Knowledge Management Analysis of AALL Educational Organization Essay Example

the existing processes and systems to offer information (Sallis & Jones, 2002). This assignment will focus on an educational organization based in Australia whereby the organization will be described considering its size, composition, and scope of operations.

The current state of the organization will also be discussed regarding knowledge retention, sharing, and creation. Lastly, the strengths and weakness of the organization will be identified and recommendations made for future improvements.

Description of the organization

The organization selected for this assignment is the Association for Academic Language and Learning (AALL Inc) which is based in Australia. The organization was founded in November 2005 to offer an organizational platform for enlarging the community of professionals all over Australia working with university scholars to improve their academic as well as learning English (AALL, 2016). In this organization, the learning and academic staff jointly works with scholars from the country and internationally at all levels from the first year all through to postgraduate. The organization assists students to realize that the challenges of moving through to higher education are not remedial but they are the same challenges faced by every student.

The mission of the organization is to endorse and provide academic language as well as learning progress through practices, policies, and research that builds, improves, and extends the teaching and learning prospects for all the scholars and staff in tertiary educational setting (Metcalfe, 2006). The organization is meant for the professionals working with university scholars to improve their development of educational language, learning, and literacy. The plan of this institution is to offer a forum for the professional improvement, networking, and information for the involvement which signifies academic learning and

language learners working in higher as well as further education establishments (AALL, 2016).

Size of organization

AALL Inc has developed to be capable of holding numerous hundreds of people working in the field whereby they are engaged in research and teaching. The requirement has developed for the organization to make possible strategic discussions, promote partnerships across the institutions, and to accommodate and publish what the AALL Inc professionals produce.

The organization publishes a refereed journal, and it has also made attempts to institute a website where information of interest to every educator, resources for teaching plus learning, and all prospects for professional improvement and joint projects are gladly accessible (AALL, 2016). Through this website, educators can relay their information to a broader academic community. The size of the organization is extensive since they have branches all over Australia. These branches are situated in Australian Capital Territory, New South Wales, Northern Territory, Queensland, Tasmania, Victoria, and in Western Australia (AALL, 2016).

The organization further opened a discussion forum in the year 2007 to enable academic learning and language professionals to pass information to each other across Australia and globally. The discussion forum serves as an archive for the entire range of topics relevant to AALL educators (AALL, 2016). This varies from employment opportunities to matters regarding the provision of academic language and learning in universities.

Composition of organization

Since the organization is an educational institution, it is composed of materials that assist the teaching staff and scholars together with those other people interested in viewing the information presented on their websites.

The organization has a journal of academic language and learning which an electronic peer is reviewed scholarly journal

that is dedicated to serving the interests of professionals who offer academic language and learning development to students as well as staff in the higher education system (AALL, 2016). The parts of the article involve research articles, letters, book reviews, and comments. To foster the broadest dissemination of knowledge, the journal offers open access to all content in it. The organization is also comprised of participative members whose valuable responsibility is to provide teaching both inside and outside curricula to help students in developing suitable academic skills. The members of the organization collaborate with the academic staff to develop a curriculum that can provide improved learning prospects to the scholar’s development of academic skills (Sallis & Jones, 2002).

They also assist in the contribution to the development of policy in connection to academic learning and language. This role played by the members of the organization is essential in the current higher and further education establishments are given the augmenting pressures to uphold excellence in the teaching and learning with reduced resources. The proof is that every AALL educators are certainly capable of impacting on scholar’s development of skills as well as general success and retention (AALL, 2016).

Scope of operation in the organization

Since its existence in the year 2005, the organization has been dedicated to promoting and offering academic language development through practices, research, and policies.

The research builds, extends, and enhances teaching as well as learning prospects for all the scholars and staff in all the higher and further education systems. The organization operates a forum in parallel to Unilearn which is an electronic list server instituted in the year 1994 (AALL, 2016). The forum’s

current major aim is to inform members of occasions such as meetings and conferences and alerting the organization members of the topics being posted on the AALL discussion forum. All the operations in this organizational setting add value to the inputs and charges only for the added value. Considering AALL which is an extensive educational organization, the operations dealt with in the organization have five objectives to meet (AALL, 2016). These objectives include quality, flexibility, speed, cost, and reliability.

The objective which is most crucial among the five of them depends on what the management in the organization wishes to attain at the end of the day. For instance, if innovation is the motive of subsistence of the organization then it might cooperate with speed. These objectives are subjective by four factors that include voluminous, visibility, variety, and variation. All these objectives and influencing factors widen the scope of operations in AALL educational organization (AALL, 2016). The wide scope of operations in the organization demands the operational managers to use all the available inputs and resources in a manner to yield maximum output and reduced cost of operation in the entire organization.

Cost reduction within the organization is not the only issue to be dealt with to ensure that the teaching staff and the scholars feel comfortable in all the AALL branches in Australia, but the worker's performance and quality maintenance of the available resources in the organization are some of the things to aid in running the organization efficiently. Additionally, the organization operates by facilitating communication and partnership among all the AALL members and providing a forum for the debate of policies, practices as well as

research particularly through channels such as the Unilearn and the association’s country-based partners (AALL, 2016). It also works towards institutional backgrounds that offer the uppermost quality of learning experiences for every scholar and staff in the organization. It operates by encouraging and developing core corrective academic and specialized skills as well as traits in all tertiary education students.

The organization promotes the realization of the academic nature of the work of language and learning growth through personal and joint research in and across tertiary establishments nationwide and globally. The organization makes use of publications and conferences for enlightening the broader academic community concerning the practices and philosophies of language and learning improvement in tertiary education. The AALL Inc committee members operate by being representatives of the tertiary establishments all over the Australian states as well as territories (AALL, 2016).

Current state of knowledge creation or acquisition

The capacity of creating or acquiring new knowledge is frequently at the heart of an organization’s competitive advantage. Moreover, sometimes the matter is not handled as the art of knowledge management because it borders and overlies with innovation management (Von, Ichijo? ; Nonaka, 2000).

As a healthy educational organization, AALL has an efficient leadership, empowered team members, consistent structure, and manageable procedures to execute its mission and attain its stated ethical goal. Knowledge creation in the organization guarantees that all the significant areas of the organization stay connected in a consequential manner and permit the organization to entirely move forward by making advancement and showing growth and improvement. According to Nonaka’s SECI model, the creation of knowledge is all about the incessant transfer, arrangement, and conversion of the diverse forms of

knowledge as users interrelate, learn, and practice (Von, Ichijo? ; Nonaka, 2000). The shift in the situation between the control of knowledge and the act of knowing something that comes along through practice, action, and interrelation is the motive towards the creation of new knowledge in educational organizations.

Knowledge creation and sharing in AALL educational organization goes hand in hand. Knowledge is generated through practice, teamwork, communication, and education as the diverse knowledge forms are shared and renewed. Further, the creation of knowledge is also encouraged by pertinent information as well as data that can advance decisions and serve as stepping stones in the creation of fresh knowledge. In AALL, knowledge creation is designed to enable and encourage knowledge sharing. The organization provides discussion forums for knowledge to be shared with the public. It also has a website and a journal whereby people can get relevant information from the organization.

The organization has created an appropriate working and learning environment for both the teaching staff and students (AALL, 2016). AALL has provided systems that support the teaching and learning the process of the people accommodated in different institutions.

Current state of knowledge retention

Knowledge retention comprises capturing knowledge in the organization so that it can be used in the future. The current state of knowledge retention in AALL is very effective. The mode used to retain knowledge in AALL is through individuals, transformations, culture, structures, and external activities of the organization.

In these five areas, it is where knowledge exists and can be retained in the organization so that it can be used later (Liebowitz, 2009). A knowledge retention strategy which is part of knowledge management identifies the

knowledge resource which is in danger and has to be retained and then implements a particular initiative to maintain the resource in the organization. Just like other knowledge management connected processes and strategies, achievement relies on victorious knowledge sharing as well as possessing a knowledge learning and sharing organizational culture (Liebowitz, 2009). AALL makes of specific tools and methods to retain knowledge. These tools include implementing a reward structure to support sharing of major knowledge and use of projects teams.

The management of AALL chose to use both intrinsic and extrinsic motivators to ensure that the teaching staff and the students are more satisfied with services rendered by the educational organization. The knowledge retention strategy used by the organization is part of an inclusive knowledge management plan that is a detachment of the overarching human capital approach of the organization (Liebowitz, 2009). Apart from the knowledge management plan, the human capital plan also has its basics in competency management, performance management, and change management.

Current state of knowledge sharing

Knowledge sharing is the most crucial segment in the knowledge management process of any organization.

This is because most of the immense initiatives rely on it. The sharing of knowledge in AALL is widely spread out to the public to view for free. The organization has a discussion forum that was officiated in the year 2005 to enable academic language and learning professional to communicate with the public and among the members of the AALL (AALL, 2016). The organization as well has a journal of academic language and learning a scholarly electronic journal. This journal is dedicated to the interests of the professionals who offer academic language and

learning improvement to scholars and staff in the tertiary education system.

In the journal, it comprises of segments such as book review, letters, research articles, and comments. To provide a wide share of its information, the journal is available for viewing to everyone. This is achieved through the utilization of open source journal management software that was developed by the public knowledge project (AALL, 2016). AALL has successful explicit knowledge sharing which is determined by the following criteria.

The sharing of knowledge is expressive whereby the user is capable of establishing what he or she needs. The sharing of knowledge creates awareness to the user since it is readily available. The knowledge shared in the organization's platform is accessible and complete whereby the user can make use of it in the manner that is expected conclusively (Huysman & Wit, 2002). On the organization website, there is a variety of knowledge shared to the user whereby a lot of enlightening information about the organization and the conferences held on an annual basis can be viewed free of charge.

Strengths and weaknesses of the organization

In the year 2005, the academic language and learning profession of Australia voted tremendously in goodwill of form an association. The strength of the AALL lies in the joint knowledge and skills of all its members and not only those who officially sit on Committees (AALL, 2016).

AALL is well recognized as a great place to attain knowledge since it provides world class education. The strengths of AALL include; Global recognition – by studying in AALL students get to achieve qualifications that are acknowledged and sought after all over the world. The Australian Qualification Framework

gives students in the organization the opportunity to effortlessly move through the education system and offer an east method for other nations around the globe to acknowledge their qualification (Desha & Hargroves, 2013). AALL in collaboration with the Australian Qualifications Framework allows local students from the country to have a comparable qualification as for that issued to international students for their use (AALL, 2016).

The learning environment – the teaching staff and students learning atmosphere in all the AALL branches all over Australia is very conducive. Many local and international students get attracted to study in AALL institutions due to their hospitality and the manner of teaching performed by the staff (AALL, 2016). Local and international students interrelate closely with the researchers, teaching staff and another faculty whereby collaboration is made a key part of the student’s achievement in the organization. In many scenarios, students get the opportunity of gaining practical training in the academic language and learning institution (Desha & Hargroves, 2013). The amalgamation of teamwork and shared learning focuses on the provision of students with a leading edge of their further studies and profession.

Availability of resources – the organization has an immense source of materials for the teaching staff and learning the process of the students. It ensures all the students have enough reading material and online material to gather knowledge and do their research (Desha & Hargroves, 2013). The weaknesses of this organization include management issues and unit coordination. The management issue facing AALL is communication in the organization whereby functional organizational frameworks of the establishment are very rigid due to the standardized manner of operation and the high level of formalization. On

the issue of unit coordination, even though departmental units frequently perform their duties with elevated levels of efficiency, their level of cooperation with each other are at times compromised (Desha & Hargroves, 2013). Several departmental units in AALL educational organization appear not coordinate well hence affecting the teaching and learning the process.

Recommendations for improvement of the organization

Many organizations focus majorly on one or the other two widely defined knowledge management strategies. Codification is majorly implemented in the structure of electronic document systems that codify and store knowledge and allows its easy distribution and reuse. Concerning the improvement plans that AALL requires checking on involve; having the government putting efforts in ensuring that funding for supporting the educational organizations such as AALL are made available. Skills forecasts are frequently unreliable and should not be the basis of central planning (Mayrl, 2011).

In the days to come, there should be more focus on a system driven by student demand balanced by employers willing to provide workplace training for students graduating from AALL. A wider variety of quality and consequential data at the provider level should be urbanized and made accessible. This will encourage the student’s choice and provision driven by student demand. Data should become a systematic component of program and policy decision-making. Trials have to be created to satisfy the data gaps involving an extension of the student outcome survey (Land, Gordon & Owen, 2013).

Training packages for students should be replaced by simple and much briefer reports of skills standards. Uniformity in standards all through Australia should be attained through a common assessment procedure to decide whether the necessary skills have been acquired.

References

• AALL
  

| Association for Academic Language and Learning. (2016). Aall.org.au. Retrieved 1 November 2016, from http://www.aall.org.au/