Building an implementation strategy to enhance knowledge capture: The intricacies of implementing a cloud-based tool, a case study

Knowledge management (KM) is considered to be a fundamental key for industries’ improvement in efficiency and competitiveness. The construction industry could benefit from KM’s adoption due to its multidisciplinary nature and the large amount of knowledge produced during the projects’ life cycle. Nevertheless, the adoption of KM in the construction industry is in its infancy. It has been shown that the construction industry has difficulty in knowledge holding and reuse which can be translated as a deficient practice of KM. Therefore, the enhancement of KM in construction industry is essential. This research seeks to understand existing barriers in the phase of knowledge capture within KM cycle in the execution of a construction project supported by a cloud-based tool.
During an initial investigation, the content of the gathered knowledge supported by the cloud-based tool was found to be incomplete. This shortcoming led this project to focus on the implementation of the cloud-based tool with which was sought to support knowledge capture during the execution of construction projects. The assessment was based on the comparison between an implementation strategy developed according to the initial proposed process, and the recreation of the deployed implementation of the cloud-based tool. The results coming from this research highlighted the lack of awareness regarding KM and its importance, despite the existence of practices such as communities of practice and development of dossiers which are just one of the components of KM. Furthermore, the results showed the need for change within construction organizations in order to successfully adopt and implement KM. In terms of the implementation process it was found that the first shortcoming came from the lack of a defined process to support. Further weaknesses came from gaps in the initial proposed process of implementation and subsequently unachieved objectives after the deployment.
Finally, using implementation strategies was found helpful to strengthen implementations in organizations, including the implementation of KM and additional required processes and tools.