"Knowledge workers think for a living. They live by their wits - any heavy lifting on the job is intellectual, not physical. They solve problems, they understand and meet the needs of customers, they make decisions, and they collaborate and communicate with other people in the course of doing their own work.
It's easy to point to examples of knowledge workers: physicians and physicists, scientists and scifi writers, airplane pilots and airplane designers. We know them when we see them. They don't necessarily have to work in knowledge-intensive industries - managers of any company are knowledge workers, applying knowledge to make decisions in the best interests of their enterprises. Even the most industrial company has engineers, researchers, marketers, and planners. Knowledge workers work in small start-ups and large global corporations. Outside of work, they reside in tony, cool areas of cities and in middle-class or wealthy suburbs; some have moved to resort locations and do their work virtually. For many of you reading this book, virtually everyone you deal with in your job and your social life could be another knowledge worker.
What's difficult is pointing to people who clearly and definitively are not knowledge workers. Most jobs require some degree of knowledge to perform them successfully, and it's probably also true that the number of jobs requiring no knowledge whatsoever has decreased over time. Even if I drive a taxi, I need to get some geographical knowledge to get by (London taxi drivers, in particular, have to possess 'The Knowledge' of its streets before getting their licenses). Even if I take tickets at a movie theater, I need both customer service knowledge and the ability to recognize when someone's trying to sneak in. Even ditch diggers need some knowledge of soil conditions and how to lift shovels full of dirt without hurting their backs. I'm sympathetic to the idea that increasing numbers of workers need knowledge to do their jobs. However, that doesn't necessarily make them knowledge workers."
Thomas Davenport
What's difficult is pointing to people who clearly and definitively are not knowledge workers. Most jobs require some degree of knowledge to perform them successfully, and it's probably also true that the number of jobs requiring no knowledge whatsoever has decreased over time. Even if I drive a taxi, I need to get some geographical knowledge to get by (London taxi drivers, in particular, have to possess 'The Knowledge' of its streets before getting their licenses). Even if I take tickets at a movie theater, I need both customer service knowledge and the ability to recognize when someone's trying to sneak in. Even ditch diggers need some knowledge of soil conditions and how to lift shovels full of dirt without hurting their backs. I'm sympathetic to the idea that increasing numbers of workers need knowledge to do their jobs. However, that doesn't necessarily make them knowledge workers."
Thomas Davenport
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