Some perspectives on communities of practice Journal Articles

A community of practice is a group of people who share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic, and who share their knowledge about the topic by interacting on an ongoing basis. In the current turbulent environment of change, communities of practice have been found to be effective tools for sharing knowledge and management strategies and practices within and between organizations, helping to cope with change and to maintain or improve competitive position. We have identified four classes of communities of practice: 1) internally in individual organizations, 2) spanning network organizations linked through formal agreements for a common business purpose, 3) network communities that span organizations but are not a part of other formal relationships, and 4) self-organizing network communities. Characteristics of these communities vary according to their classification, but not as much as might be expected. Our findings indicate that communities of practice in classifications 1) and 2) are more likely to include activities that require transfer oflegally protected intellectual property, while classifications 3) and 4) tend to focus more on managerial issues and strategies