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Knowledge Management Models 73

The Choo Sense-Making KM Model
Choo (1998) has described a model of knowledge management that stresses sense
making (largely based on Weick 2001 ), knowledge creation (based on Nonaka and
Takeuchi 1995 ), and decision making (based on, among others, bounded rationality,
Simon 1957 , among others). The Choo KM model focuses on how information ele-
ments are selected and subsequently fed into organizational actions. Organizational
action results from the concentration and absorption of information from the external
environment into each successive cycle, as illustrated in fi gure 3.3 . Each of the phases,
sense making, knowledge creation, and decision making, has an outside stimulus or
trigger.
The sense-making stage is the one that attempts to make sense of the information
streaming in from the external environment. Priorities are identifi ed and used to fi lter

Streams of
experience
Sense
making
Shared
meanings
Shared meanings

Knowledge Decision
creating making
New knowledge,
new capabilities
Goal-directed
adaptive
behavior

External information Next knowing
and knowledge cycle

Figure 3.3
Overview of Choo ’ s (1998) knowledge management model