ORGANIZATIONAL KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT: SURVIVAL STRATEGY FOR NIGERIA INSURANCE INDUSTRY

Festus M Epetimehin and Oluwayomi Ekundayo

Department of Insurance and Actuarial Science

Joseph Ayo Babalola University, Ikeji-Arakeji

festusworldwide22@yahoo.com and Oluwayomi_aekundayo@yahoo.com

ABSTRACT

The Nigerian Insurance Industry is struggling with knowledge loss resulting from employee turnover like other public or private sector organizations, especially during downsizing of employees or during a period of re-engineering. Costs of recruiting, of lost productivity and training to replace employees can reach huge amount. In the insurance industry, trade secrets, confidential information and valuable ideas are part of the workforce knowledge. A sensitive ethics-related issue is the case of insurance agents leaving the employer, to transfer to a competitor insurance company, while trying to take along as many clients as possible from the old employer. The data and information collected for the paper were mainly through journals, books and observations offered by international organizations and individuals. This paper suggests different methods of minimizing the loss of expertise, customer contacts and product knowledge when key employees leave for another company within the industry. Recommendations such as, documenting invaluable critical knowledge from top experts and key personnel, before leaving the  company, conducting exit interviews, analyzing the work force strengths and encouraging knowledge sharing among the workforce were made to reduce this loss.

Keywords: knowledge management, insurance, ethics, tacit and explicit knowledge