Modeling and Evaluation of Technology Creation Process in Academia

Abstract

The school of knowledge science at JAIST (Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology) is the first school established in the world to make knowledge a target of science. At this graduate school, knowledge management research is already producing results in areas such as knowledge conversion theory, knowledge systematizing methods, and methods for the development of creativity. It is expected recently that knowledge science should help researchers produce creative theoretical results in important natural sciences. For this purpose, we have to establish a Ba (a Japanese term meaning: place, center, environment, space, etc.), or an environment or circumstance, that supports the development and practice of scientific knowledge creation. This paper considers the advantages and disadvantages deriving from the vagueness, depth, diversity and freedom of the definition of Ba given by Ikujiro Nonaka, and stresses the need to redesign knowledge creation Ba using systems concepts. Then, the paper proposes a systems methodology to design and evaluate Ba for technology creation in academia, with a report on a preliminary survey.