Characteristics of knowledge sharing communities in project organizations

Project organizations face many challenges in knowledge sharing as projects are dispersed and peers collaborate from distance with each other. Also, project teams are temporary and a lot of learning may be lost when they disband. This study concentrates on communities, which are informal and semi-formal groups of people bound together by shared interests. In project organizations, they require certain degree of formality. Communities are viewed as connecting and enhancing knowledge sharing mechanisms in and within projects. Communities can help to connect peers working in various projects with each other. This paper describes the characteristics of eight communities in three project organizations.