Strategic alignment: A knowledge management approach to crisis management

Although some firms manage to survive for hundreds of years, research indicates that the average life span of a firm is eighteen years. Such a finding leads researchers to question how some organizations manage to survive for hundreds of years while others survive for less than twenty. Although it is unclear the specific mix of factors that are responsible for organizational demise, the damage caused by various business crises is believed to account for a considerable portion. Everyday business crises are responsible for not only tremendous business losses but also overall organizational decay. These business crises could have been prevented or their impact lessened if knowledge of their contributing factors was known and managed. Based upon this observation, it is argued that better knowledge management can help organizations anticipate these factors and design thoughtful policies to lessen the impact of such events.;This dissertation adds to the literature in both knowledge management and crisis management by demonstrating how the alignment of knowledge strategies with crisis management strategies can lead to better crisis management. Knowledge strategies are used to determine and locate the kinds of knowledge an organization needs. In this dissertation two case studies on two natural gas companies who have experienced the same type of business crises are conducted in order to demonstrate how better alignment of knowledge strategies with crisis management strategies can help organizations become less vulnerable to business crises. The crisis management model proposed by Mitroff and the crisis classification model developed by Belardo, Chengalur-Smith, and Pazer are employed to focus on critical aspects of crisis management while the knowledge strategy framework developed by Zack is selected to help identify knowledge appropriate to each stage of Mitroff's model. The proposed alignment framework of crisis management strategy and knowledge strategy contributes to organizational survivals by providing comprehensive insights into how organizations can better manage knowledge at each of the main stages of a particular type of business crisis in order to prevent the business crisis or mitigate its impact once it does occur.