Knowledge Management in Police Command of Eastern Azerbaijan Province: The Present Status and the Barriers

This research is aimed at assessing of knowledge management status and identifying the barriers in the way of sharing and documentation of knowledge in the Police Command of Eastern Azerbaijan rovince. This mixed research follows concurrent nested method. Phenomenological approach is selected for the qualitative phase of the study and descriptive-survey method is employed in the quantitative phase.  The statistical sample of the qualitative phase of the research included 10 commanders and employees of police of Eastern Azerbaijan province selected by snowball sampling method. Data were analyzed using inductive coding of phrases and words from participant interviews. The research population included 320 police employees and commanders in the quantitative phase in the same population having been selected by simple random sampling. The instruments of data collection included a semi structured questionnaire in the qualitative phase, and in the quantitative phase a standardized questionnaire of the processes of knowledge management and the infrastructure affecting knowledge management was employed.  The face validity and content validity of the questionnaires were confirmed.  The reliability coefficient of Cronbach's Alpha for the knowledge management process was 0.93, and for the effective factors was 0.90. The trustworthy of the results was affirmed by reviewing the data and recording the details of the research and prolonging the process. In the qualitative phase, inductive coding method was used for data analysis and in quantitative phase, T-sample testing through SPSS 22 software was used to answer the research questions. The results of the research indicated that the present status of knowledge management was 2.59 in terms of process, 2.73 for effective factors in the Police Command of the province. The t-value distance to the desired situation was 3.5. The main barriers to knowledge management in the Police command included trust, communication, organizational management, structure, commitment of human resource, culture, and technology. The Police Command of the province can improve the status of knowledge management in the organization by strengthening think tanks, documenting experiences, removing structural barriers, and increasing interpersonal and organizational trust.