Publication Harvard Business Review
Date (months/year) July-August/97 
Author(s) W. Chan Kim - Renée Mauborgne
Title Fair Process:  Managing in the Knowledge Economy 

 



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Harvard Business Review
 
 

Fair Process:  Managing in the Knowledge Economy

W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne
 

 

Unlike the traditional factors of production--land, labor, and capital--knowledge is a resource that can't be forced out of people.  But creating and sharing knowledge is essential to fostering innovation, the key challenge of the knowledge-based economy.  To create a climate in which employees volunteer their creativity and expertise, managers need to look beyond the traditional tools at their disposal. They need to build trust. The authors have studied the links between trust, idea sharing, and corporate performance for more than a decade. They offer an explanation for why people resist change even when it would benefit them directly. In every case, the decisive factor was what the authors call fair process--fairness in the way a company makes and executes decisions. Fair process may sound like a soft issue, but it is crucial to building trust and unlocking ideas.  

 


 
W. Chan Kim is The Boston Consulting Group Bruce D. Henderson Chair Professor of International Management at INSEAD, France.

Renée Mauborgne is The INSEAD Distinguished Fellow and a professor of strategy and management at INSEAD and a Fellow of the World Economic Forum.   
For a complete list of Professor W. Chan Kim's articles in:

Harvard Business Review

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