Nick Bontis and Alexander Serenko have recently authored A follow-up ranking of academic journals that identifies Journal of Knowledge Management as the top ranked knowledge management and intellectual capital academic journal. This is a follow- up to their earlier Global ranking of knowledge management
and intellectual capital academic journals.
I was just reading Leon Benjamin's KnowledgeBoard article titled Social media on the inside in which he writes about the transformative nature of social media platforms, the value of "flat" communities and networks as structures for building and maintaining intangible assets and getting work done, and the conflicts between these and traditional management approaches - a good, pithy article.
One phrase in Leon's article jumped out at me - "markets are conversations."
In 2002 I was fortunate to have had a number of great conversations about knowledge management with Leigh Weiss and Tim Shavers from McKinsey. Many of the conversations revolved around the concept and applicability of a market model for knowledge. This concept was succinctly described in Making a Market in Knowledge written by Lowell Bryan, McKinsey Quarterly 2004.
In a preamble to describing the concept, Bryan explores a number of "KM" approaches that have failed to generate the required returns, including:
I just stumbled across an interesting website created by IDEO called Patterns. For those few who don't know, IDEO is widely known as a permier design and innovation company, thanks in large part to articles in BusinessWeek (2004), Harvard Business Review, and a 60 Minutes segment, now available on YouTube.
IDEO has an interesting premise for their Patterns site:
"PATTERNS are how we capture and share some of the common insights we see bubbling up across projects, as well as out and about in the world. They are a foundation for intuition. A way to elevate insights to the level of cultural impact. And a way to tap into IDEO’s collective intelligence to do better work for our clients—even faster."
Their current issue/topic, titled Designing for Life's Changes, has good succinct stories about change, and a plain-English 5 step action framework. This along with their past
I wonder what process they use to identify, discuss, decide and capture the insights and stories that they expose on their site - it could be very useful in other settings when the importance of understanding overall trends and patterns is made extremely difficult by busy schedules and siloed work.
Blogger, Facebook, Twitter, Wordpress, PBWiki, Slideshare, Delicious, LibraryThing, Trumba, Google Apps, Zoho etc. etc. etc. As sers of these and other similar systems on the internet we are all creating and sharing a significant amount of information in all forms that does not exist elsewhere. Much of this information has significant value to the creator, as well as the consumer.
What happens if it disappears?
We live in turbulent, complex times. Companies can easily come and go through bankruptcies, mergers and acquisitions, or off-shoring.
What happens to the content then?
Will it just be deleted?
Will it be organized differently and be difficult find and render past links unusable?
Will it be sold off to someone else?
Will the company acquiring the content be a data miner/aggregator?
Will the company acquiring the company / content be from a different country with different privacy legislation?
Will we have reputation management challenges if content is merged / combined and paints a different picture than we intended?
Will the company doing the acquiring maintain the system and data (As Yahoo has done with Flickr and Google with YouTube)?
If the content is important to us (even something as simple as a Delicous link to a reference that supports important research conclusions), or possibly "mission critical," how can we ensure continued access?
Should we PDF and save our blogs, comments, web links etc. on our local systems?
Should we create a time/date stamped index/diary of comments we've made on various blogs, LinkedIn discussion forums, Digg, Redit, Technocrati?
If we continue to use free, or even paid, services on the Internet, can we count on enduring content availability? Or are we all just creating fundamentally highly disposable information of no lasting value?
Thanks to strong recommendations from a number of colleagues, I've been reading Managing the Crowd - rethinking records management for the web 2.0 world by Steve Bailey. In the context of challenging traditional records management perspectives in the context of current / future trends in social collaboration technologies, he raises some very provacative points:
For a recent project management community of practice meeting I was asked to facilitate an "ice breaker" activity for the group. Having read and heard about some of the great work that Dave Snowden (Cognitive Edge), Patrick Lambe (Straights Knowledge/Green Chameleon), Shawn Callahan (Anecdote) and others are doing with narrative patterning, fables, archetype creation, I thought I'd facilitate a fun, short exercise to create a archetype of a project manager in the context of the community members' organization.
I certainly didn't follow any of the specific detailed processes as modeled by the experts above, given that I only had about 10-15 minutes on the agenda. I instead I simply:
Jeremy Dean at PsyBlog just posted on Social Loafing: When Groups Are Bad for Productivity as a first in a series about the psychology of groups. I'm looking forward to the series, and hope he somehow links the subject, even implicitly, to how people share knowledge and collaborate. In this most recent post, Jeremy makes some interesting points on the role of expectations, anonymity, standards and feelings of importance in group psychology.
Despite all the promise for more democratic, collaborative organizations predicted in much of the management literature today, stove pipes / silos still exist, often deeply ingrained in the fabric of corporate culture. Internal service groups (ISGs), such as human resources, IT, audit, communications, facilities, finance and so on genuinely look for ways to improve how they collaborate with their partners, but efforts often fall short. Pressures to focus on narrow departmental work group outcomes/objectives, affinities aligned with technical expertise, difficulty communicating due to lack of common language, mismatched workflow and planning processes, and vertical rather than horizontal / group rewards and recognition are only some of the barriers to effective internal service partnerships.
ISGs exist to enable business / management processes / practices, and support managers and staff in fulfiling their roles and responsibilities in these areas. But because of partnership and collaboration challenges across the service groups, staff and manager workloads are often added to rather than reduced, and the value ISGs deliver to their customers, and to each other as partners and customers, is less than desired.
There is a lot of good literature about stratetic planning processes, but there is one necessary element I would like to point out - the definition of "we."
It's no surprise that ISGs need to be part of the strategy development process, and not just recipients of the final strategy document, to have a clear understanding of where their customers are heading and why, along with current needs and challenges they face.
Each ISG does their best to be "at the planning table" and engage in strategic conversations with their customers. The challenge is that ISGs often compete for that valuable chair at the table. They compete for attention to sell their solutions and /or draw attention to services, for funding the projects that are sold and the services they deliver, for more attention during the projects and associated change management initiatives, and for validation of benefitis realization after the projects are complete.
Imagine, instead, redefining "we," how people refer to the group that they belong to / have affinity with, to be larger than their specific ISG or discipline.
Imagine, in over simplified terms, a planning process that looks a bit like this.
The ISGs assemble integrated / multi-discipline planning teams (an new "we") who participate directly in customer planning processes and workshops. The IGS team hears first hand about the trends / external forces the customers are considering, challenges and opportunities in the current state discussed, and strategic direction decided.
In the context of the workshops the cross-discipline ISG team has the opportunity of asking clarifying questions and building collective understanding of the customers' position - and of course everyone hears the question and participates in the ensuing discussion. The ISG team then works together as a group to create, test and position draft joined-up solutions in the workshops as part of the customers' strategic plan.
Then all the ISG teams come together with their leadership teams to form a larger "we" and blend their commitments and findings from the different workshops into a set of operational and strategic plans that establish clear linkages of collaboration, cooperation and partnership and joined-up accountability for management, acitivies, results and performance measures across the ISGs. (A colleague of mine calls this part "dukeing it out for the customer.")
In this approach, synergies of group work are leveraged in developing shared understanding and making common sense of the customers' views, developing innovative collaborative solutions and proposals, respecting customers' scarcity of time and attention, serving mutual customers efficiently and effectively through partnership based on process and practices and not lip-service, and making best use of available corporate funding.
Some organizations I know of are taking a participative/collaborative approach to internal service planning and delivery, and I'm sure there are lots more out there. With increasing complexity of the world we work in, I think that horizontal / collaborative sense-making, planning, delivery, reflection and action are the keys to ISG success.
I stumbled across a posting on Slaw.ca a couple of days ago that mentioned a ruling by the presiding judge in the trial of Ottawa, Canada mayor Larry O'Brien that enables reporters to report live using their electronic devices. Glen McGregor is doing so via http://www.twitter.com/obrientrial.
If you subscribe to McGregor's feed and follow his tweets when trial resumes on Tuesday May 19th, you'll get a surprisingly raw and detailed "play by play" despite the short length of the feeds. A great compliment to the more ... polished... pieces that appear in newspapers, web sites and on TV.
Meaningful content from a credible source on a (to some) relevant topic in a timely fashion to any number of "subscribers" - great application for Twitter.
(Note: if you happen to review McGregor's feeds before he begins posting again when the trial resumes, you'll see reference to "about X hours ago," which doesn't give you the sense of frequency of posts. During the actual trail he's posting every few minutes.)
Via Louis Suarez' KM blog, a great overview presentation about presence management in Facebook, along with some good personal info risk mitigation strategies.
Amazing photographs of what lies beyond our own frame of existence.
Awe inspiring, humbling, beautiful all at the same time.
http://www.cbc.ca/photogallery/technology/110/
So, this past weekend I was walking through a few neighbourhoods as I was giving my dog (and myself) an opportunity for some fresh air and to enjoy the spring sunshine. Of course springtime for more northern climates is about switching winter "stuff" for summer "stuff," cleaning out the "stuff" that's collected in your car(s) over the winter, and heading to the nearest outlet and picking up "stuff'" to put on your lawn. Throughout this flurry of activity on the weekend, many of my neighbours' garages were open to the elements - including my own.
An informal survey of about 100+ open garages (it was a long walk), including my own, uncovered that for every one garage that was neat, clean, organized, and practically empty, about 30 were disorganized, cluttered, and most often over filled with "stuff" - including my own.
The results of this informal survey prompted me to ask "why?" repeatedly to try and understand the cause of the accumulation of all this "stuff." (Thankfully there were no adults around to smack me for asking repeated 'whys'.)
Some possibilities:
At a recent Conference Board Knowledge Strategy Exchange Network meeting, I had the pleasure hearing Adwoa Buahene from nGen Performance talk about the mix of generations at work (Traditionalists, Boomers, Gen Xers, Gen Ys), and most importantly, provide some very practical ideas on how to deal with the key challenges and create a good work environment for all.
A few key "take-aways":
A recent AFP news article states: "Chelsy Davy, the former girlfriend of Prince Harry, has confirmed to friends reports of their split by changing her profile on her "Facebook" web page, British media reported on Monday."
Two questions crossed my mind; is leading a story with a Facebook status change good journalism, and the importance of good discussions across stakeholder groups on which social media functions to "turn on" inside the organization to enable productive conversations / collaboration, and which ones will interfere with or marginalize it.
I think one of the deepest divides and potential clashes between boomers and the millennials, in particular at the opposite ends of the spectrum, is/will be the use of technology - not only "Web 2.0", but even more basic tools. I've been overhearing a lot of informal hallway/elevator/shopping mall conversations recently where millennials are expressing their deep frustration at the "old folks" inability to use even basic tools like email.
Though personal computing history dates back to the late '70s / early '80s (depending on if your an Apple or IBM fan), as personal computers and networks replaced mainframes, or were a company's first experience with technology, not everyone embraced getting personal with their PC with the same degree of enthusiasm. For some people it was a necessary evil. For others it was a tool/task that was best avoided, or delegated.
Even today, over 25 years later, I personally know of people who refuse to touch a computer outside of work. They don't have a Blackberry / PDA, have no idea how to add phone numbers to their cell phone address book, and often ask someone else to do it for them. They've still got glue covering the time display of their VCR at home as a reminder of the tape that once covered the flashing 12:00 display. They ask someone else, often the dealer, to set the time display in their car.. Internet banking? They’ve only recently mastered the automated teller machine and still prefer to go to a real teller for even trivial banking transactions.
In the office, they have their administrative assistant print out their emails, and then write their responses for their assistant to re-key. They print documents they receive and comment on them with a pen as a matter of course not convenience. And they make no effort to use corporate information / document management applications, instead delegating the tasks to others.
Some people have a genuine phobia about using computers, and others have a genuine lack of skill. Understandable. But what I find astonishing is that some people speak of their lack of technology fluency/use as though it was perfectly acceptable, a point of pride.
I think that respect is an important element of good peer and manager/staff working relationships, and I think respect is equally important for all generations.
Millennials coming into the workforce will be far more critical of others’ lack of technology use/skills, and I suspect will not be particularly respectful of colleagues, direct managers or senior leaders if they are not competent with technology. In turn, the lack of respect will undermine working relationships and pose significant challenges in getting work done.
Arguably, time will solve the problem as more and more of the boomer generation retires. But until then, it could be a rough ride.
I recently attended a good environmental scan / overview presentation about what's happing "out there" in terms of information management, technology, and the internet. As I was listening to the speaker, my mind turned, somewhat uncharacteristically, to a "dark side" perspective. Many speakers / thought leaders extol the virtues/promise/potential about Web 2.0 and social technologies, but perhaps there really is a down side, or at least a few considerations for a more balanced view:
The rise of the opinionated - Emerging technologies gives a voice to all participants (yes, like me). But not every voice is worth hearing. And since these voices are manifested in an explosion of content in a wide variety of types and formats, determining best quality and value is a significant challenge.
The rise of aggregation vs. new and innovative thinking - We first heard about it in the context of students plagiarizing internet content for projects, but now it’s rampant. On the internet, content is so easy to find that there is a tendency to copy and re-use, often without citing sources, rather than create / innovate something new. Granted, re-use saves time and money, but not in all circumstances. Sometimes new and innovative approaches are required to solve problems created by status quo thinking.
The rise of aggregation and fall of awareness / access to original, authoritative sources - The technological capabilities to aggregate content, not to mention the broad re-purposing/re-use of content without attribution, makes it very difficult at times to identify the original, authoritative sources. True, content should be evaluated on its own merit, but often part of that evaluation requires context and source of origin.
Rise of the net evangelist - Over the last few years, the internet and Web 2.0 have been the new "cool thing" to talk about. As a result, there is no shortage of evangelists who are willing and able to take money and talk about the value of Web 2.0 and social technologies in a number of abstract, theoretical ways, or reflect retrospectively/summatively on experiences of organizations who've used some of these technologies to impact their business. Many of these evangelists miss an important point - social technologies are only useful if people use them. Crowd sourcing / wisdom of crowds only works if a crowd is participating. Most of the statistics I've seen around about participation in social technologies (e.g. How Do People Participate in Social Media), and my meagre personal experience online and with in-person groups, point to only a small percentage of any group actual participates. It's a little hard to get wisdom from a crowd when there is now crowd.
Rise (re-glorification) of the speaker not the listener – Early KM initiatives mistakenly focused on the information provider / creator and not the consumer / learner, evidenced in the many stories about unused “knowledge repositories.” Two camps seem to be emerging. I find much (thankfully not all) of the rhetoric around the promise and potential of emerging technologies seems to again focus on the provision / availability of content, and not the individual / group learning and collaboration that takes place, supported by the content. The underlying assumption is that people individually and groups will do the right / logical thing as a matter of course. A bit misguided perhaps?
I certainly agree with those who say that emerging social technologies for joint content authoring, networking, linking, sharing, commenting etc. present opportunities not previously possible in the organizational context. The real challenge from my view is how to deal with the many complexities associated with people – individuals or groups – in examining, choosing, and harnessing the opportunities to integrate social technologies to create productive work environments.
I was reading a John Tropea's Library Clips blog entry about My recent article on KM Review - When Two Worlds Collide and noticed that he had used a service called Scribd to put a copy of the actual KMReview article directly inline with the blog post. Interesting, I thought. (I'm wondering the value of this type of approach to providing easy access via blogs, wikis etc. to corporate documents in a document management system.)
But, what I wanted to point to is that once on the Scribd site with John's article on my screen, I scrolled through the Related Documents list and uncovered Belonging Networks, a 217 page document that explores the people and technology sides of implementing social networking inside organizations. Very interesting.
Belonging Networks Corporate Social Networking
The National Institute for Mental Health in England's definition of knowledge management:
Knowledge Management (KM) is the cultivation of an environment within which people want to share, learn and collaborate leading to individual, team and organisational improvement.
The first one I've come across with a primarily cultural focus.
In a recent news article titled We Told You So, author Dan Gardner writes about Robert Shiller's books (The Subprime Solution and Irrational Exuberance) and the author's accurate predictions of both the housing crisis and the tech crash. Gardner's article points to Shiller's positioning of two flaws in conventional economics thinking that was a major factor in both economic events (and the Dutch tulip mania of 1637 as it turns out):
Gardner also references the emergence of behavioural economics over the last 12 years or so, and coincidentally I just stumbled across a Tom Davenport article titled Voting for Behavioral Economics (And Against My Own Self-Interest) that references same.
I haven't ready any of the above mentioned books yet, but what I find fascinating in the article is the link between what is referenced as conventional economic theory, and traditional management thinking that leading management writers and thinkers like Gary Hamel and Henry Mintzberg are attempting to break away from - that the world, its systems, and people are predictable.
It would appear to be the contrary.
(PS: Mintzberg talks about the current economic situation as a A Crisis of Management not Economics, and states that "... everything was short-term and everybody is under pressure and everybody is meeting their targets for each short-term period and so they were not managing. It is a management problem from beginning to end, and I do not think this is a banking problem or a finance problem. "
