Biographical Information
Laurence Prusak
Larry Prusak is a researcher and consultant and was the founder and Executive Director of the Institute for Knowledge Management (IKM). This was a global consortium of member organizations engaged in advancing the practice of knowledge management through action research. Larry has had extensive experience, within the U.S. and internationally, in helping organizations work with their information and knowledge resources. He has also consulted with many U.S. and overseas government agencies and international organizations (NGO's). He currently co-directs “Working Knowledge,” a knowledge research program at Babson College , where he is a Distinguished Scholar in Residence.
A noted authority in his field, Larry has lectured and been published widely. His most recent book publications include co-editing Knowledge Management and Organizational Learning (Oxford University Press, 2005), and co-authoring Storytelling in Organizations (Elsevier, 2004). His publications also include: What's the Big Idea (Harvard Business School Press, 2003), co-authored with Tom Davenport, Creating Value with Knowledge (Oxford University Press, 2003), co-edited with Eric Lesser, and In Good Company: How Social Capital Makes Organizations Work (Harvard Business School Press, 2001), co-authored with Don Cohen. In Good Company: How Social Capital Makes Organizations Work was listed as one of 2001 Best Business Books awarded by Harvard Business School Review. He has also co-authored two other books with Tom Davenport: Working Knowledge (Harvard Business School Press, 1998), and Information Ecology (Oxford University Press, 1997). Working Knowledge has sold over 100,000 copies and has been translated into 12 languages; the paperback edition with a new Preface was published in 2000. Managing Information Strategically (John Wiley & Sons, 1994), co-authored with James McGee, is a basic text on the role of information in gaining competitive advantage. Larry's more recent articles include, “Learning from the Internet Giants” ( Sloan Management Review , Summer 2004), “The Performance Variability Dilemma” ( Sloan Management Review , Fall 2003), “Where do CEO's get their Ideas?” ( Harvard Business Review, February, 2003), “Knowing What We Know” ( Organizational Dynamics , Fall 2001), “People who make Networks Work” ( Harvard Business Review , Fall 2001), “Preserving Knowledge in an Uncertain World” ( Sloan Management Review , Fall 2001), “Where did Knowledge Management come from? ( IBM System Journal , 2001), “How to Invest Social Capital?” ( Harvard Business Review , June 2001), and “Eleven Sins of Knowledge Management” ( California Management Review , Spring 1998).
Previously, Larry was a Principal and founder of Ernst & Young's Center for Business Innovation, specializing in issues of corporate knowledge management. While there, he was responsible for helping to build a consulting practice centered on organizations managing their knowledge resources. Larry's professional background also includes work as a researcher and librarian at Baker Library at the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration, and as a teacher of the History of Ideas at several universities.
Larry's awards and honors include: Simmons College Distinguished Alumni Award (2002); the Lewin Award from Organization Science (2000); an honorary Ph.D. from Long Island University (2000); the SLA Professional Award for Contributions to the Field of Information Science (1991); the H.W. Wilson Award for the year's best article on information science (1990). In 2000, he served as a McKinsey Award Judge for the Harvard Business Review, and Work Frontiers International voted Larry one of the ten most admired knowledge leaders in the world.
He holds a B.A. in history from Long Island University , an M.S. in information science from Simmons College , and an M.A. in economic and social history from New York University (where he completed all the examinations and course work toward a Ph.D.). He has lectured at the Harvard Business School, M.I.T., New York University, the University of California Berkeley, the University of Southern California, the Wharton School, Copenhagen Business School, Monash University (Melbourne), Queens University (Belfast), Tel Aviv University, and Victoria University (Wellington).