Managing the Knowledge Intensive Firm

Over the last decade, there has been a substantial rise in the number of knowledge-intensive firms - constituted primarily of professionals. The core assets of these businesses are the people themselves. Handle them badly, and they may defect or stall. Successful managers of knowledge-intensive firms must create meaning among and inspire their employees, to ensure high performance. To achieve this, leaders must understand how to target each employee's ambitions and challenges to facilitate their personal and professional development. This book examines what sets knowledge-intensive firms apart from other types of organizations, and the resultant organizational and strategic differences in business models, talent management, and client-handling approaches. The authors bring their own complementary perspectives on the subject: one, as the manager of a private consulting firm with a strong research background; another, as a business school professor whose practice-based skills are fundamental to his work; and a third, a world leading commentator on professional service firms acting as a consultant, business school researcher and a manager. Ejler, Poulfelt and Czerniawska present a new model for transforming the management of knowledge-intensive firms, which is supported throughout with practical examples and cases.

 

Introduction 1. Value Creation in Knowledge-Intensive Firms 2. What Do Clients Buy? 3. The Inner Workings of Knowledge-Intensive Firms 4. Consistent Strategy and the Client 5. Employee Capital 6. Shaping Behaviour: Values and Cultural Modelling 7. Relations with Clients Rules Strategy Execution 8. Holistic Management: The Pyramid at Play 9. Epilogue