Knowledge management and organizational innovativeness in Iranian banking industry

Abstract

Knowledge management has changed its nature from theoretical concept to an instrument that assists innovativeness. The originality of this study lies in its purpose to explore issues of knowledge management and its relation to the innovativeness of organizations. The study focuses on three selected Iranian banks (in public and private sector), an industry and a setting that has received less attention by researches so far. This paper studies the effectiveness of managers’ mindset in leading or misleading the organizations to achieve organizational innovativeness through KM. Based on a questionnaire survey, the authors argue that applying knowledge management makes it simpler to achieve the innovativeness in organizations. What we found significant in this study is that employees, provided with appropriate training and mentoring opportunities to generate novel ideas, would create new services in banking. The mindset of bank managers about their human resources absorbs diversity of opinions and provides equal opportunity for all employees to present ideas.