path dependency
how the set of decisions people face in any given situation is limited by decisions people have made or events they have experienced in the past, even if past circumstances are no longer relevant
https://ja.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/経路依存性
In particular, in the context of Organizational Knowledge Acquisition, it is used to refer to the suppression of knowledge B acquisition when comparing knowledge A, which is clearly related to the "current business," with knowledge B, which is not clearly related to the "current business.
From the perspective of individual members of the organization, when acquisition behavior of knowledge B is performed, it costs "persuasion cost for decision maker to make a decision to allocate resources such as time to knowledge B".
Acquisition of knowledge A is low in its cost.
This difference in cost creates a bias in the individual's decision to choose knowledge A as the acquisition target.
A situation occurs where all members have acquired Knowledge A and there are no members with Knowledge B in the company.
Diversity of knowledge] is lost when viewed as an organization as a whole, not holistically optimal
https://gyazo.com/babc113eaf8c33f15b7fafb597cf50a5
Some argue that this is the principle by which disruptive innovation occurs.
Newly generated knowledge is knowledge that is not currently used in the business.
Existing firms lose on the knowledge gap side because they cannot acquire new knowledge due to path dependence and startups do not have that bias.
Examples of countermeasures
Lowering the cost of persuasion
For example, if there is an engineer who wants to learn Rust, he can buy a Rust book even if he does not use Rust in his assigned work. Is personal development of OSS for business use on holidays business? - Cybozu Inside Out | Cybozu Engineer's Blog
Making such a declaration in advance can lower the psychological hurdle for the individual.
A person who belongs to more than one organization.
Pulling and combining from the outside world what is not in the company
There are two channels for information to flow into the organization
If you belong to more than one organization, your "current business" will also be more than one.
In some cases, this is negative for individuals: Company Boundaries and Personal Valuation.
Establish [Research Division
Create a department with the responsibility of acquiring and creating knowledge.
Lower persuasion costs related to members' knowledge acquisition behavior
The knowledge acquisition behavior itself is the business.
relevance
The dilemma of acquiring knowledge from outside the company
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