Knowledge Sharing in Crisis Management Networks- Mock Drills as Inter-Organizational Learning Platforms

Crisis management has in recent years become one of the most important areas in public policy. The increasing number of man-made and natural disasters is compelling governments around the world to improve their contingency plans. Effective crisis management is essential for minimising the effects of...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inInternational Conference on Intellectual Capital and Knowledge Management and Organisational Learning p. 186
Main Author Ndlela, Martin Nkosi
Format Conference Proceeding
LanguageEnglish
Published Kidmore End Academic Conferences International Limited 01.10.2012
Subjects
Case studies
Collaboration
Communication
Consortia
Contingency planning
Cooperation
Explicit knowledge
Knowledge management
Knowledge sharing
Management of crises
Multidisciplinary teams
Organizational learning
Society
Studies
Tacit knowledge
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Summary:Crisis management has in recent years become one of the most important areas in public policy. The increasing number of man-made and natural disasters is compelling governments around the world to improve their contingency plans. Effective crisis management is essential for minimising the effects of disasters. More often these crises cut across traditional boundaries and require network response strategies and approaches. Crisis brings together different organizations and compels them to work collaboratively to resolve situations that affect them all. The type of these inter-organizational relationships (IRs), whether they are networks, consortia or alliances, and differences in social capital are often identified as key factors determining the success or failure of crisis management. An important ingredient to effective crisis management is knowledge sharing among crisis management networks. Training exercises provides a platform for inter-organizational learning and knowledge sharing processes. This paper is based on a case study of a full scale crisis response exercise, in which leadership, crisis coordination mechanism, coordination approaches, crisis communication and ICT support are explored. The paper concludes that crisis training exercises increases the threshold condition for inter-organizational learning as well as reducing cognitive distances between crisis response agencies. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]