Knowledge management in the professions: lessons learned from Norwegian law firms

Knowledge management is an increasingly important source of competitive advantage for organizations. Knowledge embedded in the organization’s business processes and employees’ skills provide the firm with unique capabilities to deliver customers with a product or service. Law firms represent an industry which seems well suited for knowledge management investigation. They are knowledge intensive, and use of advanced technology may transform these organizations in the future. To examine knowledge management in Norwegian law firms, a study that involves two phases of data collection and analysis was designed. The first phase was an initial field study of the leading law firm in Norway. The second phase will be a survey of Norwegian law firms. The conducted semi‐structured interviews in the initial field study document a strong belief in the potential benefits from knowledge management. Future research will investigate law firms’ competitive advantage, value of intangible assets, profitability and capabilities from knowledge management.