The Art & Practice of Pronouncement & Prognostication

I hopped on a local city bus this morning and overheard two people talking about the weather and March heat wave that has blessed (or assaulted, depending on your winter pass-time) much of the northern US and southern Canada.

Like many of us do, the people talking about the weather were offering their own forecast. And like many of us do as well, they were expressing their opinions as definitive statements of certain fact as though they could foresee the future. They didn't preface any of their comments with "I guess," "I think or suspect," "I'm gambling," or even the venerable IMHO.

Yes, in context, we all acknowledge that personal weather prognostication is not based on scientific fact or professional judgment - "It is what it is."

It does make me wonder, though, how much confusion we create by stating option, judgments, or "best guesses" as fact in business (or even personal) contexts that are less clear, and having those words taken literally and acted upon by others.

Clarity on what we're expressing (and opinion vs. fact, or even a preliminary thought vs. a fully formed idea call to action) can go a long way towards ensuring that listeners have the right expectations, reducing confusion, making productive change, and building good relationships.

Looking for a New Edge in Knowledge Management?

Have you picked up your copy of The New Edge in Knowledge: How Knowledge Management Is Changing the Way We Do Business yet? If you've had interest in knowledge management over the last "x" years, you know that knowledge management is challenging subject area / management practice to understand, and within which to develop and implement practical, impactful initiatives that provide individual and organizational benefit. It is also often a difficult subject to have management conversations about, in particular when some managers don't understand that part of their responsibility is managing social processes for learning and knowledge sharing inside their organizations.

What I really liked about The New Edge in Knowledge, and why I think it should should occupy first place on your book shelf or e-shelf, is that it brings significant clarity and resolution to all the key KM challenges and questions such as: What is knowledge management? What is its relationship to information management and corporate culture? What type of initiatives comprise knowledge management? Where do social / collaboration technologies fit in? How do I measure success? How do I enable change? What should we do next?

Most importantly, this is not a practitioner's bible. It is a business oriented, practical view, based on solid research and best practices, that will inform effective strategic thinking and decision making about how to best improve the processes and practices people to create, share, and learn from information and from each other in a business context. That this is an excellent resource is not a surprise given the authors (Carla O'Dell and Cindy Hubert) and the organization (APQC).

I think this book fills an important void. There is lots of very valuable academic research and practitioner information about knowledge management, but a notable absence of business oriented, jargon-free material for managers/decision makers.  "Edge," like it's predecessor by the same authors, is an excellent business read.

Buy it. Learn from it. Use it. Then consider leveraging other APQC KM resources.  You won't be disappointed.

APQC's Evolving Technolgies Study - An Enjoyable Experience

I have the privilege of being the lead contact for my organization that has signed up as one of the sponsors for the just launched APQC best practice study on the Role of Evolving Technologies:
Accelerating Collaboration and Knowledge Transfer. I attended the kickoff meeting this past July 19th at APQC’s location in Houston and thoroughly enjoyed the experience.

This was my first time participating in a study, and all the staff at APQC were very engaging, hospitable, and made a point of welcoming me into the “community.” Their benchmarking process is solidly based on effective experiential learning and facilitation processes, rooted in their quality lineage. Their approach to engaging kick off event participants (study sponsors) in choosing organizations to study, and determining key qualitative and quantitative questions were highly participative and democratic, and based on the candid disclosure of all relevant information.

All in all, the event was well planned, and managed event. Sincerest thanks and appreciation to Carla O’Dell, Darcy Lemons, Jim Lee, Gerry Swift and the rest of the APQC staff who made the event a success. Everyone was awesome.

(And Jim, keep blogging! I know there are more than just me reading! Plus, you're promoted on the APQC Web site.)