A Formal Approach to Modelling Knowledge Transfer Processes

An organisation's competitive advantage depends on its ability to transfer knowledge effectively. Research suggests that knowledge transfer remains a problem for many organisations. More work needs to be done to contribute to the understanding of how organisational knowledge transfer can be improved. This paper aims to address this issue by using a formal modelling approach to represent the process of knowledge transfer within organisations. A process algebra named Communicating Sequential Processes (CSP) is used for this purpose (Hoare, 1986). This allows low-level details to be modelled meticulously and the efficacy of the process to be analysed using formal tools. Based on Tong and Ayres' (2009) work, the researchers use basic CSP building blocks to represent a set of people's behaviours in the process of knowledge transfer. An initial analysis of this formal transfer model is also conducted. The application of CSP in analysing knowledge transfer models is a novel idea. It is expected that this study explores a new direction of studying human knowledge related processes in this field.