Comprehensive Report on Knowledge Management Strategies at TCS

This report focuses on knowledge management at Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), examining how the company manages its knowledge assets for strategic advantage in the global market. It highlights the importance of effective knowledge management, addressing the need to integrate corporate culture and IT for improved information flow and decision-making. The report details TCS's initiatives, including PEEP and PROPEL, and discusses the difficulties in implementing knowledge management systems, such as employee knowledge sharing, organizational culture, and lack of performance indicators. The assessment of successful knowledge management initiatives, including the importance of people, process, and technology pillars, is also provided. The report concludes by discussing the PROPEL initiative and the significance of organizational learning and intellectual capital, providing an overview of knowledge management dimensions and success metrics within TCS.

Running head: KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author’s note

1KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
Executive Summary
The report mainly focuses on knowledge management at Tata Consultancy Services. The
company implements knowledge management that can help to manage the organisations’
knowledge assets. The practice of effective knowledge management helps to enable the
organisation with strategic advancement for competitive advantage in the global market. The
prominence of knowledge management is that it provides the organisation with managing the
knowledge effectively. There is a need to address corporate culture and IT for the purpose of
improving the information for effective actions. The knowledge management initiatives can
help to avoid failure in knowledge management projects. The initiatives influences the
decision making process of management in specific intervals. The gaps and improvement
areas are discussed for future enhancement of addressing knowledge management practices
in the organisation. The perspective of knowledge and its importance is addressed in this
paper.

2KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
About the Organisation..............................................................................................................3
Problem and opportunity............................................................................................................4
Nature of knowledge management Initiative.............................................................................4
Difficulties in implementing the system....................................................................................5
Assessment of successful knowledge management initiative....................................................6
PEEP Initiative...........................................................................................................................7
PROPEL Initiative.....................................................................................................................8
Knowledge management dimensions.........................................................................................9
Success metrics........................................................................................................................10
Conclusion................................................................................................................................11
Reference..................................................................................................................................12

3KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
Introduction
The report mainly focuses on knowledge management at Tata Consultancy Services.
The company implements knowledge management that can help to manage the organisations’
knowledge assets. The practice of effective knowledge management helps to enable the
organisation with strategic advancement for competitive advantage in the global market. The
prominence of knowledge management is to provide the organisation with managing the
knowledge effectively. There is a need to address corporate culture and IT for the purpose of
improving the information for effective actions. The knowledge management initiatives can
help to avoid failure in knowledge management projects. The initiatives influences the
decision making process of management in specific intervals (Dalkir 2013). The gaps and
improvement areas are discussed for future enhancement of addressing knowledge
management in the organisation. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the perspectives of
knowledge and its importance in addressing the initiatives in this paper.
About the Organisation
Tata Consultancy Services delivers several IT consultancy services to the global
business platform. The company was founded in 1968. The knowledge management is
practiced in TCS, where people, technology and processes are the three main pillars of
knowledge management. People in TCS builds the value for learning and involvement. The
knowledge management is used to enhance the learning aspects of the company through
PEEP (Proactive Employee Engagement Program) and PROPEL (Professional Excellence,
Role Enhancement, Ownership Culture, Personnel Growth, Employee Involvement and
Learning). TCS Company is adopting confluence collaboration software program that helps
the team to collaborate to achieve knowledge in efficient manner.

4KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
Problem and opportunity
TCS have the opportunity to expand its business globally with effective knowledge
management. The company have the opportunity to develop the cross cultural capabilities by
providing opportunities to women workers. The problem with the company was that it needed
high quality of service, high agility and to create a decentralised system. The problem can be
addressed by addressing improvement in knowledge management techniques and to get
prominent knowledge to proficient person at precise time in the company.
Nature of knowledge management Initiative
The aim of knowledge management is to provide value and establish knowledge
assets effectively to meet organisational goal. The two initiatives that TCS have implemented
are PEEP and Propel. The nature of PEEP for Knowledge Management initiatives of the
organisation is to formalise a face -to -face meeting with employees according to their
performance, grades and functions. Through the meeting the employees are provided with
the opportunity to discuss their problems and provide with some suggestions to solve the
problems. The nature of PROPEL provokes similar aim to encourage the employees for
sharing their concerns, which can help the management to solve critical problems related to
the employees at local level. The PROPEL involves the activities that enhance the knowledge
through Professional Excellence, Role Enhancement, Ownership Culture, Personnel Growth,
Employee Involvement and Learning. The Web technology is the initiation where users and
employees working on online platform interacts. It provokes for knowledge sharing and
acknowledges the challenges of current technologies. The company through this initiative
provides end to end solution to the employees. It is by developing and delivering the
programmes for addressing knowledge based products. The company initiates PEEP,
PROPEL and Web technology are the initiatives to advance their knowledge and reskill to

5KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
achieve the organisational goals. The organisation have initiated knowledge performance
parameters for effective capital management and enabling with learning organisation.
Difficulties in implementing the system
The analysis of some difficulties in addressing knowledge management initiatives are-
 The employees must possess that will to share knowledge with others in the
organisation.
 It is difficult to manage the organisational culture by the management team. Thus it is
important to share knowledge in practice and manage the culture on community and
organisational level (Becerra 2014).
 It is difficult to realise the perfect definition of knowledge management. Thus
knowledge management initiatives are required to provide technology driven
organisation.
 The failure in knowledge management approach is when the employee could not
reach organisation’s expectations. The difficulty can be observed when the employee
fall short while targeting the organisational goal to achieve.
 The difficulty observed in knowledge management initiatives is by lack of
performance indicators. The company faces difficulties in taking measurable steps to
provide benefits in acknowledging the knowledge for employees.
 It is also difficult to address knowledge management when there is inadequacy in
management support.
 Without proper planning, coordination, design and evaluation of process can be
difficult for the management.
 The management faces more difficulties in skilling the employees as well as
managers who train the employees for enhancing their knowledge.

6KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
 Without a proper organisation structure, the organisation faces more difficulties in
acknowledging knowledge management. As the flow of information cannot be
processed properly.
 It is difficult when the implementation of technology is not addressed properly.
 If knowledge management has lack of latest technology then to be competent is
difficult.
 Without developing an effective plan for implementing the knowledge management,
it is hard for the management to result profitable organisation.
 The budgeting of knowledge management process must be evaluated properly. The
budgeting and accounting excess cost faces difficulty in determining.
 The difficulty is also observed when there is lack of ownership and responsibility in
workplace (Holsapple 2013).
Assessment of successful knowledge management initiative
The assessment of initiatives by PEEP, PROPEL and Wed technologies implements for
successful knowledge management in TCS. The company have people, process and
technology as the three important pillars of the company. These three pillars of success have
increased the profit margin of the company.
People- the organisational culture is managed by the people of the organisation. The people
are the main factor of success in the organisation who contributes to increase the value of the
organisation. The knowledge management must be strengthened by addressing organisational
culture in the organisation. The knowledge of culture improves the management practices
Process- the process must be changing continuously so that continuous improvement can be
determined properly. The knowledge management process is the important strategic asset in

7KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
TCS. The process must have knowledge management strategies as the strategic element
enhances the knowledge management.
Technology- TCS have emphasised on interactive knowledge management technology
regarding virtual community. It involves the humans in knowledge management
improvement plan. Organisation states that knowledge management is the technological
discipline. The employees accessing the web technology or web platform enables to have
innovative technical background. The technology also address the drawbacks in the
technologies which focuses on various alternatives that can solve for competitive advantage.
PEEP Initiative
The PEEP has succeeded in achieving effective knowledge management initiative in
TCS. The communication among the employees and higher employers have provoked this
proactive employee engagement program in the organisation. The program enabled various
departments to express their views and issues to be resolved so that transparent
communication can be achieved in the workplace environment. The PEEP involves
individual employee meetings that can clearly determine the issues to address effective
knowledge management techniques. In PEEP, senior managers directly interacts with the
associates. It does not involve any impersonal activities such as e-mail or memo to convey
the value and objective of the organisation (Nonaka 2015). The employee are free to express
their opinion in front of senior managers or to share their problem to get advice from senior
managers that they have never got to express. The PEEP aims to provide the employees a
forum to speak out for themselves. The personnel handling reports of employees provides a
platform to know the team members for flexibility in work system. The employees
individually speak with senior management for proposing their views in work culture and
they understands the perspective of management in TCS. The CEO, VPs, HR managers, team

8KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
leads and many more are involved in the face- to- face interviews. The knowledge
management is improved when the senior management is provided with the background
information on the employee grades, service period, achievements and many more. It is to
involve both employee and employer in the interview to speak on specific topic for effective
time management and effective results with adequate solutions. The management provides a
feedback form for recording the suggestions, problem, solutions and many more.
PROPEL Initiative
The PROPEL initiative in TCS helps to encourage the practice of share- care- grow in
the organisation. In this initiative process, the aim is to address employee issues and their
shared ideas are discussed in the provided forum. The employees take initiatives to promote
their ideas and discusses their problems to solve at their level. The PROPEL initiative helps
the organisation to create an ownership culture to improve the retention and sourcing. The
main aim of approaching this initiative is that it covers all associates of the organisation. The
confluences and camps helps to solve the problem and to determine new ideas that can help
to improve the knowledge management approach. Professional excellence helps to improve
the professional background so that the basic knowledge and the goals to achieve can be
understood. Role enhancement is that the role of that specific level can be compatible. The
ownership culture is that where the employees feel obliged to be a part of the organisation
and they can feel as personal stake towards the organisational performance. It develops a
situation where behaviour is taken into consideration for values and not by any rules. The
personal growth is to improve self -development skills to achieve the organisational goal with
its potential. The personal development is vital in individual’s growth and success. The
development possess effective emotional values, intellectual capability and physical strength.
The employee involvement is important so as to sustain business progress. The employee

9KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
involvement helps to directly participate in organisational function to achieve its mission and
goal. The employee involves to solve several problems of the organisation and participates in
decision making process. The learning is a continuous improvement process which enables
progression in the organisation. Propel is highly emphasized in TCS by its leaders, and
associates. The activities involved in PROPEL initiatives tend to implement organisational
learning and improves intellectual capital in the market and develops strategic management
and mobilizes the knowledge.
Organisational learning
The organisational learning is the process where retaining of knowledge and
transferring it in the organisation is processed. The organisation put effort in improving its
activities over time to experience more to eradicate errors. The experience provides the
organisation that enables for higher knowledge.
Intellectual Capital
The intellectual capital denotes the value of the organisation that is intangible and
knowledge of the employee. It describes the relationships with those people and organisation.
The human capital, customer who are also known as relational capital and organisational
capital are elements of TCS.
Knowledge management dimensions
Strategy- the strategy in addressing knowledge management have corporate strategy. It
focuses on managing, sharing, creating knowledge assets that helps to achieve tactical
requirements of the organisation.

10KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
Organisational culture- The culture of the organisation mainly influences the employees’
interaction within the organisation. It focuses on the context upon which knowledge is
enhanced for changes.
Technological growth- the technological enhancement helps to enhance the knowledge of
the organisation and people working in it. The technological expectation must be met to
achieve competitive advantage in global market environment. With technological disciplines,
the knowledge can be achieved by sharing to large number of groups in the organisation.
Management and leadership- the knowledge management requires competency in
managers to train the employees with right knowledge. The leadership approach is by
experienced leaders to provide adequate knowledge for growth at all levels of the
organisation.
Success metrics
Gap assessment- the gap assessment helps to identify the required element is present in the
organisation that can build systematic approach for knowledge management. The SECI
model helps to focus on people, process and technology for effective growth and profit for
the organisation. The expectation of effective leadership approach, rewards and recognition
and knowledge management support helps for proper governance of the activities.
Development metric- the knowledge management framework is used by the project team
members and communities. The framework has knowledge management plan in each project
and have one knowledge management champion. The project team are assessed under the
knowledge management principles.

11KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
Activity metric- the organisation establishes the effective framework that provides the
knowledge management to measure different activity levels of the organisation. The team
metrics focuses on identification of knowledge but community metric focuses on haring of
knowledge and on its growth. The reward and recognition helps to recognize poor
performance among the employees and then improvement measures are developed to reward
them as per their performance.
Outcome metric- The knowledge management is used for sound business outcome. Thus, it
is essential to bring improvements in the activities of the business. These improvements are
the efficiency of the employees to perform a task, effectiveness of that specific process and
changes observed in behaviour and culture of the organisation. This helps the organisation to
take investment decisions accurately.
Conversions- the measurement of conversion helps to identify what changes needs to be
done in the organisation. The sales, and revue must be converted to result in profitable
aspects of the company. The tracking of tasks helps to analyse the performance of the
organisation.
Conclusion
The report concludes that the knowledge management has successfully approached
for a systematic management of knowledge of the organisation’s assets to create and develop
value for strategic growth of the business. The implications of initiatives have been addressed
and the boon of knowledge management is discussed. Confluence has helped the organisation
to collaborate the work activities and strengthen the communication between employees and
employers for establishing flexible workforce environment. The knowledge management has
several success metrics that can trigger the success factor of the business for a long term

12KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
aspect. The senior managers and HR managers directly interacts with the employees for
addressing the issues and identify critical problems for solving in an effective manner.

13KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
Reference
Becerra-Fernandez, I. and Sabherwal, R., 2014. Knowledge management: Systems and
processes. Routledge.
Choo, C.W. and Bontis, N. eds., 2002. The strategic management of intellectual capital and
organizational knowledge. Oxford University Press on Demand.
Dalkir, K., 2013. Knowledge management in theory and practice. Routledge.
Hislop, D., Bosua, R. and Helms, R., 2018. Knowledge management in organizations: A
critical introduction. Oxford University Press.
Holsapple, C. ed., 2013. Handbook on knowledge management 1: Knowledge matters (Vol.
1). Springer Science & Business Media.
Holtshouse, D.K., 2013. Information technology for knowledge management. Springer
Science & Business Media.
Nonaka, I. and Toyama, R., 2015. The knowledge-creating theory revisited: knowledge
creation as a synthesizing process. In The essentials of knowledge management (pp. 95-110).
Palgrave Macmillan, London.
Noruzy, A., Dalfard, V.M., Azhdari, B., Nazari-Shirkouhi, S. and Rezazadeh, A., 2013.
Relations between transformational leadership, organizational learning, knowledge
management, organizational innovation, and organizational performance: an empirical
investigation of manufacturing firms. The International Journal of Advanced Manufacturing
Technology, 64(5-8), pp.1073-1085.

14KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT