Communities of Practice and their central role in KM

CoPs are often considered an essential organisational tool to facilitate knowledge sharing and learning improvement of organisations and single individuals. In the KM literature, and also in the practice, CoPs have, however, been treated in different ways, by using different notions, and by adopting various research approaches. The paper proposes a survey of the literature, by examining the papers in leading KM journals. The main aims of the study are: a) to trace the origins and evolution of the notion, and how it is defined and used, both in practical and theoretical terms; b) to highlight the role played by CoPs in the KM literature; c) to classify the approaches used by KM research on CoPs; d) to discuss the critical points that the use of CoPs raise both in research and practice, and highlight the potential prospects in a future KM research agenda