Knowledge Sharing in the Context of Social Enterprises.

Abstract

The organizations have been recognizing the importance of dealing with knowledge as a critical way to reach their purposes. With emphasis on the organizational learning development in Solidarity Economy Enterprises (SEE), this study intended to investigate if and how the socially produced knowledge sharing occurs in Brazilian SEE. The research was conducted through a survey in two phases: the first one considered a sample of 378 enterprises, verifying the continuity and the main SEE characteristics, and the second one considered a sample of 32 enterprises analyzing if the produced knowledge is transferred and shared. As a reference for the analysis, we used the study conducted by Souza and Schlemm (2012) on knowledge application in organizational networks. The results showed many challenges to be faced, and the SEE surveyed presented some characteristics in common: the link created with its components is spontaneous; the work they performed, singly, is significant; the prescriptions are minimum and are limited to bylaws based on the legislation; the working rules only follow a legal requirement and are not shared by all the associates, reason why there is no commitment of them to the enterprise.