Joe Miemczyk
email: jmiemczyk@audencia.com

Thomas Johnsen
email: tjohnsen@audencia.com

Emmanuelle Bernardin
email: ebernardin@audencia.com

Developing a Green Supplier Maturity model: Concepts, application and limits

The purpose of this paper is to review the literature stage models in purchasing and supply, and environmental management, to develop a model of 'green' supplier management. Starts with a discussion of current thinking on models of supplier assessment and development, particularly in the field of environmental performance. Thinking behind maturity models, especially as applied in purchasing, supply and green performance, is then treated. The applicability of combining green and supply maturity models is then described. The paper finishes with some comments on limits of maturity models in this field and their applicability.

Introduction

Environmental or green performance continues to be one of the significant issues facing purchasing organisation today. Legislation that limits the types of product inputs, aims to facilitate product recycling, minimises pollution and waste from production processes and controls the effects of transport and logistics networksare among a whole raft of policies that influence decisions businesses make. Current challenges include reducing the carbon footprint of whole industries, where trading of emissions is seen as one way of balancing the needs of industry and society more equally. One opportunity for influencing the action of firms is through supply chain relationships. While companies are directly influenced by legislation, they are often more directly driven by customer requirements. Hence, if those requirements include green targets it can be reasonably be assumed that such goals would form elements of decisions taken by supplying organisations and contribute to green performance. Clearly not all suppliers will be at the same level of performance and hence targets need to be set that reflect this. In addition, it is well documented that green performance is related to certain organisational attributes, so that firms that display certain characteristics are likely to be better performers, perhaps exhibiting less risk, than others (Fischer and Schot 1993;[START_REF] Welford | Environmental strategy and sustainable development[END_REF]. This paper starts from the point of view that firms' organisational characteristics differ in relation to their green activities and that this influences their performance. The argument also follows that much of this green activity is driven by customer influence, bringing a customer relationship element into the development of green strategies of firms [START_REF] Carter | Environmental Purchasing: Benchmarking our German counterparts[END_REF]. From this it follows that combining thinking on the development of green strategies within firms and strategies for purchasing and supply provides a useful perspective on how companies can view the capabilities of their suppliers to respond to the increasing influence of the environment. An important concept here is maturity, whereby firms that display certain characteristics are more able to respond to more challenging targets. There are many models of maturity in the environmental strategy field, and this is also reflected in the purchasing and supply domain, but these have not been viewed together in order to help evaluate suppliers capabilities. While there have been attempts to apply this thinking to purchasers (Bowen et al. 2001a), there is also utility in applying these ideas to the other side of the relationship, i.e the supplier side.

Background literature

Relatively little has been written on how supplier environmental activities and performance evolves as a result of buying companies initiatives in this area. Examining a firm's evolution naturally links to thinking on maturity models, which are regularly featured in management literature. While there are examples of maturity models for purchasing organisations (eg [START_REF] Reck | Purchasing: A competitive weapon[END_REF], there is little evidence of these models being explicitly applied to the supply base itself. However, looking at the supplier development and assessment literature there is ample research showing that customers measure their suppliers' performance over time, categorise them and initiate actions to help suppliers achieve expected levels of performance. We argue that this activity maps well onto maturity model thinking and that bringing these literatures together is of value. Furthermore the application of these two literatures to the field of suppliers' green activity is also novel and is useful in the development of theory and practical insights.

Supplier assessment and development

The assessment of suppliers along various lines of performance is a well researched field [START_REF] Baiman | Performance measurement and design in supply chains[END_REF][START_REF] Harrington | A methodology for measuring vendor performance[END_REF][START_REF] Ruamsook | U.S. Sourcing from Low-Cost Countries: A Comparative Analysis of Supplier Performance[END_REF]. Assessment criteria typically include a combination of externally focused measures linked to competitive priorities, such as quality, delivery, price, service and flexibility, and internally focused measures such as defects, schedule realisation and cost (Venkatraman and Ramanujam 1986;Prahinski and Benton 2004). Internal process-based supplier assessment criteria enable companies to better understand the supplier's process capabilities and this creates a rationale for the formation of supplier development programmes. Supplier assessment is therefore a natural precursor for successful supplier development programmes (Modi and Mabert 2007; Prahinski and Benton ibid), and there is clear evidence of a positive relationship between the two [START_REF] Dyer | Specialized supplier networks as a source of competitive advantage: evidence from the auto industry[END_REF][START_REF] Hines | Creating world class suppliers: unlocking mutual competitive advantage[END_REF]. Supplier development programmes aim to improve supplier performance and capabilities by diffusing manufacturing and production expertise throughout the supply base (Modi and Mabert 2007). In practice, supplier development programmes often involve engineer visits, in-supplier improvement workshops, dedicated teams and personnel allocated to supplier skill development [START_REF] Krause | The relationships between supplier development, commitment, social capital accumulation and performance improvement[END_REF][START_REF] Rogers | A supplier development program: Rational process or institutional image construction?[END_REF].

There is some evidence to suggest that supplier assessment schemes increasingly include measures of suppliers ' environmental, ethical, health and safety, and social standards (Waddock and Smith 2000). Indeed, outsourcing to low-cost countries increases the need to integrate corporate social responsibility (CSR) into supplier development programmes both for legal and voluntary reputational reasons (Kortelainen, 2008;[START_REF] Walker | Drivers and barriers to environmental supply chain management practices: Lessons from the public and private sectors[END_REF]. Environmental or green practices form a key part of CSR, which has become a strategic challenge for all organisations.

Research on green activities within the supply base has primarily focused on drivers, measures of performance, categorisation of green supply strategies and links to the buying companies' capabilities [START_REF] Beamon | Designing the Green Supply Chain[END_REF]Bowen et al. 2001b;[START_REF] Green | Green purchasing and supply policies: do they improve companies' environmental performance?[END_REF][START_REF] Mcintyre | Environmental Performance Indicators for Integrated Supply Chains: The Case of Xerox Ltd[END_REF][START_REF] Rao | Do green supply chains lead to competitiveness and economic performance[END_REF]. However, suppliers are frequently assessed on their environmental performance as one of many assessment criteria [START_REF] Carter | Environmental Purchasing: Benchmarking our German counterparts[END_REF][START_REF] Preuss | Rhetoric and reality of corporate greening: a view from the supply chain management function[END_REF], although often low down the list of decision priorities [START_REF] Grankvist | The impact of environmental information on professional purchasers' choice of products[END_REF]. What is less understood is the supplier development activity in this area and how it impact on suppliers' green performance. Certainly approaches will vary from industry to industry, but there is some evidence that that companies may integrate 'green' improvement activities with suppliers in their supplier development strategies, as is the case of Unipart in the UK [START_REF] Handfield | Integrating Environmental Management and Supply Chain Strategies[END_REF]. The focus of supplier evaluation for environmental related reasons tends to be on the measures of specific physical parameters which is useful but is very specific to the industry and the strategic objectives of the suppliers and potentially their markets. Hence, there is also utility in assessing suppliers on their relative sophistication, or maturity, in more organisational or process oriented measures. While most firms focus on environmental system adopted (eg ISO14001), there are other aspects which could be viewed as useful in judging likely performance or risk. Again the case of Unipart highlights a range of organisational measures aimed at judging a supplier's level of engagement in environmental systems, ranging from 'not demonstrating compliance' to 'certification to ISO14001 or EMAS' . However, this scale does not include some measures of proactive environmental management found in other models and the path to achieving the top score is not necessarily step-wise (and supplier may jump stages).

Models: stages and maturity

Looking at both the supply and environmental strategy literatures reveals a wealth of models typically allocating practice to stages or levels of maturity. The following outlines some of the key models.

Models of supply maturity

There have been many models of supply (purchasing) management maturity proposed in the past, often stemming from other works such as that from [START_REF] Hayes | Restoring our Competitive Edge[END_REF]. One theme is that the stages of maturity appear to be path dependent in the sense that jumping steps can be problematic [START_REF] Reck | Purchasing: A competitive weapon[END_REF]. [START_REF] Schiele | Supply-management maturity, cost savings and purchasing absorptive capacity: Testing the procurement-performance link[END_REF] has provided a well-grounded review of supply maturity models covering the scope of the main models (no. of stages, no. of assessment items, planning, structure, process, human resources, control and collaboration). Key milestones in the development of these models include environmental scanning [START_REF] Burt | The American Keiretsu. A strategic weapon for global competitiveness (Irwin: Business One)[END_REF], the visibility and strategic level of purchasing (Reck and Long, Cousins et al 2006) and so on. The important link to performance, while mentioned by all studies into supply maturity, is not always tested.

Stages or levels

Human resources

Level of: Professionalism, skill levels (including technical), recruitment, integration and appraisal [START_REF] Kraljic | Purchasing must become supply management[END_REF])

Planning

Level of: planning of specifications, analysis of markets and technology or scanning of the environment [START_REF] Paulraj | Strategic Buyer-Supplier Relationships, Information Technology and External Logistics Integration[END_REF] Table 2: Dimensions of purchasing/supply stage models

The focus of this paper is to understand supplier maturity, in the context of the buying organisation. With this in mind we assume that the supplier maturity (ie the company's role as a supplier) reflects similar dimensions as purchasing or supply maturity. This is because much of the supplier's role is relational, as is purchasing, and so we can explore this almost as the mirror of the purchasing dimensions. No doubt the link between purchasing and performance is linked to performance of suppliers themselves, and so both sides of a relationship needs to be understood. This rationale has been developed in supplier assessment and evaluation models in previous research [START_REF] Johnsen | Supply Relationship Evaluation: The Relationship Assessment Process (RAP) and Beyond[END_REF].

Models of ' green' maturity

Stage models of corporate 'greening' have also received much attention over the last 2 decades [START_REF] Roome | Developing environmental management strategies[END_REF][START_REF] Schaefer | Stage models of corporate 'greening': a critical evaluation[END_REF][START_REF] Shuangyu Xie | Corporate environmental performance evaluation: a measurement model and a new concept[END_REF]. Two of the first and most cited examples of green maturity in general are those developed by [START_REF] Hunt | Proactive environmental management: avoiding the toxic trap[END_REF] who describe 5 steps from beginner (1) through to proactivist (5), and [START_REF] Roome | Developing environmental management strategies[END_REF] describing non compliance (1) to excellence (4). These have since been modified and added to, but still remain the most widely cited.

Roome's (1992) model of corporate strategic response to environmental issues is one of the more comprehensively defined. He distinguishes between five strategic options ('noncompliance', 'compliance', 'complianceplus', 'commercial and environmental excellence' and 'leading edge'). The first four are conceived as stages on a developmental continuum whereas the fifth option defines the environmental leaders for a given industry, regardless of their position on the 'non-compliance' to 'excellence' continuum. [START_REF] Hunt | Proactive environmental management: avoiding the toxic trap[END_REF].

Like [START_REF] Roome | Developing environmental management strategies[END_REF] they conceive of five stages on the route to environmental excellence: 'beginner', 'fire fighter', 'concerned citizen', 'pragmatist' and 'pro-activist'. They define these stages in terms of risk reduction, commitment and programme design, with a number of sub-criteria. There are also a number of less cited examples of stage models of green maturity. [START_REF] Newman | Managing in the environmental era: Lessons from environmental leaders[END_REF] suggests three stages: 'reactive', 'pro-active' and 'innovative'. The individual stages are not well defined but they broadly represent a company's attitude to environmental risk and opportunity. Winsemius and Guntram (1992) conceive of four stages in corporate environmental response: 'reactive', 'receptive', 'constructive' and 'proactive'. They define them in terms of integration of business functions, co-operation of people and organizations and generation of new ideas and concepts. [START_REF] Greeno | Environmental excellence: meeting the challenge[END_REF] describes three stages defined in terms of primary purpose, primary motivations and vulnerability of environmental management. Yet later research suggests that these models are overly simplistic and difficult to apply in practice, mainly because of their prescriptive, normative intention as opposed to empirical bases [START_REF] Hass | Environmental ('green') management typologies: an evaluation, operationalization and empirical development[END_REF][START_REF] Schaefer | Stage models of corporate 'greening': a critical evaluation[END_REF]. Hence, research suggests that the use of these models primarily depends on the use for which they were designed. As the design of these models tends not to be driven by a supply performance perspective, there is opportunity here to explore whether a supply oriented model is useful in a supply context. The following table outlines the key dimensions used to categorise a firms 'level' with respect to environmental strategy or response.

Stages or levels

Process / programmes

From reducing liabilities/crisis management to product stewardship, clear goals and auditing [START_REF] Greeno | Environmental excellence: meeting the challenge[END_REF] Table 4: Dimensions of environmental stage-based (maturity) models

Assessing and developing a supplier's green maturity

Thus examining the literature on supplier assessment, development, stage models and maturity indicates that the links between development and performance in the area of green activities is an emerging area. It is clear that customers measure their suppliers environmental performance and may suggest some measures to improve the level of performance. One example is that of Unipart in the UK. In developing its 'Ten to Zero' programme included a set of performance levels relating to environmental performance, with zero aiming at zero impacts (of course unattainable in reality). While certain actions were implemented to help suppliers, such as information briefings in adoption of ISO14001, these efforts were limited. Yet examples of this type of practice are mainly anecdotal. In order to develop suppliers' green maturity (assuming this is an objective of firms), it is clear that looking only at supply maturity models or green strategy stage models will be a limited exercise both because of the intentions of each approach and that each fails to address the specificities of the other's purpose. While supply models tend to focus on purchasing organisations, an important element is the level of strategic visibility and the level of interaction or joint activity between buyers and suppliers. This then forms a major 'common' component in the development of a green supplier maturity model.

Hence it is proposed to examine the combination of supply and green stage models. The approach is to select those dimensions which are common across the supply and environmental maturity models, i.e. those that focus primarily on the relational (external, and relationship supporting) aspects of companies in a supplying context.

Levels

Structure

Low visibility, separate function

Integrated, matrix approach

Human resources

Awareness training Function responsibilities

Strategy and leadership

No links Part of corp values, board level rep.

External collaboration

Confrontation Partnerships with key stakeholders

Process

Focus on supply risk Full LCA and eco-design

Planning

Specification checks

Market, legislation scanning

Control

No measurement EMS and PMS linked

Table 5: Initial model of green supplier maturity

The following section develops some of the dimensions of green supplier maturity. The first important element links to the structures in place to support green strategies. Firms that have relatively low visibility and little internal integration of the environment related functions may be expected to respond less completely compared to suppliers with a greater level of integration and perhaps a more matrix oriented structure in relation to responsibilities. Linked to this would be the alignment of human resources which would range from only providing awareness training through to detailing full responsibilities at each functional level. As most research suggests, any strategic endeavour requires top management support and leadership, hence more mature firms would be expected to exhibit a greater level of integration of green imperatives into the corporate values of the firm and even responsibilities at the board level. An important element of the relational aspect of this model is the dimension relating to external collaboration. This dimension would be viewed more broadly than just buyersupplier relationship, but also include further links to a wider representation of stakeholders deemed important to the green imperatives the firm considers. This dimension would vary according to the established levels of collaboration ranging from confrontational to fully collaborative with a range of stakeholders. Models in both areas of green and supply maturity consider process elements. This could be viewed in relation to increasing sophistication of processes from only focusing on risk management through to complete life cycle analysis and links into the product or service design process. Linking back to the focus on risks, the planning dimension would start with checks on customer specifications through to broader market and policy scanning in order to pre-empt new developments and put in place proactive strategies to capitalise on opportunities (first mover type advantages) and minimise threats on licence to operate. The control element again ranges in terms of sophistication particularly related to measurement systems and extends into full integration of environmental management systems into the firm's performance measurement systems.

Clearly each of these dimensions required a precise and detailed description which cannot be described here, in order to be operationalised by companies. Furthermore the initial model is based on a theoretical combination of literatures, which logically appears to be useful. However, the next stage of testing would be required in order to validate the dimensions and their constituent measures and their practical use.

Conclusions, limits and further research

This paper has attempted to review and combine two literatures (environmental strategy and purchasing and supply stage models) in order to develop a new model of green supplier maturity. There are many elements of these models that are either the same or complementary so that a combination of the two sets appears feasible in the first instance, although the important testing phase is still to be completed. In particular, those dimensions that are specifically relational are viewed as important in the developed model.

As many of the critical studies of maturity models have shown there are numerous pitfalls in the operationalisation of the model. The first and main criticism is the assumption that firms can direct strategy from above in a prescriptive and rational manner so there is a logical flow through stages of development. As the example from Unipart shows, existing models often ignore the fact that companies could jump levels, and perhaps miss crucial stages in development. The model developed here is based on a combination of models, many of which have already been tested, and have sought to avoid some of these issues.

The second assumption, specific to supply (or network) management is that suppliers can be influenced (developed) to move through a set of prescribed levels. The central idea in this paper is that purchasing organisations require their suppliers to respond to their demands and requirements, and depending on their maturity level suppliers would be better or worse equipped to cope with these demands. If suppliers do not meet expectations their may be an expectation that customers could influence firms to move up the maturity 'ladder'. This is a big assumption however, and many suppliers may simply not be willing or able to do this. Further, buyers that exercise low levels of power over their suppliers could not be expected to do this. This is an initial development of a green supplier maturity model which still needs to be tested and validated. The exact measures which could be used by a company may differ from industry to industry according to its specificities. Thus an important stage is to develop these measures and test them in a range of industries to evaluate their applicability. A second point is that the intention here is to develop a practical model that can be used. While the model is based on established theoretical contribution, it is not intended to be a research instrument (although this could be a use). Thus, for companies to use such a model it needs to be implementable. An overly complex, difficult to understand and use model is unlikely to adopted. This next stage, then would need to consider a balance between comprehensiveness and efficiency, as well as the fit with other assessment and development tools.

Table 1 :

 1 Comparison of selected purchasing/supply stage modelsIt is important to understand how each model is operationalised, in order to apply these models and/or perhaps select appropriate elements of each model to develop a novel application. Examining the main dimensions used to define each stage it is possible to find commonality between the models. The following table details the main dimensions used and their related elements (detail of how each is defined).

	Reck and Long	Passive	Independent	Supportive	Integrative
	1992	 No strategic direction	 Latest techniques	 Suppliers	 Strategic
		 Quick fix	 Independent strat	resource	 Cross functional
		 Routine	 Cost/efficiency	 Monitoring	 Developed
				 Analysis	capabilities
	Freeman	Buying	Purchasing	Procurement	Supply
		 Basic financial	 Forecast based	 External	 Strategic
		planning	planning	oriented	management
				planning
	Cammish &	Serve the factory	Lowest Unit cost	Coordinate	Strategic procurement
	Keough	 Clerical	 BU level	purchasing	 Cross-functional
		 Basic logistics	 Analysis	 Centralised	 Certification
			 Negotiation	 Corp policy	 Development
	Burt and Doyle	Reactive	Mechanical	Proactive	Strategic Supply

Table 3 :

 3 Comparison of selected 'green' stage models


Claude Paraponaris

Jean-Louis Ermine

Claude Guittard

Pascal Lievre

Knowledge Management in a French Research Community: A Case Study of GeCSO Congress

Keywords: Knowledge management, knowing communities, knowledge transfer, business modeling, situated learning, knowing in action, tacit knowledge, activity theory-based approach, knowledge modeling, knowledge engineering

Purpose: To present the state of the art of a rising French research community on Knowledge Management, who organized during the past four years years now, a French speaking congress (GeCSO). Interests in Knowledge Management (KM) come from various disciplines; economy, social, engineering. These interests are not often linked. Within the firms, KM practices vary a lot depending on national cultures and on activity sectors. However, one can identify a potential symmetry between the diversity of practices and the partitioning of scientific approaches. Design/methodology/approach: In order to synthesize the different approaches in KM, we have studied all the 62 papers published in the first three conferences. To have a first representation of the diversity, we analyzed the keywords that were used: among 173 keywords used by the authors, 8 keywords represent 27% of the total amount. Findings: We analyze three main dimensions which emerged from the articles: the practical dimension, the epistemological point of view, and the intention to define a theory of action.

Research limitations/implications: The French research KM community is growing, but it is not unique. The work presented only reflects a snapshot of the knowledge capital of this specific research community. Practical implications: We can give two converging main streams: Knowledge cannot be conceived as objects relevant to physical or economical manipulations. Two KM strategies can be adopted by the organizations. The first one is a defensive strategy to prevent risk. The second one is an offensive strategy, where knowledge is a resource giving the opportunity to develop new products and improve the processes in the firm. Social implications: Highlight some of the recent research work and themes conducted in the field of Knowledge Management in French speaking countries. We also present the challenge to integrate more and more the different scientific domains of Knowledge Management in the GeCSO community. Originality/Value: KM is an emerging domain, especially in the French culture. This paper can be seen as a first foundation of the domain, and also a manifesto to develop interdisciplinary research on this topic.

Interests in Knowledge Management (KM) come from various disciplines; economy, social, engineering. These interests are not often linked. Within the firms, KM practices vary a lot depending on national cultures and on activity sectors. This is one of the missions of the scientific community to indentify these interests, to analyze the potentialities, and to propose an evolution of concepts and practices. However, one can identify a potential symmetry between the diversity of practices and the partitioning of scientific approaches.

In an integrated way, we will present in this article a state of the art of a set of research developed in the French speaking world during the past four years. Although they come from different perspectives, some French speaking researchers have decided to exchange and compare their problematic and methodologies. Since 2008, an annual congress (GeCSO, Gestion des Connaissances : Société et Organisation), creates an opportunity to consolidate exchanges. In this article, we show the common bases of the different fields, as well as their complementarities.

The GeCSO Congress

The GeCSO congress started with the objective of establishing a dialogue between the different approaches dealing with dynamics of knowledge in the society and in the firms. The originality of the congress is, from one side, the rich interaction between different disciplines and, on the other side, the importance of the relation with practice, as nearly all the presented researches are based on practical experiences.

This dialogue has been going on for four years 1 without favoring a specific discipline. The constant increase of the number of participants leads to the conclusion that a community is emerging in the French speaking world: it gathers researchers coming from psychology, computer science, economy, management, sociology, communication, learning sciences, and cognitive science.

The different events have gathered researchers from about thirty institutions and from six countries. They have also gathered case studies presented by firms in special sessions 2 . This kind of special sessions gives the opportunity to compare experiences in modeling and managing knowledge and concepts, methods and researches in a more academic framework.

We first present the methodology used to structure this synthesis, and then we will develop each research track including the different studies.

Methodology

In order to synthesize the different approaches in KM, we have studied all the 62 papers published in the first three conferences. To have a first representation of the diversity, we analyzed the keywords that were used: among 173 keywords used by the authors, 8 keywords represent 27% of the total amount. They are, by decreasing order:

-Knowledge Management -Knowledge -Community -Modeling -Sharing -Innovation -« Savoir » (in French, another concept for knowledge).

-Engineering Several dimensions emerged from the articles: the practical dimension, the epistemological point of view, and the intention to define a theory of action.

3

The practical dimension can be seen in cases studies in technical or economical environments that are rapidly changing: it may concern questions related to knowledge identification, modeling or sharing. The technological component is important, and the problematic is either to use concepts and methods to achieve a real life specific objective, or to study how knowledge creation and sharing operate, or to build a specific tool. In this dimension, there is a real convergence of the disciplines: social sciences, cognitive sciences or engineering. Most of the papers describe the functioning or the success of knowledge systems.

The epistemological point of view is characterized by the deep precision given to key concepts and terms in analyzing and modeling. It seems mandatory to give definitions linked to knowledge. The authors stress on the importance of giving their own approach on the different cognitive aspects of knowledge, the subjectivity of the notion, and the different modes of expression.

Regarding the theory of action, studying the knowledge dynamics is often adopting an anthropological approach to analyze the link between the subject and his/her environment. Some research is dealing with the link to procedures or techniques; other research is interested by the link to power or economical efficiency. Then, knowledge is linked to individuals together with the groups they constitute, the decisions they take, within socialization processes that are always specific. This state of the art is not a statistical study. It is based on theories and methods used, explicitly or not, in the different researches described in the articles. This first synthesis is not limited to the different authors, their disciplines and their results. It is oriented towards the underlying concepts of the articles. Concurrently with the progress of analyzing the papers, approaches and concepts were discovered, as numerous mark-ups to explain KM processes.

The identification of the different fields was conducted through a progressive reading, and by referencing the presented concepts and theories. As a matter of fact, for each article, in a systematic way, we have searched for the theories, concepts and methods (and their authors) that are at the heart of the prerequisites of the authors. Each of the 62 articles was part of one to three different fields. We used a saturation methodology to stabilize each and to operate differentiations.

The different researches are grouped in six main fields:

-Knowledge generation from activities -Epistemological foundations of knowledge as situated action -Knowledge as situated action -Knowledge capitalization -Knowledge modeling, with and around the MASK method -Epistemic communities, and communities of practice

Knowledge generation from activities

Activities, as any complex system (organizational system, or informational device) are "knowledge intensive". From that observation, that is mostly shared by management sciences, and knowledge engineering, one need to have pertinent analysis to identify, in the activities, the knowledge creation and dissemination processes, and then build methodologies to facilitate these processes.

Creativity in the activities, especially in design, is also linked to the dissemination of strategic knowledge within the concerned organization. Then, we are within the organization, and we deal with its routines. We highlight the spaces to create and share knowledge in an abductive approach.

KM in design activities

The question is to adapt different time scales in the organization, one for activities or projects, and one for knowledge capitalization.

An example is given in the Myriade project, with a design model based on contradictions (microsatellites design), in CNES (French National Center for Space Studies) studied in [START_REF] Belleval | Modèle de conception à base de réseau de contradictions[END_REF]. This program implies for the actors an evolution of their theories of action in the sense of [START_REF] Argyris | Organizational Learning[END_REF]. The point is to transform a representation based on « Mission Success First » (that targets reliability and robustness of systems) into a representation « Smaller, Faster, Better, Cheaper » inspired by the NASA policy implemented by Dan Goldin, in the early 90. This evolution is central to the design process.

In that case, the design problem is ill-defined and contradictions may appear during the process. The need is to overcome that problem, and not to stay in the « problem solving » model initiated by [START_REF] Simon | Rationality as Process and Product of Thought[END_REF]. Different theories of design are then mobilized, highlighting the interdependency between three spaces (Pimmler & Epinger, 1994):

-The space of product (what to do?) -The space of the design project (how to do?) -The space of actors (who does what?) Interaction between problem solving activities and the design process organization has an impact on the number of iterations in the design process, and on the performance (cost, quality, time). Accepting perturbations occurring between these three spaces, we have a new definition of innovative design. Its process is non-structured, because its objective is built following the pace of the activities. The problem to solve is contradictory: a set of technical, organizational or cognitive contradictions has to be cleared [START_REF] Belleval | Modèle de conception à base de réseau de contradictions[END_REF]. System engineering is a good candidate for such an approach, especially the classical "V life-cycle" of [START_REF] Forsberg | The Relationship of System Engineering to the Project Cycle[END_REF]. This model allows the co-evolution of the problem together with the solution Requirement analysis leads to define precisely the technical specification that can be discovered as contradictory. These contradictions have to be solved during the architecture design. For that, one can use an existing knowledge base, or give up the project because it is not feasible, or use the contradictions to create new combinations (Altshuler, 1984), by expanding the solutions space (Le Masson and al., 2006).

In each case, one considers the interactions between the technical characterization of the product, the organization of the design project, and the organization of the company, especially the actors. These three dimensions are deployed in different V cycles to structure design building blocks. The design space is then an open space, with opportunity to solve problems or contradictions by expanding the cognitive, technical and organizational dimensions.

This study shows that a dead end at only one contradiction can cause the project failure (an incremental innovation instead of a disruptive innovation).

Towards a generalized approach

Mastering of interactions between those three dimensions is then strategic for orienting the design project. This leads to an attempt to generalize what is knowledge generation from activities. This is the proposal of the "Bordeaux School" (Brunel, Girard, Moradi, Vallespir, Zolghadri, 2008[START_REF] Wannenmacher | Le partage de connaissances tacites : l'importance de l'interaction in situ[END_REF] which is a systemic approach that defines an "ingenition" cycle. Those researchers are inspired by the engineering method, and consider that different complementary theories are not linked: design, knowledge and learning. After several actions in industrial domains, they conclude that it is false to think that "good" specialists know how to manage their knowledge and the way they learn. Their goal is to manage the produced knowledge in the design project by taking in account the whole knowledge value chain in a specific organization. For that purpose, a filter "object-semantics-social and structure » is given to design step by step a product together with the appropriate data, then information and then knowledge. All along that value chain, knowledge, competencies and actors are shared. The objective is to build knowledge bases available when designing and developing a product.

The integrating knowledge process has five phases:

-Modeling the context -Designing the product usage by the client -Knowledge generation during the extended life cycle of the product -Comparative scale of internal and external resources -Value chain-value sequence-knowledge generation This process facilitates integration of resources and cognitive capabilities of the firm.

Epistemological foundations of knowledge as "knowing in action" and impact on Knowledge Management

Specific research is concerned with Knowledge Management from a point of view of epistemology of practice. It concerns the definition of knowledge as a situated practice, as "knowing in action" in the sense initiated in the 50s by Polanyi.

We can distinguish three types of research:  The research initiated by Lièvre and al. (Lièvre andRix-Lièvre, 2008, 2010), in the field of "organization studies" intends to give a more theoretical and precise meaning for the notion of tacit knowledge. They prefer to talk about "Knowledge in action", in a sense given by Piaget, and consider that "tacitness" is a characteristic of knowledge in action, and prefer to use "implicit" for that non-explicit aspect. This concerns only individual knowledge. They propose to restrict the tacit dimension of knowledge to a characteristic of collective knowledge, as in law one refers to something that is not yet elicited, but already known by different people. This research is to use the Polanyi's intuition, the Piaget's concepts about "succeed and understand" in the 70s, and the methodological works of Pierre Vermersch, in a psycho-phenomenological perspective, in the 90s to clarify the notions of tacit and explicit knowledge that are central to Knowledge Management. The basic idea is to consider that practices and then attached knowledge are in a pre-reflective state, then non conscious, that operates a fundamental distinction between acting and consciousness of acting. When I read, I read. I don't need to be conscious of reading to read. But I can consciously analyze the way I read to progress. The actor is not able to refer spontaneously to his knowledge, because he rationalizes. He makes his personal experience coherent with his counterpart and his identity.

One needs then a specific way to access to theses "knowledge in action", elicitation interview (Vermersch, 1996), self-confrontation interview (Theureau, 1992), subjective re-situ interview [START_REF] Rix | Towards a codification of practical knowledge[END_REF]. It is impossible to access to that type of knowledge by a classical simple sociological interview after the action. These authors propose to study the implications of that theory on Knowledge Management, for instance for knowledge codification.  The research of Hakim Hachour and Safia Abouad (2008) in information and communication sciences (Paragaphe laboratory, Université Paris 6), in the sociophenomenological framework initiated by Schultz (1953Schultz ( , 1976)), distinguishes three types of knowledge: fundamental knowledge, routine knowledge and specific knowledge. [START_REF] Schutz | Common-sense and Scientific Interpretation of Human Action[END_REF][START_REF] Schutz | The Phenomenology of the Social World[END_REF]Schutz and Luckman 1973) define three types of knowledge (table 1) and are interested in the cognitive styles for achieving a goal. That process is structured in different steps; the articulations between steps are precisely studied. This approach (« course-of-action patterns ») is developed in [START_REF] Theureau | Le cours d'action: méthode développée[END_REF]. Tacit or fundamental knowledge is seen as « obvious ». This is the result of purely subjective processes. Specific knowledge is separated from action, it is objective. Routine knowledge is attached to practical goals of the action; it is linked to the potential realization included in the daily environment (signification in action). [START_REF] Schutz | Common-sense and Scientific Interpretation of Human Action[END_REF][START_REF] Schutz | The Phenomenology of the Social World[END_REF].

Fundamental Knowledge

Routine

From these principles, and from analyzing the organization of a socialized knowledge system, those researchers are designing knowledge management systems as a new organization "memory-centered", in a sense given by Lemoigne, which implies three fundamental levels of modeling: the syntactic level (technical), the semantic level (referential), the pragmatic level (implication). These three levels are dependant from a primordial meta-level: ethics.  The research of [START_REF] Brassac | L'acquisition de savoirs comme activité située et distribuée[END_REF] distinguish two types of studying cognitive processes : o The "internal" perspective, where cognition is an information processing system operating on cerebral entities and mental states corresponding to real life states that the actor tries to understand, memorize, tell and manipulate o The "external" perspective that relies brain, body and external world. Cognition is then an activity that doesn't represent the Characteristics of the world, but make them present.

Most of papers analyzed in the present state of the art are in the second perspective, concerning essentially the managers, the routines and the communities. We are then far from the Simon's model of "rationality" [START_REF] Simon | Rationality as Process and Product of Thought[END_REF][START_REF] Simon | Rationality as Process and Product of Thought[END_REF] and we are more interested in the practices that participate to knowledge elaboration.

Knowledge Transfer

Knowledge Transfer practices are various and ancient. One can classify them in two parts: the organizational training systems and the specific knowledge transfer systems.

Knowledge transfer with training systems

Wannenmacher (2010) presents a large synthesis of training systems: tutoring, pairing, mentoring etc.

The tutoring function is a process of professional socialization and a process of transmission of professional practices. Tutor is a guide of the new comer and helps him in his learning problems [START_REF] Boru | Introduire et développer la fonction tutorale dans les entreprises[END_REF].

The pairing function facilitates the new comer's socialization. He is associated to an experimented worker during all his learning period [START_REF] Meignant | Former sans la formation ?[END_REF].

The mentoring function disseminates know how, competencies within specific working communities.

These three functions favor interactions. One cannot disseminate know how without simple actions as observation, impregnation, imitation, practical experience, advising by experienced workers, demonstration, trial-and-error, exercises. But to be effective, some conditions for learning must be fulfilled.

Knowledge transfer between « Knower » (K) and « Learner » (L)

Research of specific conditions to realize critical knowledge transfer within an organization leads to a better understanding of the knowledge transfer process. [START_REF] Brassac | Intercompréhension et Communiaction®[END_REF][START_REF] Brassac | L'acquisition de savoirs comme activité située et distribuée[END_REF] develops a methodology for supporting knowledge transfer, based on an approach of social psychology of cognitive processes.

The most relevant situations are the retirements of a technician or engineer.

Knowledge acquisition is a process where at least two actors, "Knower" (K) and Learner (L), are coresponsible. This process takes place in a set of social interactions, discursive exchanges, body language, and machines manipulations. The actors must maintain these manipulations. Under those conditions, there is no real knowledge transfer, but a construction of significations that are to be used afterwards by L, after acquisition.

To facilitate that acquisition, Brassac develops the following methodology:

 Speech collection is not enough  You should not disconnect the speech of K and the apprehension of this speech by A,  You should not abstract the expression of the expertise of the concrete place of effectuation,  You should not prevent both actors C and A from representing diagrammatically working elements This is the opportunity for K and L to have a direct relationship: for knowledge, hesitations, oversights, documents or limits dependencies. This preserves the possibility of asking, raises incoherencies or conflicts, and proposes new perspectives. For that reason, it is necessary to have three persons: K, L and a knowledge engineer (or the researcher). One uses overviews in concrete working context, films, interviews, comments on films.

Transfer possibilities are possible because knowledge is distributed among K and artifacts (documents, equipments…). A good strategy is to have a constant feed-back with the different ways of collecting knowledge (diversity, redundancy). This is the way to reveal discrepancies between performative statements and experiences, and give recommendations and performative reformulations.

To summarize, two practical recommendations are formulated:

 Retention: organization of the documentation, expertise retention, organization of resources after corpus analysis.  Capitalization: save operational protocols, anticipate the next transfer and design a back-up for L's activity.

Industrial Knowledge Capitalization

Lessons learned for technical objects

In an engineering context, working on technical objects, Knowledge Management is useful for the actors to give sense to information on objects, and browse among the different objects they manipulate in their activities. An example is given by TEEXMA [START_REF] Rachedi | Etude de cas d'une offre industrielle de management des connaissances techniques[END_REF]) used as a support for lessons learned. In that tool, a situation can be attached as a fact to a technical object, and can be documented with a short piece of knowledge, that can be appropriated by the concerned actors, in an objective of continuous improvement. [START_REF] Rachedi | Etude de cas d'une offre industrielle de management des connaissances techniques[END_REF].

Capture professional gestures

Another given example of Knowledge Capitalization technique is given by video-based knowledge capture. This technique is developed in a sensible domain: nuclear energy (EDF, the French Power Supplier), to capture the know-how incorporated in technical gestures called "rare". A very deep research has been made about diversity and quality of video-taping and about elicitation modes by actors during recordings (Le [START_REF] Bellu | Comment capter le savoir incorporé dans un geste technique à l'aide d'outils numériques ?[END_REF].

The EDF approach is based on a subjective view of the operator's activity, and on a protocol for collecting subjective cognitive elements concerning technical gestures in context. Two cameras are used, one outside the operator, one carried by the operator, nearby his gestures. The choice of « firstperson » filming fosters the identification process to the operator by the observer. It increases also the quality of elicitation by the operator.

The questions are: are the operator's routines unconscious (proportionally to his expertise)? How to make him elicit his routines? What are the limits?

The filming technique is very specific. The operator is mentally prepared, and is asked to think of his gesture, to have a reflexive posture regarding his gesture (tell successively goals and results) in order to give the best possible description, in a format adequate to have a cognitive modeling and then a structure for training documents.

Knowledge Modeling around and with MASK

A lot of research refer to the MASK method (Method for Analyzing and Structuring Knowledge) , developed by Jean-Louis [START_REF] Ermine | Les systèmes de connaissances[END_REF][START_REF] Ermine | Management et ingénierie des connaissances, modèles et méthodes[END_REF], vastly used for industrial use and others 3 .

In the last version, the MASK method has two parts: the first one (MASK II) is a method for identifying an organization's strategic knowledge portfolio (knowledge mapping), the second one (MASK I) is a method for knowledge preservation, based on modeling techniques for tacit knowledge.

MASK II : Knowledge Identification with knowledge maps

Knowledge mapping

Knowledge mapping is a modeling method to classify knowledge and access to the right knowledge at the right moment. This is a management process to identifying the portfolio of strategic knowledge, and for the design of a KM plan of the organization. Different approaches can be used with different issues for KM (table 2).

Functional classification

It tags the competencies. It is easy to make, and is privileged by the management. It is based on the organization chart of the company, and then depends a lot on that organization. .

Knowledge domains classification

A knowledge domain is related to the activity of a group of actors. This approach is adapted when the complexity level is high. The models may be, for instance, trees or cognitive maps [START_REF] Ermine | Introduction au Knowledge Management in Management des connaissances en entreprise[END_REF].

Processes classification

It links knowledge to activity. It is rather complex to operate. It comprises four steps: sensible processes and collective consensual issues, critical activities linked to those processes, knowledge needed to solve the main problems, measurement of the criticality of this knowledge. The knowledge map may be used as a data repository, and processed by data mining techniques to progressively elaborate knowledge (Menaouer and Baghdad, 2009).

The connection between the knowledge map and the firm's units is essential. The knowledge systems can be maintained through two logics (figure 2). One is from knowledge to action; the other is from the operational level to the strategic level.

Critical knowledge maps

Knowledge mapping can be extended, in some sensible domains (agriculture, nuclear energy, personal cares, extreme environments…), to minimize the "knowledge crash" risk (i.e. loss of knowledge that can be fatal). According to [START_REF] Grundstein | Gameth : un cadre directeur pour repérer les connaissances cruciales pour l'entreprise[END_REF], crucial knowledge are necessary for companies to solve their critical problems. Each knowledge domain is tagged by a criticality measure that is based both on vulnerability of knowledge (rareness, accessibility, cost and delays for acquisition), and its strategic importance.

This analysis is made by semi-directive interviews with institutional and practitioners, in three parts.

We give an example for a system in organic farming [START_REF] Soulignac | Gestion informatisée des connaissances pour une agriculture durable[END_REF].

The first part gives the general contexts and infrastructures and identifies where the concerned actors are. The second part develops the informational activities. The third gives a model of information flows between the institutions and others actors. Each type of information is related to the supports (technological dimension), the origin (organizational dimension) and the content (informational dimension) (the SOC model: Support, Origin, Content). Relational matrices are then established to identify flows (information-prescription): weak knowledge flows and strong knowledge flows.

After this phase of identification of the knowledge system involved in organic farming, the map of the different knowledge domains is built, and for each knowledge domain, the criticality is calculated, and domains are classified (figure 3). Criticality is proportional to a combination of four parameters: usefulness, rareness, difficulty of acquisition, difficulty of use. Criticality evaluation is qualitative; it is calculated with a grading system.

The relationship between communities and knowledge is that of local and socialization. Communities are analyzed as places where, permanently, local models, shared representations and jargons are built, hence enabling synergies of individual varieties [START_REF] Amin | The Architecture of Knowledge[END_REF]. A community is founded on self-made norms that are de facto guides for action. Not to respect the norms may jeopardize the community [START_REF] Munier | Viabilité des communautés de pratique pilotée : un modèle dynamique[END_REF].

Most of organizations are made of several communities. How then can functional organization and autonomous communities be coordinated?

Communities of Practice (CoPs) Epistemic Communities (EC)

Their objective is to improve their activity by leading a reflection on practices, building and sharing a common repository of resources.

Socialization process made of tacit knowledge, socially localized in shared repository of common resources (routines, artifacts, vocabulary and styles).

Small working groups composed of actors working on subset of mutually recognized problems linked to a type of knowledge, which, at least, accept a procedural authority, recognized by everybody in the same way and seen as essential to the success of their cognitive activity [START_REF] Cowan | The explicit economics of knowledge codification[END_REF].

They use codebooks: dictionaries, grammar rules, to facilitate communication and synergies.

They create knowledge with the use of externalization.

Table 4: The two types of community

The study of community implies the study of problematic interactions. Interactions with hierarchical structures ask the question of knowledge dissemination and combination. In that case, communities are not a lot concerned. Interactions between autonomous communities ask the question of knowledge transfer, with the background of organizational pressure.

The antinomy Hierarchy-Community

The rules for the hierarchy and the communities are antagonist. The community can have pressure from the hierarchy in its organization. But the community is creative through its own norms, and more generally through the interactions of its members. The hierarchy is interested in the community to develop its activities, to innovate and to control. From a synchronic point of view, the relationship firm > community can be apprehended as a pressure [START_REF] Munier | Viabilité des communautés de pratique pilotée : un modèle dynamique[END_REF]. A community is viable if it respects the social norms elaborated by its members, it acts regarding a repository of norms. Hence, the community can stand the pressure, if and only if, the required norms belong to the repository of possible norms.

If a firm is always objective-driven, a community evolves regarding its past, its action is structured by constraints on its resources and orientation on its rules. The firm, as a regulator, must manage a double bind: respect the norms of the community, and capture and orientate this community. We have then a double governance structure, which justifies the interest of studying the complementarities between "entrepreneur" and "manager" from a management point of view.

From a classical point of view, the community is considered as a risk of losing control. Advanced studies prove now that is not really true. The strange characteristics of a knowledge community must be seen as a managerial innovation, and not as an organizational risk [START_REF] Bootz | Les communautés de connaissance : leviers de changement organisationnel pour le manager et l'entrepreneur[END_REF].

Entrepreneur role Manager role

Oriented towards dissemination and management of new knowledge, tacit activity, difficult to identify.

Oriented towards internal/external links.

Guarantee an environment favorable to community creation, and manage the knowledge by codification.

Intention + attention.

Intention: wish to implement a given strategy and rally the company.

Attention: observation and assimilation of weak signals from all communities.

The entrepreneur tries to maintain knowledge diversity together with dialog.

Preoccupied by interfaces management to keep control.

Use of frontier objects to guarantee communication.

Table 5: Entrepreneur and manager roles, [START_REF] Bootz | Les communautés en pratique : leviers de changements pour l'entrepreneur et le manager[END_REF], [START_REF] Créplet | Dualité cognitive et organisationnelle de l'entreprise : le rôle différencié du manager et de l'entrepreneur[END_REF].

From an evolutionist point of view, several ways for promoting communities are explored (Créplet and Dupouët, 2009). The authors recommend to not directly managing the communities, in order to create an efficient environment for communities development, and to not edict contradictory injunctions of rules or norms.

Conclusions

As a synthesis of this transverse analysis, we can give two converging main streams:

Knowledge cannot be conceived as objects relevant to physical or economical manipulations

A clear distinction is made between information and knowledge:  Knowledge is structured in personal schemes and in dialogist processes "person/environment"  Information is the code used by knowledge to disseminate. It may be the support for knowledge transfer

Two Knowledge Management strategies

Two KM strategies can be adopted by the organizations. The first one is a defensive strategy to prevent risk (knowledge loss, knowledge crash). Knowledge codification is a main tool in that strategy (Knowledge Books, procedures, documentation…). The second one is an offensive strategy, where knowledge is a resource giving the opportunity to develop new products and improve the processes in the firm. There are many tools for that strategy, which can be seen as supports and combinations of two types of knowledge transfer (Figure 5).

  Figure 1: The TEEXMA© tool for technical Knowledge Management[START_REF] Rachedi | Etude de cas d'une offre industrielle de management des connaissances techniques[END_REF].

Figure 2 :

 2 Figure2: The three approaches knowledge/competencies/processes[START_REF] Aubertin | Cartographier les connaissances critiques: une démarche stratégique pour l'entreprise. Management des connaissances en entreprise[END_REF]

Figure 5 :

 5 Figure 5: Indirect and direct knowledge transfer, according to Nonaka, Ermine (2007).

Table 1 : Characteristics of the three types of knowledge,

 1

		Knowledge	Specific Knowledge
	Internalized elements	Elements with growing	Externalized elements (data)
	(capacities)	specificities
	Attached to the situation Dependent on the situation	Independent from the situation
	Subjective	Inter-subjective	Objective

Table 2 : Three types of approach for cognitive resources mapping

 2

	Strategic level	Critical Knowledge	Key Competencies	Critical Processes
		Knowledge	Professional	Process
		Maps	Repositories	Maps
	Operational level	Knowledge Repository	Competencies	Processes

3 -See for instance : http://aries.serge.free.fr/

Knowledge themes

Weed

Reducing criticality requires knowledge development and acquisition by a significant number of actors. This must be designed according the double nature of knowledge

MASK I : Knowledge elicitation with modeling techniques

MASK I is a Knowledge Engineering method. Its objective is to collect and capitalize tacit knowledge of experts with interview and modeling techniques [START_REF] Ermine | Management et ingénierie des connaissances, modèles et méthodes[END_REF]. The objective is to deliver a structured synthesis of the knowledge on a given domain in a form named (as a metaphor) a « Knowledge Book ».

This method is a tool for an expert, in interaction with a knowledge engineer, to analyze and formalize his knowledge to create a knowledge base. It is based on conceptual framework given by the "knowledge macroscope" (figure 4). It is a modeling method based on six different models for six different fundamental types of knowledge (table 3).

In practice, the MASK I method is implemented in three steps:  Knowledge elicitation: that process consists in making visible an added-value part of a personal or collective tacit knowledge ("pushing away the tacit frontier"). Elicitation is made by interviews with knowledge holders, co-construction of different knowledge models, peer reviews and assessments. The limits of this elicitation process are regularly discussed in the GeCSO congresses [START_REF] Lièvre | Retour sur la mise en oeuvre de la méthode MASK à la conduite du blé biologique : la question du mode d'investigation des connaissances tacites[END_REF]. The transfer of real life situated experience of experts to modeling of this experience with the MASK I models is related to very important questions. How to skip from the expert's practices, which are "unlogic" in the sense given by [START_REF] Bourdieu | Raisons pratiques[END_REF] to a formal logic framework given by the MASK I models? The basic idea is to start from investigating "knowledge in action" (Piaget), with a methodology as the elicitation interview (Vermersch 1996), and then build a link between the level of "knowledge in action" and the formal level of MASK Domain: model general phenomena that must be mastered in the domain Activity: model the processes of the domain. Identify and decompose the activities, the flows between activities, the actors, the resources. Identify the knowledge, know how … Concept: model the conceptual structure of an expert (semantic network) Task: model know how as problem solving methods.

History: model the historical context explaining the evolution of the domain.

Lineage: model genealogic trees of solutions, ideas, products … with the attached pros and cons.

Table 3: the different models in MASK I

Epistemic communities and communities of practice

Specific research on communities is conducted at the Strasbourg school, within the BETA lab (Bootz, Burger-Helmchen, Créplet, Cohendet, Dupouët, Guittard, Kern, Munier, Pénin, Schenk). Its interest is in knowledge dynamics, and its relationship to authority.

Different approaches for communities

Research on communities of practice and on epistemic communities has now a well-known genealogy. The first identification of communities was made in case studies. [START_REF] Orr | Sharing knowledge, celebrating identity: war stories and community memory in a service culture[END_REF] is recognized to be the founder of this research relative to learning, socially designed by the employees. More generally, the literature on community is presented with four main streams, based essentially on North American sociology:  Learning by practice [START_REF] Brown | Organizational learning and communities-of-practice: Toward a unified view of working, learning and innovation[END_REF]  The situated characteristic of knowledge [START_REF] Greeno | Situativity and symbols : Response to Vera and Simon[END_REF]  Learning as a social construct [START_REF] Lave | Cognition in Practice[END_REF](Lave, , 1991) )  Learning as a social practice where significations linked to action are negotiated [START_REF] Wenger | Communities of practice: learning, meaning and identity[END_REF]