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knowledge workers work alone, typically they work in teams of varying sizes
with varying degrees of inter-dependency. In addition, it is not always the case
that management in knowledge-intensive firms shares the same levels of skills
and expertise as the expert workforce they are trying to manage. Therefore,
knowledge workers’ demand for autonomy, in combination with an insufficient
understanding of the work being conducted in some instances, means that
management is typically not in a position to directly control or even manage
knowledge work processes. Therefore, it is perhaps more appropriate within a
knowledge-work setting to suggest that management’s role is to provide the
necessary enabling context that will facilitate knowledge work. Further evi-
dence for this is provided in more recent research conducted by Amabile et al.
(2004, 2005). Amabile and colleagues conducted research focused on the
cognitive aspects of creativity and adopted a social psychology methodology.
In total 222 knowledge workers, working in 26 teams across 7 companies
and 3 industries completed a daily questionnaire which sought information
to establish the relationship between positive affect (mood) and creativity.
A positive mood was found to be positively associated with creativity and this
lingered through to the following day (Amabile et al., 2005). Moreover lead-
ership behaviour was found to have a significant influence on subordinates in
that leader behaviours was found to precipitate subordinate perceptual and
affective reactions, which in turn influenced subordinate creative performance
(Amabile et al., 2004).

Knowledge base and working methods
Different types of knowledge worker rely, create, share and apply different
types of knowledge in their work. Thus in different knowledge work settings
distinctive ‘epistemic cultures’ can be found (Knorr-Cetina, 1999), epistemic
cultures being ‘those amalgams of arrangements and mechanisms. . . . – which,
in a given field, make up how we know what we know’ (Knorr-Cetina, 1999, p. 1;
italics authors own). Such cultures are characterized by different social, discur-
sive and material practices, including different levels of interaction with natural
objects, sign systems and so on. When we consider the different epistemic cul-
tures associated with different forms of knowledge work we start to appreciate
the ‘the complex texture of knowledge as practiced’ (Knorr-Cetina, 1999,
p. 2) and how this might differ across different knowledge work contexts.
Robertson et al. (2003) found significant differences in knowledge creating
practices across a scientific consultancy and a legal consultancy which was
explained in terms of institutionally embedded means of legitimating knowl-
edge across scientific and legal contexts. These included different emphases on
experimentation versus interpretation, different forms of personal networking,
and significant differences in the relative importance of codifying knowledge.
In scientific professions for example, claims to knowledge are legitimized by
the application of the scientific method (principally experimental) to natural
and biological phenomena. Once established and replicated through the scientific

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