5 years ago, in late 2014, I made an estimate of the number of knowledge managers in the world. Here is an update - the number has increased to over 47,500, of which 28% are in the USA.
Number of knowledge managers per country, normalised for population |
Of course there is no list of global knowledge managers, and as a proxy I made a count of the number of people on LinkedIn with the word "Knowledge" (or Conocimiento, or Connaissance, or Kennis, etc etc) in their current job title, in a selection of the larger countries. They could be knowledge managers, chief knowledge officers, knowledge leaders, knowledge experts, knowledge engineers and so on.
Of course
d) how the number has changed in the past 5 years
Of course
- there may be some people in that list who have Knowledge in the title in another context (for example "Student with knowledge of French"),
- there may be knowledge managers not on linked-in,
- some of the people may have been counted twice (with both Knowledge and Conocimento in their job title, perhaps)
- I did not search through every country (only the bigger ones where I know there is a history of KM),
- nor did I search for every language equivalent of "Knowledge".
Therefore the number of knowledge managers estimated by this method is approximate. However I counted 47577 people by this method. If your country, or language, is not on the lists below, then please feel free to do a count yourself, and let me know the answer.
This blog post goes on to discuss, in maps and lists,
a) where these people are
b) the number as a percent of the national population
c) the number as a percent of the LinkedIn populationd) how the number has changed in the past 5 years
Where the knowledge managers are
Total number of knowledge managers per country. Jan 2020 |
This map shows the total number of people with Knowledge (or its equivalent) in their job title, on LinkedIn, in Jan 2020. The countries are listed below in order of "Knowledge Manager" population, with all the caveats mentioned above.
Country | total number of knowledge managers, 2020 |
USA | 13430 |
India | 5050 |
UK | 4577 |
canada | 2333 |
netherlands | 2135 |
germany | 1841 |
france | 1807 |
spain | 1615 |
Australia | 1576 |
brazil | 1218 |
south africa | 895 |
colombia | 877 |
belgium | 864 |
italy | 849 |
indonesia | 843 |
china | 699 |
phillipines | 611 |
switzerland | 596 |
mexico | 548 |
israel | 527 |
Argentina | 477 |
poland | 433 |
iran | 375 |
malaysia | 350 |
new Zealand | 307 |
singapore | 300 |
UAE | 298 |
ireland | 292 |
sweden | 285 |
chile | 277 |
saudi arabia | 234 |
thailand | 222 |
denmark | 192 |
hong kong | 191 |
austria | 166 |
norway | 164 |
russia | 123 |
Number as a share of national population
Of course many of the countries at the top of this list are large countries. We need to look at the number of knowledge people as a proportion of the national population. This is shown in the picture and list below (the list shows the number of people on LinkedIn with Knowledge in their title, divided by the national population in millions).
Total number of knowledge managers per country as a proportion of national population. Jan 2020 |
The USA is no longer top of the list - that honour goes to the Netherlands, just as it did in 2014, where 133 out of each million (one in 7500) has knowledge in their job title (subject to all the caveats above). The USA is now in 11th place.
Country | K Managers per millions population |
netherlands | 133 |
belgium | 86 |
switzerland | 75 |
UK | 74 |
new Zealand | 71 |
israel | 69 |
canada | 69 |
Australia | 69 |
ireland | 66 |
singapore | 60 |
USA | 43 |
spain | 35 |
denmark | 35 |
norway | 33 |
sweden | 32 |
france | 28 |
hong kong | 27 |
germany | 23 |
austria | 21 |
colombia | 19 |
south africa | 18 |
chile | 16 |
italy | 14 |
malaysia | 13 |
Argentina | 12 |
poland | 11 |
saudi arabia | 9 |
UAE | 7 |
phillipines | 7 |
brazil | 6 |
mexico | 5 |
iran | 5 |
India | 4 |
indonesia | 4 |
thailand | 4 |
russia | 1 |
china | 1 |
Number as a proportion of the LinkedIn population
Of course the number of people counted from LinkedIn is unreliable, as the global use of LinkedIn is highly variable. Perhaps the lack of knowledge managers in China is because there is less use of LinkedIn in China, for example?
The map and list below account for this, and shows, for each country, the number of people on Linked with Knowledge etc in their job title, per million people on LinkedIn. This may be a truer representation of the distribution of KM interest.
The map and list below account for this, and shows, for each country, the number of people on Linked with Knowledge etc in their job title, per million people on LinkedIn. This may be a truer representation of the distribution of KM interest.
Total number of knowledge managers per country as a proportion of LinkedIn population. Jan 2020 |
Now we see Israel as top of the list, followed by the Netherlands again. China is still at the bottom. USA has fallen to 23rd place.
Country | KM per million linked in population |
israel | 261 |
netherlands | 249 |
belgium | 195 |
switzerland | 191 |
new Zealand | 157 |
UK | 148 |
Australia | 133 |
canada | 128 |
singapore | 124 |
ireland | 123 |
south africa | 110 |
iran | 109 |
austria | 109 |
spain | 107 |
hong kong | 107 |
norway | 105 |
poland | 102 |
thailand | 97 |
colombia | 92 |
france | 78 |
germany | 74 |
malaysia | 74 |
USA | 72 |
sweden | 72 |
phillipines | 69 |
India | 68 |
UAE | 67 |
denmark | 66 |
italy | 51 |
Argentina | 50 |
indonesia | 44 |
chile | 39 |
saudi arabia | 38 |
mexico | 36 |
brazil | 25 |
russia | 17 |
china | 12 |
How the number has changed in 5 years
Percentage increase in the number of knowledge managers per country between Dec 2014 and Jan 2020 |
In every country other than Switzerland and Norway, the number of "Knowledge Managers" with all the caveats above, has increased. The countries are listed below in order of increase in "Knowledge Manager" population over the past 5 years. This gives us a proxy measure for areas where KM seems to be on the increase, vs countries where the topic is relatively mature.
Country | increase in knowledge managers 2014 to 2020 |
indonesia | 168% |
germany | 159% |
poland | 150% |
phillipines | 143% |
iran | 142% |
chile | 135% |
saudi arabia | 129% |
france | 125% |
colombia | 98% |
spain | 97% |
thailand | 95% |
china | 91% |
UAE | 86% |
mexico | 84% |
belgium | 71% |
ireland | 70% |
italy | 66% |
brazil | 66% |
hong kong | 66% |
sweden | 59% |
India | 56% |
israel | 51% |
malaysia | 50% |
Australia | 43% |
singapore | 39% |
south africa | 37% |
canada | 34% |
UK | 33% |
austria | 33% |
netherlands | 29% |
new Zealand | 28% |
russia | 28% |
USA | 28% |
Argentina | 27% |
denmark | 15% |
norway | -1% |
switzerland | -11% |
Note that these increases are only partly due to an increase in the number of people using LinkedIn. LinkedIn usage is increasing rapidly (on average 120% in the last 5 years for the countries in this study), while the increase in KM numbers is at a lower rate (on average 70%). Possibly the Knowledge Managers were early adopters of LinkedIn, and are now becoming diluted as others join.
Conclusions
Bearing in mind the caveats above -
- There are in the order of 47500 knowledge management people in the world
- The largest numbers are in the USA, then India, then the UK
- In terms of percentage of Knowledge Managers in the national population, the Netherlands is the highest, then Belgium, then Switzerland. Russia and China are at the bottom.
- In terms of the percentage of Knowledge Managers in the linkedIn population, Israel is at the top of the list, then the Netherlands, then Belgium. Russia and China are still at the bottom.
- The greatest percentage growth in numbers is in Indonesia, Germany, Poland and the Phillipines. Numbers have decreased in Switzerland and Norway.
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