The Concepts of Communities of Practice, Practice Based Networks, Open Essay

The Concepts of Communities of Practice, Practice Based Networks, Open Innovation and Social swell - Essay ExampleToday, the terminal figures of organizational development have been differentiated. Innovation and instruction have become key elements of organizational performance. In the past, mental institution and learning were promoted using standardized policies, such as research and development, training programs and so on. Currently, the development of innovation and learning within organizations is mostly based on genial networking. At the same time, concepts like communities of practice and amicable ceiling have been apply for reflecting the key role of tender networks in enabling organizations to learn and innovate. The supra two concepts, the communities of practice and the social capital are compared in this paper. Their similarities and differences are presented and evaluated, using relevant literature. Moreover, the challenges that an organization is likely to fa ce when participating in social networks are analytically discussed. It is revealed that social networking in critical for organizational success under the terms that it is aligned with the organizational ethics and culture. 2. Communities of practice versus social capital Communities of practice can be used along with other concepts, such as the social capital concept, for highlighting the importance of social networking in promoting innovation and learning within organizations. However, the two concepts may be differentiated, as of their requirements or their priorities. This fact is made clearer by comparing the elements of communities of practice, as described above, with the elements of social capital. The first of the above concepts, the communities of practice is based on the view that learning starts with engagement in social practice and that this practice is the fundamental cook up by which individuals learn (Wenger 1998, in Langer 2005, p.77). In the scene of the above framework, the achievement of organizations goals is based on the initiatives of teams that have a shared personal manner of pursuing interest (Langer 2005, p.77). On the other hand, the term social capital is used for reflecting two different functions the promotion of specific social structures and the facilitation of certain actions of the actors (Coleman, 1988, p.98). The term actors, as used above, implies both individuals and organizations (Coleman 1988). From another point of view, social capital can be characterized as an asset that emanates from participation in social transaction (Nielsen 2003, p.2). In other words, social capital can be a quite wide concept, reflecting all activities of individuals, as members of a particular organization. However, in the context of social capital individuals, as actors, are not necessarily members of a team, as in the case of the communities of practice, a fact that offers them a higher tractability in acting as they wish. Moreover, i n accordance with Al-Ali (2003), employees tend to form informal communities or networks all the time (Al-Ali 2003, p.91). These networks are used for the development of divers(a) organizational tasks, more or less important. This means that the control of organization over the rules and the form of communities of practice may be difficult, especially if they are used for supporting temporary organizational needs (Al-Ali 2003). Such problem does not appear in the