI: 10.1504/IJPMB.2016.079674

International Journal of Process Management and Benchmarking, 2016 Vol.6 No.4, pp.491 - 511

Received: 17 Oct 2014
Accepted: 01 Mar 2015

Published online: 08 Oct 2016 *

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