Knowledge management: An information science perspective

Knowledge management (KM) is an emerging field of specialization in a number of professions, including Information Science (IS). The different professions are contributing to and influencing the developments in KM in their own ways. However, it is argued here that IS is not contributing to the advancement of KM as much as it should for a number of apparent reasons. The main purpose of the paper is to call on the members of the IS profession to take a more proactive and visible role in advancing KM by showing that KM is a natural and long-awaited development in IS and that a number of circumstances have made KM to be an area of emphasis in IS whose time has come. The paper also aims at contributing towards achieving a consensus among IS professionals on conceptualization, goals, and scope of KM in IS. The recommendations of the paper focus on how the profession could proactively be involved in advancing KM. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.