《财经专业英语教程》（第三版）教学课件 Unit 2.pptxVIP

Unit 2;Knowledge Management [Para 1] 　In 1988 Peter Drucker (11)wrote: [Para 2]　The typical business [of the future] will be knowledge-based, an organisation composed largely of specialists who direct and discipline their own performance through feedback from colleagues, customers and headquarters (Page 12). For this reason it will be what I call an information-based organisation.;[Para 3]　In such an organisation, the management of knowledge and information becomes a key to gaining competitive advantage. [Para 4] “Business today”, echoed Charles Handy (Page 14) in 1992, “depends largely on intellectual property, which resides inalienably[in?eili?n?bli] in the hearts and heads of individuals.”(Page 13) Both writers were reflecting a growing awareness that companies had moved far from Victorian times, when they were (as Handy put it) “properties with tangible assets worked by hands whose time owners bought”(Page 15). They had become properties whose most valuable asset was intangible—the knowledge which exists in the heads and hearts of employees or in formal databases, patents, copyrights and so on.;[Para 5]　Knowledge was seen as the key to the creation not only of business wealth but also of national wealth(Page 16). In the British government’s 1998 White Paper(Page 17) on the competitiveness of the nation, it said: [Para 6]　Our success depends on how well we exploit our most valuable assets: our knowledge, skills and creativity … they are at the heart of a modern knowledge-driven economy. [Para 7]　Lester Thurow (Page 18), an American management professor, went so far as to suggest in a 1997 article in Harvard Business Review that intellectual property rights had become more important than manufacturing products or dealing in commodities. Once companies realised this they became aware of the need to find out how to manage that knowledge, how best to use it to create extra value. This was not an issue they had addressed systematically in the past.;[Para 8]　Infor