The problem of effective knowledge management is one of the key objectives of improving the competitiveness of both individual companies and entire regions and states. The process of socio-economic systems developing is a nonlinear function that characterizes the dynamics of the efficiency of the system functioning, depending on the phase of the observed cycle. At the same time, microeconomic cycles are imposed on the waves of macroeconomic dynamics. Due to the relatively recent global formation and development of knowledge management systems, most researchers adhere to the concept of a rising wave in the context of the problems of knowledge management in macroeconomic terms. Our research covers the period of market transformation of the Russian economy, and the retrospective period of a planned economy in the USSR, starting from 1947. The results obtained show that knowledge management cycles have started long before the day when the term "knowledge management" appeared.