Governing Knowledge-Processes

Abstract

The effective dissemination throughout the MNC organization of valuable knowledge acquired by its local affiliates is seen as an important source of competitive advantage. • Knowledge differs in characteristics and so do the available transfer mecha- nism. As such, it is essential that the MNC employ the mechanism of transfer that suits the specific knowledge characteristics. The use of unsuitable transfer mechanisms may cause loss of knowledge in the process of transmission or may involve unnecessarily high communication costs - both with potentially nega- tive effects on the performance of the MNC