What I Would Like in a Corporate Library System

How well do you know your librarians? I think I know the ones in my organization quite well. As has been my experience all the way back to high school, librarians are a wealth of knowledge, and not just about subjects and collections, but often what is "going on" in the organization. And they're pretty terrific people too.

If you'd like to have an interesting conversation, bring a book on a general business topic back to the front desk and ask, "Can you tell me the names of the last 20 people who borrowed this book? I'd like to talk with them about their thoughts on the book, what they learned from it, and how they are thinking about applying what they learned to their work context."

That type of question is typically met with "We can't give you that information! That's personal / private!"

So, this scenario started me thinking about what I would like to see in a library system or related functionality. Here's what I've come up with so far:

• see who else is interested in particular topics based on the books/ articles / references they access
• find out (discover & ask) what they thought of the books, what they learned
• use this information to tap into / form a community / discussion group about the book/article/reference or general topic area
• maintain a compose a "wish list" of what I'd like to read, share it with others, and have library acquisitions teams automatically acquire access to popular requests based on popularity/frequency across multiple lists
• have a personal list of books / resources accessed / read / currently reading that I could share
• find out who is reading what now
• easily generate automatic bibliographic references for writing papers/reports/documents etc.
• include, and share (aggregate) references in a different context (e.g. on a blog/wiki etc.) for all external/internal, reference links, documents, presentations, graphics, photos, podcasts, video clips, charts etc.
• access an organized / grouped subset of these in various contexts (general responsibilities, projects, communities etc.)
• have references suggested to me based on identified interests roles / responsibilities / activities, existing references, interactions with others, search patterns etc.
• "references" I define here as quality, relevant links / actual content of all types, in internal systems, library collections, external / 3rd party collections & content, blogs, news media, social media, etc.

I suppose this list is a bit like Amazon meets LibraryThing, meets EndNote, meets Delicious, meets Slideshare, meets RSS, meets Facebook etc.

More on Community Leadership

In December of last year (2007) I posted on community of practice leadership, and offered a few questions in that context.

Stan Garfield, on the HP Weekly KM blog has done a very good job summarizing a number of conversations /emails that took place as a result(on community leadership) and has offered a few links as well. Well worth reviewing. Thanks Stan.

Best Practice Knowledge Transfer - Practical Ideas

I participated in a recent SKIM Leaders community conference call, featuring a presentation by Kent Greenes about best practice knowledge transfer.

I captured a number of interesting explicit/implicit ideas that have merit.

1. "Best" or "better" practices are not adopted, they're adapted.
2. A very interesting quote: "You don't have a better or best practice until someone else is using it." - Jack Welch
3. The leaner is important, and making learning (identifying, accessing and adapting) easy is critical, or people will re-create "good enough."
4. There is high value in focusing on general, broadly applicable practices first, rather than choosing highly specialized practices.
5. Do something, see what works, then broaden the scope.
6. Peer Assist is a critical tool to begin, and even conclude, the process.
7. Uncover success stories, communicate the stories, and assist learning and adaption process.
8. Facilitation is critical to the process - both the role and the capability.
9. Documentation / video / audio artefacts are the starting point for discovery and productive conversation - it is vital to put people with the learning needs and the people who have the leveragable practices together to enable transfer.
10. To facilitate discovery of best/better practices, short (<1>Leverage communities wherever possible - knowledge transfer is what these forms are all about.

Barriers to Knowledge Exchange

A recent post on Jack Vinson's blog pointed to a very interesting article titled Why We do Dumb or Irrational Things: 10 Brilliant Social Psychology Studies.

Psyblog also recently featured a post titled When We Are Fools To Ourselves.

I've grown somewhat infatuated with subjects like social psychology, social anthropology, cultural anthropology etc. in the context of enabling personal and organizational change, and facilitating knowledge creation and knowledge/information exchange.

I think Psyblog is one to watch. It seems to present complex psychological topics in simple language.

Meeting Rules

David Meiser, author of numerous books (my favourites being the Trusted Advisor and First Among Equals), started a conversation on Meeting Rules. Funny how making meetings more productive seems to be a recurring theme and common problem in organizations, despite the volumes of information and proven practices available out there.

In the blog entry, David asks: "What meeting rules would you propose?"

In my comments, I suggested that the MOST IMPORTANT RULE, maybe the only one is "We will respect each other and ourselves."

Meeting organizers should respect participants by creating an environment that maximizes participation and contributions, and minimizes unnecessary negative impact on workloads - by being clear and explicit about outcomes, objectives, roles, responsibilities, preparation required, meeting structure and underlying process.

All meeting participants should respect each other by:

• "being there" - being cognitively present in the meeting and focused on contributing to outcomes, and yes, that means turning off cell phones and Blackberry's .. perhaps every meeting room / meeting organizer needs one of these - http://www.phonejammer.com/cell-phone-jammer/p2jbz-r.asp
• tabling all relevant information to enable everyone to make fully informed choices and decisions
  listing to others' opinions and ideas for value, and not just criticism - balancing advocacy with inquiry
• being productively candid, and discussing the "undiscussable"

These are a blend of a few principles found in Roger Schwartz' "Using the Facilitative Leader Approach to Create an Organizational Culture of Collaboration." and some of the principles in that video FISH! that you may have seen a few years back.

Another Reason Why KM is more than just IM

On the Anectode blog, Daryl referenced an interesting Star Article by Louise Brown titled The fine art of (not) lecturing. In it Brown references criticisms of the typical lecture model used in post-secondary education by Nobel laureate Carl Wieman, leader of the $2 million-a-year Carl Wieman Science Education Initiative for improving science learning.

The article references some interesting points:

• people don't remember what they don't pay attention to
• short-term memory can only process four ideas at a time - reduce the load and stimulate the brain
• vigorous interaction – the guessing, answering and arguing and persuading – stimulates protein in the brain, which in turn helps anchor ideas into long-term memory
• we remember only those things we think have meaning at the time, and ignore everything else (Ever re-read something months or years from the original read only to take away a whole new understanding? I certainly have.)
• we can remember only seven items at a time and can process only four ideas at once

Given the relative truth in these statements, and the old axiom in the facilitation world that "the brain falls asleep 2.8 seconds after your posterior does," I wonder why lecture based "training," with a typical talking head at the front of the room, is still often equated with effective learning. Why so many corporate communication, or "change management" programs focus on pushing information, presuming that once communicated, it will be consumed, understood, accepted and duly acted upon. And why groups often resist efforts to facilitate the interactivity necessary to generate mutual learning in support of problem solving and decision making into meetings and workshops.

If you at least notionally agree that knowledge is created through active learning in context, supported by quality, relevant content, then it is critical for the exchange / transfer of knowledge to be highly interactive, with active engagement by the learner in the process. Passivity is counter productive.

Sounds a bit like adult learning 101, doesn't it? At least it seems to be the common ground for collaboration between human resource management and knowledge management.

Another Spin on Management Innnovation

Interestingly, The Six Practices of High-Impact Nonprofits (a Fast Company excerpt from the book Forces for Good by authors Leslie R. Crutchfield and Heather McLeod Grant) contains remarkable similarities to the new management principles suggested in Gary Hamel's book The Future of Management.

Community of Practice Leadership

In my previous post, I mentioned new management principles suggested in Gary Hamel's book The Future of Management:

• variety, diversity, experimentation, depoliticizing / depolarization of decision making
• resource allocation flexibility through a market model
• enabling activism through democracy (devolution of accountability, distributed leadership, unalienable dissention rights)
• engagement and mobilization through meaning and common cause
• increasing the odds, and successful contribution, of serendipity

These are in stark contrast to the principles of "modern management," generally comprised of standardization, specialization of tasks and functions, goal alignment, hierarchy, planning and control, and extrinsic rewards. (Well summarized in Gary's book, page 151)

I'm currently working with the leadership team of a project management community of practice to enable them to grow the community and enrichen knowledge conversations and member learning and development. Many of the ideas and concepts in Gary's book have me thinking about what leadership really is in the context of a community of practice, and in turn, their relavence to the specific community I'm working with.

Much has been written about communities of practice (what they are & how they differ from task teams, how they work, value propositions, what the challenges are, nascent vs. seeded, etc.). Much of the writing talks about a variety of roles and responsibilities in the context of communities (e.g. facilitator, coordinator, information manager/librarian), and talks generally community leadership and its importance.

Gary has a very intreaguing reference in The Future of Management to some points from Mary Parker Follett's book, Creative Experience, first published in 1924:

• leadership is the capaticy to increase the sense of power amonng those being led, in essence to create more leaders
• difficult problems are best solved by creating "higher-order solutions" through the integration of diverse perspectives of all relavent stakeholders
• growth of organizations is maximized when the local communities within are effectively self-governed

Certainly visionary thinking for the time.

I'm not sure anyone has specifically, and with any great degree of depth, succintly explored the leadership dimension in communities as it has been explored more broadly in the context of business. At least, I haven't found it yet.

The questions that form in my mind are:

• What core principles (should) guide community leadership?
• What should effective community leaders do/act/practice to align with the core principles?
• What is community leadership and what makes it different than other forms or contexts of leadership?
• What are the key leadership processes in communities and how are/should they be shared across a leadership team?
• How can visibility, horizontality, transparency, inclusivity be woven into community leadership, while maintaining or increasing leadership effectiveness?
• How should community leadership be rewarded/recognized in the context of organizational hierarchy?

As I explore some of these questions with the help of colleagues and experts, I'll share emerging ideas here.

Web 2.0 and the Future of Management

Jim Lee at APQC has recently posted a blog entry titled Et tu, web 2.0? In it he reviews a number of Web 2.0 technologies and rates their usefulness in the context of his own impressions, needs and contexts. At the end of the post, he asks Gen Y'ers to share their experience with Web 2.0 stuff. (Which is why I'm commenting here and not on his blog.. I'm a bit "long in the tooth" to qualify as a Gen Y'er.)

Jim has been exploring the use/usefulness of Web 2.0 technologies for a while, even questioning the value of his APQC blog. I think his questions are in line with what many of us are considering when looking at Web 2.0 in the context of business value and purpose.

I picked up on a couple of interesting themes in his blog;

• the value of Web 2.0 tools if you're on the road almost 100% of the time
• some of the tools don't work for him , which it think is as much related to preferred learning style as anything else
• and most interestingly, he mentions "knowledge marketplace"

The last point really caught my attention, as I'm reading Gary Hamel's absolutely brilliant book (at least in my opinion), The Future of Management.

In the context of key trends and external forces that are affecting individuals and companies alike, requiring dramatically greater adaptability, Gary points to the shortcomings of the current management paradigm built on the core principles of standardization, specialization, hierarchy, alignment, planning and control, and influencing human behaviour using extrinsic rewards. He then suggests that the key is management innovation, which he defines as "anything that substantially alters the way in which the work of management is carried out, or significantly modifies customary organizational forms, and, by so doing, advances organizational goals."

He also suggests that adopting new principles is at the core of management innovation, and offers:

• variety, diversity, experimentation, depoliticizing / depolarization of decision making
• resource allocation flexibility through a market model
• enabling activism through democracy (devolution of accountability, distributed leadership, unalienable dissention rights)
• engagement and mobilization through meaning and common cause
• increasing the odds, and successful contribution, of serendipity

When I think of these, I see a role for Web 2.0 / social media in supporting and enabling management innovation. The effective integration of social media content, features, functions and capabilities (e.g. collaborating, creating, publishing, linking, sharing, commenting, reviewing, rating, aggregating, dis-intermediating, combining and re-combining) has the potential to enable a shift in management paradigm, to support the change from old to new, and provide the part of the support infrastructure for working in new and innovative ways.

BTW: James Gardner has an interesting view of Web 2.0 social media in his blog post titled "The New Divide: The workforce gap."

As well, McKinsey has published a management innovation related article titled Innovative Management: A Conversation with Gary Hamel and Lowell Bryan.

Can't Do KM Until You Get IM Right - Truth or Misconception

I've often seen an interesting perspective from a few information professionals in conversations about knowledge and information management. They sometimes categorize information management as the "hard stuff" and knowledge management as the "soft stuff." I've seen a few of them assert that you can't do the "soft stuff", often pointing at their heads, until you get the "hard stuff" right, pointing to or holding a piece of paper. (The implication there perhaps is that our heads are soft ? )

At first blush, that premise seems to make sense. In many respects good information is very important to creating and sharing knowledge; we are what we read (or don't), information about people's location, experiences and competencies can help us decide with whom to initiate a conversation.

There are couple of alternate perspective that are worth considering.

First, if you subscribe to the metaphor of the knowledge "iceberg," (where knowledge that is codifiable, or codified (information) is the tip of the iceberg above water, and the knowledge that is below the waterline is much larger, and is only accessible during exchanges between individuals), then does it really make sense to think of a linear progression from IM to KM? If, for example, you attribute 20% to what is above the water and 80% to what is below, then you have to ask if devoting 100% of your resources for %20 of your value/potential is a good decision?

And secondly, if you consider "IM" to include developing principle based policies, developing information standards /guidelines / practices, capacity building across a diverse community, generating awareness and encourage compliance & use, you probably know that none of these are possible without working collaboratively with colleagues and stakeholders across multiple perspectives and disciplines. This requires negotiating and agreeing on common objectives and outcomes, the process for achieving them, sharing information and knowledge through the collaborative process to enable effective/efficient teamwork, and sharing in the risks / rewards.

To me, that sounds a lot like knowledge management, which is as much or more about "how" people work, than what they do. So it would seem that you can't do much of IM without using KM approaches to accomplish IM objectives.

So, should you start and finish IM, working on the "hard stuff," before you do the "soft" KM stuff? I'm not so sure.

Group Discussion: A Business Case for Social Network Analysis

Last week I attended the September meeting of the Canadian Conference Board Knowledge Strategy Exchange Network, of which I'm a member and on the Advisory Group.

(Dave Pollard also attended and has a very good write up on his blog titled Introducing Social Networking Tools and Social Networking Analysis to Business: What To Do, which captures some information from those discussions, and a breakout session he conducted.)

(For anyone involved in formulating / implementing strategies and programs involving management of knowledge and information, you should seriously consider joining.)

After presentations and discussions with Patti Anklam and Ted Graham about Social Network Analysis, one of the group discussions was around "How do you build a "jargon-free" business case that will lead to a meaningful project and a valuable outcome."

To set the context for the business case we talked about a number of the cultural and contextual challenges that, in some combination, many public and private sector organizations face:

• acknowledged difficulties across the organization managing workloads, information "assault"


• many long serving employees, strong relationships, long memories, tendency to be more polite/collegial with each other than candid


• shifting demographics as "boomers" retire


• highly regulated environment, subject to a variety of legislation that governs requirements record keeping - e.g. e-discovery, duty to document, access to information


• moderate to high risk aversion, tendency for perfectionism rather than "good enough"


• deep social networks, highly leveraged to get work done, yet often taken for granted


• some degree of "command and control" / hierarchical management culture where subject matter experts have risen through the ranks


• multiple "stove pipes"


• difficulty recognizing / rewarding horizontal collaboration


• many other initiatives competing for scarce attention


• multiple major sub-cultures such as research or R&D / operations / corporate administration (HR/FIN/Audit/Communications / IT etc.)

After two modified "world cafe"-type discussions, I summarize the key learnings as follows:

1. Go "deeper" than broad - target a specific group or 'stove pipe' rather than position SNA at a broad or strategic context



2. "Dance with a willing partner" - see if anyone understands the value of social networks and is interested in exploring them. Look first at the part of the organization that is perceived as most critical / important / visible at the time - someone in our session humorously described this as "suck up to power."


3. Pick articulated pain - find out where needs and issues exist rather than trying to create them, and look to key organizational issues like retiring "boomers", identified collaboration issues etc.


4. Need Proof Points - that the value of SNA has to be proven, which could mean an effective internal pilot, and / or bringing in external case studies


5. Connect the initiative to Risk - financial, operational, reputational


6. Think of SNA as a diagnosis tool - a means to an end and not an end in itself. Position it as part of an approach in a business case, and don't try to build a case for the SNA itself.


7. Look at SNA as not just a vehicle to uncover hidden experts, but also to expose informal leadership, hidden roles, influence, strength of connections, informal communities etc.


8. Look at connecting / blending SNA with an engaging HR strategy e.g. "rapid onboarding", workforce planning, talent development


9. Work with whoever is talking to the Board as a way of adding value to tackling real business issues with SNA


10. Use models and scenarios when communicating with engineers, R&D, economists etc.


11. Expose your own personal social network so you can identify weakness relative to exposing / promoting the use of SNA as an effective management tool


12. Expose the value of "net work" to the organization in the context of key organizational processes and deliverables

When I step back a bit, I think the most important things that the presentations & discussions reinforced were:

• SNA is definitely rooted in the people side of KM - who we are and how we work


• analyzing the results of the analysis in the actual business context is critical


• SNA shouldn't really be done without a strong collaborative partnership with HR who can play a significant role in making sense of the analysis and working with clients on action planning, and of course who will provide some of the data on turnover rates, retirements etc.


• don't try and sell SNA - it's a tool / approach that should be part of a bigger business project

Interesting trend in retailing customer interaction

This has nothing to do with knowledge management.. I think.

Something I've been noticing of late (which doesn't mean it has not been happening for a while) is the following interaction at a retail store:

You go up to, let's say a coffee counter. You order a coffee, are given the product, and informed of the amount due. Let's say the amount due is $3.57. So you had over a $5 or a $10 bill. The person behind the counter gives you your change, to which you respond "thank you," and you receive a pleasant "you're welcome" in return.

It strikes me that in this exchange, as a customer, you are never thanked for your business, but, instead, thank the clerk for giving you back what is yours in the first place.

Isn't this a bit backwards?

It makes even more precious those few situations where staff at retailers go out of their way to thank you for buying from them, or even coming into the store. Fortunate I do run into these occasionally, and it sure encourages the next visit.

Cognitive Barriers to Collaboration

I attended a management seminar earlier in the week, hosted by master storyteller Frank Rambeau, to verify the alignment of the seminar's core principles with those of collaboration and knowledge work (and fortunately they were), and of course, to reinforce, remind, and learn as well. It's hard to move ahead if you don't have the basics right, or if you unconsciously develop bad habits!

The workshop focused on the need for managers to create a highly collaborative, participative"climate" that encourages staff to contribute to business outcomes, and enables their staff to develop and succeed, as opposed to a mechanistic approach to directing and controlling actions and behaviours in simplistic, rather Pavlovian (or in some instances Machiavellian) ways. Some of the core competencies referenced were collaboration, facilitative leadership, and good communication based on empathetic listening. (Hey.. where did all that cheering come from!)

Much of the discussions was about what managers should do to create the right climate for knowledge work, and what they, or should I say "we", often do that gets in the way. We are all "our own worst enemies" at some time or other are we not, often acting in ways that defy all logic and overwhelming evidence to the contratry?

Have you ever wondered, after a particularly unproductive meeting or conversation, why people have difficulty working together / collaborating? Why people can hear / read the same thing and take away a different meaning? There are many reasons, but in the context of collaborative work, "cognitive biases" play a major role in disconnecting and derailing even the best of communications, information and knowledge sharing intentions.

What are cognitive biases? I generally define them as ways of thinking that, singly or in combination, are limiting, or inappropriate, for a given circumstance or context. (It may not be technically accurate, but it works for me.. )

As an example, the a common critique of having "having blinders on", can be linked to one of the cognitive biases called "anchoring", which is basically to use a past event, or a single piece of information, to make a decision, ignoring broader valid information.

Being told "we don't do it that way here" in the context of resisting change, can be associated to a "status quo bias".

Take someone who says, in reflecting on a recent event or outcome, "I knew that would happen all along!" If they didn't / couldn't have predicted the outcome in advance, yet tell themselves they did, they're likely exhibiting "hindsight bias."

When I look at a more extensive list of the various biases (for example http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases) I certainly wonder how we humans get anything done!

And that's only the start! Imagine what can happen when an individual unconsciously defaults to their "home" type of reasoning (e.g. deductive, inductive, abductive, fallacious) when a situation calls for a different one, or when conflicting types of reasoning implicitly held by participants collide in a meeting or conversation! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasoning)

For me, different ways of thinking and viewing the world represents a never ending challenge to collaboration, but also a never ending wealth of possibility and potential.

Courage of Constructive Candor

In his exploration of facilitation, and facilitative leadership, Roger Schwartz describes and promotes what he calls a "mutual learning model", adapted from work by some acknowledged thought leaders in learning. This learning model can also form the foundation of good collaboration, as Schwartz presents in his article titled Using the Facilitative Leader Approach to Create an Organizational Culture of Collaboration, which he currently makes available on his web site.
When you examine the model, even superficially, there are some interesting elements (e.g. free & informed choice, share all relevant information, discuss the undiscussables) that point to the need for something I call "constructive candor."
It is very hard to collaborate effectively unless everyone involved speaks their mind - but in a way that is productive, contextual, and leads to the agreed upon outcomes.
If you've heard people ask "May I be brutally honest?" - that is not what I'm referring to. Someone being brutally honest is often commenting on something unrelated or overly tangential to the shared objectives, promoting their own agenda, or not willing to take a few minutes and be "un-brutal".
On the other end of the spectrum are people who are not candid at all for a number of reasons, ranging from: fear of repercussions or consequences - often unknown or unpredictable; being ill equipped to respond to a reciprocal challenge or tirade; appearing incompetent in front of colleagues, subordinates, or supervisors; wishing not to disclose a personal agenda (or failure).
Have you ever been to a "collegial" meeting with a number of well meaning people who have wide ranging pleasant, conversations, accomplished nothing, only to immediately launch into a series of one-on-one and small group bilateral conversations about the same topic? I would say there is not a lot of constructive candor going on, nor a lot of collaboration.
Constructive candor takes courage. The courage to do it, because it has significant payoffs in collaborative work. The courage learn and practice doing it, in particular for those who feel it's "not in their makeup." The courage to be persistent at it, since falling back into old habits is all too easy. The courage to live with the personal consequences of candor, which often are not so bad if it's truly constructive.
The bottom line is that if candor is constructive, it generally benefits people, and people certainly don't mind being benefited.

The "Ways" of Management in a Knowledge Work Environment

I had the pleasure of working with some very talented, collaborative colleagues in a management consultant practice a few years ago, (Ron Wiens, Tania Carriere, Brian Kelly, Jen Hunter et al). As I reflect back on our work together, it occurs to me now, as it did then, that their practical thinking about management and leadership was ahead of their time in many ways.

One of the key principles / quotes heard often in conversations with clients, and used often in workshop materials was, and I hope I remember this right:

"Releasing the will and talents of others is the essence of leadership. Today's knowledge workers do not want to be managed; they want to be led. They want the opportunity to make a meaningful contribution."

I think if you look at successful knowledge-based organizations, managers at all levels understand this and act accordingly.

They let others "hold the pen." They encourage productive / learning oriented experiments, and yes, mistakes. They understand that work is no longer production-oriented where the number of quality "things" produced is what is rewarded and compensated. They understand that "knowledge work" occurs fundamentally in people's heads, is essentially unobservable, but is greatly dependant on access to quality information and by the effectiveness of how people work together. They are sensitive to the fact that employees are not "things" to be accounted for and moved like chess pieces, but are complex individuals with varying perspectives, priorities, strengths and weaknesses, and lives outside work that are often, uncontrollably, in conflict with it.

If I can summarize what I think effective management is in a knowledge based organization ...

Point the "way", remove barriers that are in the "way", encourage progress along the "way", and get the hell out of the "way".

A "storyteller's" view of storytelling

Not long ago, I was talking to friend, "master storyteller" (at least in my mind), former newspaper columnist and published author - I'll call him "Dave" to guard his privacy.

I asked him: "Dave... narrative and storytelling are emerging as a key business strategy for knowledge exchange / transfer in a corporate setting, particularly in light of retiring boomers.
What do you consider to be elements of a good narrative/story for that purpose?"

And "Dave" responded with:

" ... depends on the intent. What is the objective? In any event, most important elements are brevity and humour.

There's an old storyteller theatre in the back of one of the stores in a local village. It still has the gaslights in place. It's small. It's used for storage now but I think it would have held about 40 people. When storytellers like Mark Twain and Will Rodgers ruled the entertainment scene, small towns had small theatres for the less famous. I looked at that old theatre and wondered if that market could be refired. I'm quite busy as a guest speaker, but that in effect is nothing more than a storyteller. (What keeps me busy is probably the fact I don't charge.)

Admittedly, my thoughts have been strictly entertainment. Stand-up comedy has become the only form of non musical entertainment to survive television. They make people laugh.

Laughter is only one end of the emotional scale. People can be made to cry, and like it. How many times have you watched people coming out of a movie wiping their eyes and gasping about a wonderful film? It gave them an emotional hit, and that's what people want. Currently it's unidirectional. "

"Dave" the recounted personal experience with a master storyteller..

"Bill Cosby is probably today's best storyteller. He comes out on stage and the only props are a lamp and a chair. He sits down and holds his audience for up to three hours. He makes them laugh. He makes them cry.

I caught his show after his son was murdered in California. He cried while he talked about that event. So did the audience. There was rousing applause after that segment. Then he switched to humour, and now that he had our emotional strings taut and twanging, he played them like a master.

George Chuvalo is a helluva storyteller. His kids died from overdoses, his career has been ups and downs, he's articulate and he's funny. But he's not marketable for television, so he doesn't get heard. What I see happening someday is people will wise up to the television trap, and return to the idea of getting out of the house and seeking entertainment that isn't on such a grand and manipulated scale."

"Dave" also suggests that ...

"Electronic communications have destroyed our ability to communicate. Very little is face-to-face and immediate. Businesses use voicemail and email as a shield. Television has succeeded in making the unreal believable.

As for using storytelling as a teaching tool, I've long believed the idea of teaching has become a commercial success, and the other end of the spectrum - learning - has been downplayed. The former makes money. The latter doesn't. "

So, it would appear that elements of a good story include: brevity, purpose, and, generally something that evokes some form of emotion.

(By the way, for some outstanding reading and engaging human interest stories, consider"The Best of Brown - Window on Ottawa" by Dave Brown, a selection of his over 10,000 newspaper columns.)

How Knowledge Management is like Golf

• the "sweet spot" though obvious, is often illusive
• it's not all about technology, though it helps
• upgrade opportunities abound
• it's not enough to look good doing it
• collaboration is required across multiple systems and disciplines
• though you may be able to see the goal, the hazards are always in play
• there are many tools to choose from - the challenge is picking the right one, and using it effectively
• there are many ways to get to the outcome, which is often different depending on who you talk to
• everyone has advice to offer
• it is both humbling and educational to see the "pros" do it
• anyone can do it right once, often by accident, but there is only a very small portion of the players who do it right consistently
• opinions and perspectives abound
• there are tons of books and articles on the subject
• not everyone can see the value in playing
• no two courses (organizations) are alike

... anyone have any other pithy ideas?

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.)

Dead Staff Walking

Sorry for the movie-related play on words, but I noticed something rather sad the other day.. at least my interpretation of it.

I was standing outside an office building, just doing a bit of typical people watching, and noticed a fairly high number of people with a number of common characteristics – typically over 40 years old, a bit pale, sad or somewhat blank looks on their faces, and judging by their posture, body language and walk, appeared to be very world-weary.

I know, we’ve all had “those” days/weeks/months where you’re dealing with work-related issues, personal ones, or both, and the stress and weight of them continually bears down on your shoulders. But what I saw seemed to be more than that. I think I was witnessing the severely “disengaged employee.” (I’ve seen some disturbing statistics recently on the degree of disengagement in the workplace)

In the context of knowledge management and the retiring generation of “boomers” this disengagement presents a significant hurdle to overcome. Not only will the disengaged employees be reluctant to participate and contribute to any knowledge related initiatives, but the “receiver” of this knowledge, let's say Generation X/Y, will not be overly inclined to spend time with these individuals. And this becomes a particularly critical issue when the knowledge the individual possesses is important to the ongoing business of the organization.

Of course it is impossible to diagnose the cause of the disengagement I assumed I observed in this instance, but the odds are pretty good it’s got something to do with one of:

• longing for the “good old days” (we all do that to some extent, right?)
• a perceived ineffective manager
• a job with no learning / growth opportunities, or a pure lack of interest in the work and context
• a job that lacks challenge, or is overly (or perhaps mind numbingly) repetitive
  disillusionment with the organization’s (treatment of friends and colleagues
• learned helplessness or a lack of sense of control over even a small degree of personal destiny
• a lack of direction, or understanding of if and how personal work fits into the big picture
  difficulty coping with stress and pressures of work
• being all too frequently subjected to micro management
• being implicitly and explicitly told that their opinions / contributions don't matter

Re-engaging disengaged employees is certainly a looming if not current management challenge.

So, how is re-engagement accomplished? Certainly not by proclamation of “thou shalt be engaged!”. And certainly not by some degree of implicit or explicit punitive measures – that will at best result in compliance. Old style command and control approaches will not work. Engagement, like knowledge, can only be volunteered not conscripted.

Things that managers can do to improve engagement include:

• explicitly and systematically improving the processes people use to work together at problem solving and decision making
• making explicit and rewarding the key enabling behaviours that align with effective work processes, and coach staff and colleagues in learning about and engaging in those behaviors
• ensuring everyone is accountable equally for both business results, their impact on others, and contributions to the success of colleagues
• increasing the degree of staff participate in identifying and resolving key business and organizational issues, and recognize / reward the participation
• “tell less”, ask more questions and listen closely to the answers
• make it clear in every circumstance who “owns” decisions, how they will be made
• being tolerant of (or even encouraging) faults / failures that result (or have the potential to result) in important learning
• encourage productive candor, full disclosure of all relevant information, and transparency of motives, reasoning and rationale
• ensuring business direction and course corrections are clear, well communicated and transparent in rationale
• effectively coaching staff so that they can see and achieve the positive / potential in themselves and in their work situations
• providing effective "feed forward" that focuses on learning and growth for the future
• leading by example
  
  

Forget "Just The Facts"- Gimme the Knowledge!

I recently came across reference to a famous line from Sgt. Joe Friday on the 1950s series Dragnet, typically used when he was interrogating people. "I Just Want Facts 'Mam, Just the Facts" (or something like it) .

Many of us are preoccupied with information and data - facts and figures, dates, numbers, financial results, lists of accomplishments and that's all good but what about the "knowledge" behind it? The rationale, the thinking approaches, considerations etc. - the stuff more easily shared in conversation and stories, and rarely if ever captured.

I was reviewing my notes from Richard McDermott's KMWorld 2006 presentation, in which he shared some interesting perspectives and some good practical ideas on sharing deep knowledge and expertise.

He broke down knowledge into three types:

• Specific knowledge of systems, tools, clients, structures, contacts etc. - useful but degrades over time. Experts build this knowledge through intimacy over time.
• Analytic knowledge, gained through sensemaking of experiences - guidelines, processes, cookbooks - in essence "scaffolding" through which to understand the knowledge domain
• Intuitive expertise - the ability to handle situations, exceptions and quickly improvise in real time

He elaborated a bit on defining expertise as the intuitive ability to use experience to solve problems. It is embedded in experience and doesn't use decision trees or pros/cons - experts can't often describe how they know. When faced with a situation, experts size it up, intuitively applying various models and looking for clues - then they identify possible actions, go through a mental rehearsal, and examining potential outcomes - then they take action (sounds a bit like a good chess player, doesn't it?) .

And offered suggestions for transfer in for each of the types:

• To transfer specific knowledge, organize files, add metadata where useful, make existing knowledge more accessible
• To transfer analytic knowledge, articulate basic work processes, develop guidelines, decision frameworks etc. which will help people think.
• To transfer intuitive expertise, unearth how experts see the world and how they think

Richard suggested that one of the best ways to transfer expertise is through a "true master class", where the learners present their problems/ dilemmas, and think aloud about them - the expert listens and also thinks aloud - questions back and fourth draw out experts' lived experiences and allow learners to draw on them and build their own.

He reinforces that to build expertise, practice is critical. Learning through practice can include master classes, visiting masters coach on projects, collective reflection on different ways to approach a situation, simulations, serious games, cases and mini-cases.

If you'd like a simple experiment to try the "master class" approach, here is a simple "judgement-laden" example that I've tried with some very good success and feedback - improving fair and equitable application of managerial discretion in the context of corporate / business policy.

Many policies in a corporate environment are fairly straight forward and prescriptive, often based on legislation. Others are far more open to interpretation.

1) Bring together three groups in to a room

• the key policy makers / "owners" who are intimately familiar with the policy, the policy framework and rationale, organization context, and likely awareness of how the policy is being regarded and applied across the organization
• experienced mangers, who have much experience, good and bad, in the interpretation / application of the policy
• a full spectrum of less experienced and new managers (from inside our outside the organization) with varying degrees of experience with the policy, and a need to learn more

2) Compile and present a number of real-world scenarios and examples, in a succession of increasing complexity.

3) Have mixed break out groups consider each scenario and come up with a group decision on the application of policy discretion.

4) Have each group present their decisions (facts), and most importantly, also have them also share and elaborate:

• their thinking approach / process and why they used the approach
• considerations and non-considerations and why they were such
• contextual factors and external forces and why they were considered "in play"
• assumptions and what they thought were facts in evidence
• commonalities/convergence and conflicts/divergence during the group discussions

This is the "knowledge", or as Richard describes it, the "intuitive expertise." This simple approach exposes the experts viewpoint and thinking process in an interactive, dialogic way in the context of a meaningful issue / problem (or reasonable facsimile of one).

Final notes ..

I understand from Richard that he is working on an article based on the concepts from his KMWorld 2006 presentation. Watch out for it, it will be a good one.

And I see a strong synergy with the four quadrant model that Tom Davenport articulates in his book Thinking for a Living, and the concepts in Dorothy Leonard's book Deep Smarts.