Creating dependable systems can be viewed as the process of applying the embedded knowledge of individuals and organizations to create systems that are reliable and sustainable. Managing the knowledge assets of an organization is accomplished through the application of knowledge management systems.

Knowledge Management (KM) is a discipline that seeks to improve the performance of individuals and organizations by maintaining and leveraging the present and future value of knowledge assets. KM systems encompass both human and automated activities and their associated artifacts.

(Newman and Conrad, 2000)

The importance of KM for creating dependable systems is based on the assertion that technical systems and artifacts are products of applied knowledge. Thus many system faults are a result of flawed or mismatched knowledge assets. KM systems provide an opportunity to capture, communicate, verify, and adapt the knowledge assets in an organization.

Many KM efforts are focused solely on electronic connectedness and information dissemination. Less well understood and certainly not accounted for in most attempts at KM are the human factors that make sharing both possible and worthwhile. However, to build a sustainable learning culture these human factors must be addressed in the architecture of organizational system design to enable learning and sharing.

It is important to state two assumptions fundamental to this chapter. First, a learning organization knows how to process knowledge, appreciates the value of shared collective knowledge, and grows stronger and more knowledgeable with each activity it performs. It does so because its systems (human and technical) interact in meaningful and healthy ways. Information is represented in ways meaningful and useful to humans, what Novak (1977) referred to as transparent learning as opposed to rote or conceptually opaque learning. The organization learns because its human members interact with each other in ways that stimulate sharing and reapplication of organizational knowledge (Argyris, 1991). Second, the core of an organization's knowledge resides in the work units and projects where it is being generated, not in a central repository. The key to managing knowledge is not necessarily to extract it from its origins but to facilitate its use both at the source and within communities of practice across the organization (Wenger, 1998; Rogers, 2004). These two premises will not be argued here but are foundational to the approach taken in this chapter.

After discussions of the general issues of knowledge and KM practices, this chapter provides an example of a KM implementation developed at the Goddard Space Flight Center. The approach taken at Goddard seeks to overcome the tendency for large organizations to focus on information technology (IT) efficiency drivers and instead works toward building an effective learning organization supported by appropriate technology.