Knowledge Creation within Nucor Steel

Nucor Steel is one of the top ranked steel companies in the world. They have achieved this status through the knowledge conversion process. Specifically, the knowledge creation involved in the spiral effect of knowledge management has allowed Nucor to succeed in a highly capital intensive environment.  The vision CEO Ken Iverson had for Nucor was a process in which accumulating knowledge would be key for success.

Nucor Steel mills are built with an ideal employee base of 250-300 employees.  This allows for knowledge acquisition and knowledge creation to be managed and handled at a smaller level. The smaller number of employees also creates and fosters a "family" type atmosphere.  This is due to knowledge retention in Nucor Steel. Employees are never laid off, and have life time employment. The longer you are with someone, the more you develop a bond with someone. And since the mills are not that large, the reality of knowing someone fairly well increase substantially.

Knowledge identification and outflow are also implemented at Nucor Steel. Bonuses are tied to output generated by a team of workers, not individual output. Also, to achieve the bonus, it requires thought process by the operators involved as well as management on how to improve or invent a better process to achieve a bonus.  Conversely, when the economy is in a recession, layoffs do not happen, but hours are reduced at the plant, which means lower wages for the employees, but the management takes a bigger cut of wages, resulting in a "share the pain" mentality which fosters respect and loyalty throughout the mill.

Nucor Steel also does its own improvements to its mills. When remodeling a mill, the process involves everyone involved from the operator to the supervisor to the plant manager. This knowledge transmission ensures the task is done in the most efficient way and feedback is gathered from all involved parties to ensure the remodeling occurs to what is best for the mill and generates the most productive output possible.

Through the use of spiraling knowledge, Nucor Steel has shown how successful a manufacturing process can be when everyone is involved. They have consistently grown in size since their inception in the 1960's and with over 1200 people waiting in line to apply for 8 jobs, that is an indicator of how much people want to work for Nucor.