Knowledge and Information Management Skills

This report analyzes the importance of knowledge and information management skills in the workplace, using Zara as a case study. It examines the relationship between data, information, and knowledge, analyzes Zara's knowledge assets, and evaluates its framework for knowledge sharing. The report also provides recommendations for improving Zara's knowledge management practices.

Knowledge and Information
Management Skills for the
Workplace

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
a). Relationship between data, information and knowledge...................................................1
b) Relationship between individual knowledge and organisational knowledge....................2
c) Analysis and modelling techniques to identify the knowledge assets................................3
d) Evaluate actual and potential knowledge assets.................................................................4
a) Requirements for creating, storing, applying and integration knowledge.........................5
b) Consider the importance of intellectual property rights.....................................................6
a) Contribution of a knowledge assets on the organisation....................................................7
b) Evaluate the knowledge requirements of Zara...................................................................9
c) Evaluate organisation's framework for enabling knowledge sharing...............................10
d) Recommend proper improvements for above discussed frameworks..............................11
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................12
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................13

INTRODUCTION
Knowledge and information is very important part of the business or organisation.
Knowledge is the scope of information whereas information is the act of communicating
knowledge. The difference between them is thin line (Li and Herd, 2017). It is very important for
organisation to have the skills to manage the data, information and knowledge. Various skills are
required to manage the data, information and knowledge at workplace such as technical skills,
conceptual skills, communication skills, decision making skills, problem solving and many other
skills. Data comprises the basic, unrefined and generally unfiltered information.
In this present report, Zara company is being chosen for assessment. It is a Spanish fast
fashion clothing and accessories retailer based in Arteixo in Galicia. It was founded in 1975 by
Rosalia Mara and Amancio Ortega. Inditex is the main brand of Zara, the world largest apparel
retailer. The revenue of the company is €25.34 billion. Zara has 7475 stores across the world.
This present report will provide the evaluation of the concept as well as significance of
knowledge management in Zara's knowledge asserts. Further, it also provides a detailed
understanding of important knowledge process in the development of Zara.
MAIN BODY
a). Relationship between data, information and knowledge.
Data, information and knowledge are the most important things within organisation or at
workplace. It is very important for all types of organisations to manage the information,
knowledge and data in very effective manner as it require skills for effectual management
(Schlee and Karns, 2017). It is very important for Zara to better understanding and management
of knowledge, information and data. Data, information and knowledge are almost interconnected
to each other, the difference between them is thin line.
Data- It is an atomic representation of a concept, a sign or symbol, an observed fact,
being natural or artificial. It is the outcome of observation more or less accurate that may or may
not be inspired by a problem or an issue to be resolved (Travis, 2017). Data are the outcome of
an objective categorization, evaluate, comparison of what observed. It might be useless for the
person who collect data. Data must be fixed on medium in order to allow to be convey, managed,
processes by automated system or human being. The data in Zara are managed by both
automated system and human beings (managers).
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Information- It is the result processing of data in to make them important for the users. It
is the process which gives meaning to a raw data. If data is not available the process of
information cannot begin as it is interconnected on each other. Without the process, data is
meaningless. Information can be consist of one of more than one data. This shows the
relationship between data and information as information needs to data to give meaning and data
also need information to make the raw data useful for users.
Knowledge- It is the super level of understanding regarding the output of information
about a particular topic. It is the level that permit utilising generic law instead collection of
information, it is internalized by people and shaped by their experience by people as well as
shaped by their experience along with perceptions (Cheuk, 2017). Raising knowledge means to
obtain information which can improve the plane of information. In order to satisfy the plan of
knowledge, manager or employee of Zara move back and forth from harvesting of data,
composition of information as well as creation of knowledge.
b) Relationship between individual knowledge and organisational knowledge
The individual knowledge and organisational knowledge can be termed out to be the two
sides of a same coin. A good and effective personal insight or knowing the stuffs will help a
organisation like Zara to have a good functionality and growth and thus will lead the firm to
improve its operations effectively. This will help the organisation to improve its performance and
thus will; lead the organisation to have a good management of informations that are been lead
within an organisation. The individual knowledge can be defined as the information and skills
sets that are been possessed by an individual employee or designer at Zara, which will help
him/her to improve the quality of business operations and actions that are been followed by the
person (Laudon and Laudon, 2016.).
On the other hand, the organisational knowledge can be termed as a combination of
several individual knowledge, placed together to perform a task or activity and improve overall
management of operations that are been carried out within selected fashion firm. Both the
components are effectively related to each other that will assist the organisation to have a good
combination of operations and this will support a proper placing of business operations and
activities in much suitable manner. A good organisational knowledge will improve its expertise
and thus will lead the organisation to meet the requirement of their customers. Other than this, it
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will help in mitigating the risk factors which will improve their performance by identifying the
potential risk factors and mitigate them before their occurrence.
The relation between the individual and organisational knowledge can be managed and
explained by VARK model by Neil Fleming, which will improve the overall management of
various knowledge gaining and implementing operations and thus will lead the organisation to
have a good rise in performance level. It stares that, in individual learning, a person can gain
knowledge or information by the means of reading and writing about a problem or factor. On the
other hand, the organisational knowledge, being a larger attribute involves visual, Auditary and
Kinaesthetics measures which will improve the person's knowledge towards the operations
within firm.
It is a combination with other business activities of Zara will lead the firm to improve the
quality of operations which are been lead within the organisation and thus, guides the effective
knowledge management within the organisation. This will help in effective planning of their
business activities. The organisation will look after adoption of different concepts and theories of
knowledge management which will act as the tactics to carry out proper structuring and planning
of operations to maintain sustainability of organisational knowledge. For example, organisational
knowledge will help Zara to collect the informations or feedbacks from their customers over the
issues in their products and services while the individual knowledge will help in suggesting their
proper rectification or removal.
c) Analysis and modelling techniques to identify the knowledge assets
Identification and management of knowledge assets is a very important attribute within
the organisation. A knowledge assets can be defined as the gathered intellectual and
informational resources that will assist an organisation to perform its functions. It can be in form
of ideas, learning memory or insight assessed by the use of cognitive and technical skills.
Besides this, the knowledge assets are the attribute that are hold by the stakeholders of an
organisation like customers, suppliers or partners.
Within an organisation like Zara, there are certain focus groups that will help in
improving the management of knowledge assets. These focus groups includes individuals and
experts that will identify and analysis the knowledge assets. Different measures of analysing the
knowledge assets which are followed by the focus groups of Zara. Some of them are:
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 Evaluation of previous year: The objectives set for the proper knowledge management
are been evaluated and feasibility of the measures is been analysed. It helps them to look
through the targets achieved and utilisation of knowledge assets.
 Setting goals for next year: once the evaluation of past year is been done, focus group
look after the planning of strategies for coming year. The long term goals are been set in
order to evaluate various areas and techniques related to analysis of knowledge assets.
 Comparing the results of two focus groups: once the goals are been set, the results are
been analysed and valuable information is generated with the proper combination of
different approaches which improves knowledge management by a firm (Travis, 2017).
Other than this, models are been implemented for proper management of knowledge
assets to a greater level. Some major knowledge management models are:
 CommonKADS: It is a AI software that will improve the performance of the
organisation which will improve the system development and investigate various factors
to maintain the data asset within a firm. It has various levels like Knowledge level,
symbolic, logic and circuit based levelling to maintain data or information.
 Adams Model: It involves the processes, advices, improvements and the peoples who
will work upon proper assessment of the knowledge assets or data management
operations which will improve the quality of actions plans and have a strategic approach
to knowledge management (Schlee and Karns, 2017.). Besides this, it also assists the
organisation like Zara to transfer the data or knowledge to a right person, at a right time.
d) Evaluate actual and potential knowledge assets
The Knowledge assets are the intellectual property in form of ideas, concepts or designs
that are been possessed by an organisation and its manpower (How to identify knowledge assets,
2016). This is been further classified into two sub categories: Actual and Potential, which will
improve the quality of operations in much effective way. Thus, it will lead the organisations to
plan its strategies accordingly. The evaluation of both will help in improving performance of the
firm.
Actual Knowledge assets: In case of Zara, the actual assets are the fabrics, marketing ideas,
designs and accessibility to fashion trends. Besides this, the manpower or employees including
the product planner, designers marketing and sales executives etc. which will contribute in their
part for the effective development of their fashion based products and services. The work force
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will use their learning or knowledge to improve the performance of business operations of
selected enterprise. It includes the selected organisation's expertise in clothing and accessories
manufacturing.
Potential Knowledge asset: It includes the potential or unexplored measure or market segment
that can be utilised by selected firm. As per this, Zara can opt for fashion foot wears as its
potential knowledge asset. In order to have a good functionality for this, effective footwear
designers, manufacturers and developers can be hired by the firm. It will also help the
organisation to carry out its operations and develop a proper market plan to explore potentially
untouched market and information source. Besides this, the present workers can be trained to
work upon foot wear products to have good operational effeciency.
a) Requirements for creating, storing, applying and integration knowledge
Various measures are been undertaken for creating, storing, implementing and integrating
the knowledge within a firm. Knowledge can be termed as a proper result of information
processing that is been applied to raw data in order to get the proper management of business
operations and thus, will lead the firm to improve gaining of effective knowledge by the selected
fashion firm, Zara. All these measures are been carried out by a firm to have a proper
management of their knowledge and hence will improve cognition processing. Basically, the
measures of knowledge mapping is undertaken within the firm (Pauleen and Gorman, 2016). The
tacit and explicit knowledge is been taken in consideration that will improve functioning.
Creation of knowledge
Proper analysis of data related to an area or sector is been collected by the firm in order to
have an effective creation of knowledge. As per the developmental theory of knowledge by John
Piaget, the knowledge that is been generated through this process can be classified in three
categorise: physical, logical-mathematical and social.
Storing of knowledge
As per the knowledge management system that is been carried out within Zara, the
managers will look after the proper storing of informations or intellectual properties s its is a big
source of knowledge for the firm (Adeleke and et.al., 2015). It can be stored in tangible or
intangible format, that will contribute to carry out effective management of informations and
data that is been analysed within an organisation. The other employees within a firm like
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designers, tailors and marketing executives will also contribute in proper utilization and storing
of this knowledge.
Application of knowledge
The stored knowledge will be put to implementation when in need as it will assist the
organisation to carry out effective processing of data and generate a decent information.
Whenever the selected fashion enterprise faces an issue, this information or data is been carried
out within the firm which will improve the proper planning of operations and thus will support
the workers to analyse these knowledge assets to find out proper solution to these problems and
thus will improve the quality of products and services offered by Zara. The knowledge
management system or KMS will assist the workers to analyse the operations and apply proper
solutions in their intellectual asset or database (Collet, Hine and du Plessis, 2015). The
knowledge gaining and its application will also provide an individual or worker within the
selected firm to have a good experience to tackle various issues related to fashion operations.
Integration of knowledge
The gained or derived knowledge is been effectively integrated or placed in various
operations which will improve the quality of actions which will support a good rise in business
operations and hence, will imply a good assessment on the business operations and activities
which will improve the proper planning of knowledge management strategies and thus will lead
the firm to improve the efficiency of professionals working within selected fashion commodity
manufacturing enterprise (Raish and Rimland, 2016).
b) Consider the importance of intellectual property rights
The intellectual property rights or data protection rights are the legal obligations and
measures, that are undertaken to protect and preserve the intellectual property of selected fashion
business enterprise. Various measures are been taken along with certain laws which will aid an
organisation to safeguard its knowledge and gaining a good sustainability. Some of these
measures are as follows:
 Data protection Act, 2018: It is a legal obligation which will help an individual or a firm
to protect its personal data, information and intellectual property. Any hampering or
disdaining of these measures will impact the overall operations of the organisation
effectively (Fonseka and et.al., 2015).
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Besides this, certain principles are been followed for effective data protection which will help the
firm to outline the proper safety of knowledge or important data of the firm. Some of them are as
follows:
 The knowledge must be processed for the limited purpose and not be widely broadcast.
 The data protection measures which are been taken by the selected firm is required to be
adequate, relevant and not in excess complication or size as it increases its accessibility
for mishandling the data and thus, makes it susceptible to get altered (Fonseca, Conde
and García-Peñalvo, 2018).
 If not necessary, the data must be diminished in order to prevent its adverse usage over
the firm.
 Also, Zara is required to look after the proper transmission of this data to others over a
secured medium for preventing its misuse.
Other than this, different measures are been taken in considerations by the selected
fashion firm, Zara to protect its intellectual property. Some appropriate and effective measures
are as following:
 Patent: It is a unique licensing of a good or idea that is been developed by the firm and
will safeguard these intellectual property in effective way. It prevents theft of copying of
idea by others.
 Copyright: it is an exclusive right over a product, design or idea by an individual or a
firm. In this case the product can be accessed by others, but with the permission of the
owner (Wu and et.al., 2015.).
 Trademark: It is a unique name or logo given to a firm or individual that helps the firm
to maintain their operations and thus will, lead the proper protection of intellectual
property.
 Design right: It can be exclusively used by Zara. It provides the organisation a special
right over the products and fabric designs and thus prevent their copying or misuse.
a) Contribution of a knowledge assets on the organisation
The effective framework is been taken in consideration by the firm that will improve the
quality of business operations and hence, it will improvement the quality of business operations
and thus will improve the quality of business operations and assets that are been carried out by
the firm (Moss, 2017). For this purpose, effective knowledge asset framework is been carried out
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that will improve the effectiveness of planning of resources for the operations laid by selected
fashion firm, Zara. The knowledge is basically of two types: Tacit and Explicit. These will help
in identifying the proper framework of the organisation which will improve their performance to
a greater level.
The effective knowledge frame work will include certain components and is hugely based on
knowledge mapping measures which will improve the quality of operations and thus will lead the
firm to have a good sustainability.
Knowledge elicitation: It includes the management of knowledge assets of the firm and discuss
the proper assessment of required knowledge and uses system software like ERP, CRM etc.
Knowledge externalisation and assessment: It includes the proper usage of effective tools that
will help in gaining a proper advantages of the organisation and manage different types of
knowledge.
Knowledge Distribution: It involves two stages or modes: Push and Pull. In the pull mode, the
knowledge is distributed by the means of effective searches and filters with proper assessment of
knowledge items. On the other hand, in push mode, effective corporate trainings and workshops
is been taken. Also, the data is been transferred using communities of practice (CoP).
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Illustration 1: Knowledge management framework
Source: KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT FRAMEWORK, 2018

Knowledge maintenance: It involves the effective management of relevance of knowledge with
the effective handling of corporate knowledge assets at Zara. It helps in removal of outdated
knowledge items or assets and skilfully place or update the new ones. Other than this, it helps in
filling the gaps of knowledge mapping measures (Kane, 2017).
The knowledge assets contribute a larger part for the growth and development of selected
fashion firm. This will help in improving the overall performance of the firm and thus, enable the
organisation to carry out its business activities and operations in much suitable way. This will
also help an organisation to lay out the proper planning of business measures. The actual
knowledge assets will assist an organisation to assist its management and work force to improve
their current fashion based operations while the potential knowledge asset helps the firm to
explore and utilize the new sectors or segments in market. This practice will not only improve
the product portfolio of the firm but will also increase their overall customer satisfaction level.
b) Evaluate the knowledge requirements of Zara
There are various requirements of knowledge for the organisation to carry out the data
operations and thus will improve the quality of business activities and thus, increase the
effectiveness of operations within the selected fashion based enterprise. The suitable utilization
on available resources and knowledge will support the selected business entity to improve their
operations and hence various sort of informations are been assessed and collected within the
organisation that will improve the quality of business operations and thus will lead the firm to
have a good sustainability.
It will have various, yet effective implicative requirements that are been taken in
consideration by the firm (Johnson and Raju, 2018). The organisation will look after the proper
fulfilment of these requirements that will help an organisation to have a good and sustainable
growth measures which are as follows:
 It will help in suitable cost cutting the futile expenses which improves the financial
stability of the organisation.
 Improves the selected firm's efficiency to tackle the risk factors of the organisation and
thus will improve the productivity.
 This will help the firm to have a good decision making and improving the effectiveness
of planning and development of the strategies.
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 This will also lead the organisation to adopt new technologies and enhance the time
management and resource handling measures by selected fashion based enterprise. It will
guide the organisation to explore potential market segment.
It improves the individual and organisational knowledge which will assist Zara to handle
different sort of risk factors and have a good increase in efficiency and versatility of their
workforce. The proper assessment of these operations will help the firm to carry out the business
operations and thus will lead the fir to improve the quality of business activities and thus will
lead the firm to improve the quality of work operations and thus will lead the firm to carry out
business activities of selected fashion based firm. This will also assist the organisation to
improve the quality of products and services that are been taken in consideration by the firm.
Other than this, it will help the organisation to improve the performance of Zara to a greater
extent. This will help in improving the quality of business operations and thus will lead the firm
to enhance the product or service quality to have an enhancement customer satisfaction level.
c) Evaluate organisation's framework for enabling knowledge sharing
An extensive organisation's framework for enabling knowledge gathering and sharing.
This will also improve the quality of business operations and thus, assists an organisation to have
a good and effective development of business operations and will improve the products and
service quality to a greater extent (Osmani and et.al., 2016). This will guide the organisation to
enhance the performance of the selected fashion based firm. Various KM processes and
frameworks are been undertaken by the firm. However, the most effective framework is
knowledge pooling approach. This will help the management of business organisation to have a
good collection of various skilled labours and the intellectual properties like designs, ideas and
other strategies. This will help in execution of operations undertaken by Zara.
As the actual knowledge assets will use this framework of knowledge pooling to identify
the customers needs related to their apparels and fashion accessories (Schnurman, 2010). It will
support the organisation to develop new products and services for their buyers and thus, will lead
organisation to enhance its performance. This will lead the organisation to enhance the
effectiveness of fashion based products and services. Other than this, the knowledge pooling
process will help the organisation to look after its potential knowledge assets (Holmes and
Stubbe, 2015). As the firm is presently not operating in footwear segment, the KP process will
help the management to hire footwear designers, manufactures and artisans. Besides this, it will
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also help in getting proper guidance from experts in fashion footwear segment. It assists the
organisation to make good interaction with various stakeholders in firm fr knowledge sharing
and improve the intellectual property of Zara.
d) Recommend proper improvements for above discussed frameworks
Various recommendatory measures are been undertaken by the selected fashion product
firm that will help the organisation to have an effective growth and thus will lead the firm to
enhance the overall performance of a firm. The usage of pooling facility will improve the quality
of business operations and thus will lead the organisation to have a good arrangement of the
activities. However, the firm is required to lay out certain recommendations which will improve
quality of business activities and hence, lead to increase in knowledge management of the firm.
Some major recommendations that are been taken by the firm are:
 Proper training can be provided to the employees or work force within Zara in order to
decrease the time gap and have a good assessment of market shares and operations to a
greater level. This training measure undertaken by the firm will help an organisation to
meet customer's needs and requirements (Brabazon, 2016).
 Effective market research can be performed before operating in the potential knowledge
assets segment. This will help in improving effectiveness of various products and
services and reduce the chances of loss that can impact the firms' performance.
 As various intellectuals and experts will be working together within the firm, there are
chances that certain conflicts between the workforce or stakeholders can impact the
overall functionality of organisation. Hence, proper rectification of these issues is must
for Zara.
 A proper handling plan is required to be developed by management of Zara, that will
impact the effective growth of the enterprise and hence, will lead the firm to maintain the
sustainability of a business enterprise, effectively (Obeidat and et.al., 2016).
Implementation and following of all these recommendations will assist Zara to have a
good market share and thus, it will help in proper assessment of te growth measures that can be
undertaken by the firm.
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CONCLUSION
Based on this assessment, it can be further concluded that management of knowledge is a
major concern within the firm. This can be further said that a good handling of business
operations of Zara is deeply based on the assessment and handling of certain informations and
knowledge by the firm. The interrelation between data, information and knowledge with the
individual and organisational knowledge is been carried out improving insight of the firm.
Effective analysis and modelling techniques are been taken with evaluation opf actual and
potential knowledge assets. Besides this, the knowledge creation, storing and integration is been
taken in context to handle the intellectual property rights of selected firm. Other than this, the
knowledge requirements and framework is been taken in consideration with the assessment of
effective recommendations to reduce the risk factors associated with it.
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