Adventures in Knowledge

Facilitating Knowledge Transfer and Retention in the Modern Workplace

I have just returned from making two presentations and participating in the Ark Group conference - "Facilitating Knowledge Transfer and Retention in the Modern Workplace". I made two presentations that are available on Slideshare:

Shift happens: how to share knowledge in a network centric world

Knowledge transitions: using narrative to understand the issues of attracting and retaining volunteers

This certainly was an enjoyable conference with active discussion and participation from attendees. What was encouraging was the discussion being based around people and connection. It seems that as knowledge professionals we have an important role to play in talent attraction and retention - in fact the alignment between HR and knowledge sharing is becoming even more important and valuable to the business. It was encouraging to see communities and collaboration being a key theme of the conference.

Do you RSS?

Coming into the new year of 2008, I still am amazed at the number of people who do not know about RSS or indeed know what it is, yet have failed to utilise it.

I wish my organisation was more proactive in using RSS, but it still does not seem to be on the radar screen of the IT department, despite the fact that Enterprise licenses for RSS are cheap!

Could the uptake and adoption of Web 2.0 be greater if people used RSS and were exposed to the benefits it provides? My view is a resounding YES.

Looking back to when I first took my first baby steps in using RSS, a whole new world opened up to me - the conversations I could now participate in amazed me, and indeed encouraged me to start blogging. Today, I do not know how I could survive without access to RSS feeds - it simplifies and amplifies my world at the same time. Conversations have allowed me to connect - RSS extends my reach and also provides a tapestry of rich rewards.

I wonder how much more connected people could be if they took a small step into Web 2.0 through RSS...

What's up with collaboration?

I don't know about you, but I have seen an huge increase in discussion around collaboration in the last month. Initially I thought that maybe this was me re-framing my thought processes, but my RSS feeds keep bringing up more discussion on collaboration. Interestingly, these discussions have not focused on collaboration tools, but rather on the people aspects of collaboration and the absence of vendor led discussions has also been noticed!

Recently, I have been dedicating a lot more of my thinking around the move to a networked world, and what is refreshing is that collaboration is a key aspect of this fundamental shift that is now occurring. But we are talking about collaboration not only face to face but also in a distributed framework, where teams are not co-located but can be located globally. Some are calling this Collaboration 2.0 which in reality is the focus shift from technology being the solution to an enabler for people to collaborate.

What I did find interesting is how collaboration can be regarded as one of the catalysts underpinning the four drivers I have previously mentioned that are moving us into a networked world:

Web 2.0 - it is people's desire to communicate and collaborate that has driven the development of Web 2.0 tools, rather than technology for technologies sake. So in utilising these tools, I believe people are now beginning to ask how they can truly collaborate. Rather than having some technology thrust upon them and being told "here you go - no excuse not to collaborate" people are selecting tools and processes that more closely fit their needs around collaboration.

The Rise of the Participation Culture - the new generation just beginning to come into the workforce are intuitively collaborating as this is the way they have always interacted and got what they wanted. The challenge now is how to collaborate in groups that span a multi-generational divide

Changing Business Models - the move to greater transparency, co-opetition, peer-to-peer networks etc are constantly challenging the traditional command and control structures. Connection across company and even industry boundaries is driving new ways to innovate. Central to this is how to effectively collaborate in these networks.

Shift back towards community - a desire to more effectively contribute to participate in the community also requires effective collaboration both at an individual and group level. If anything the challenge is for people to understand how to sharpen their listening skills!

However, I also see lots of organisations and businesses who do not have a clue about the change that is occurring around them. It almost seems that we are on the cusp of a "phase transition" i.e from water to ice  -  unless you recognise the fundamental shift that is going to happen, your chances of adapting to a changing environment are significantly less.

Eight business technology trends to watch

Happy New Year!

I have been remiss in my absence from posting over the holiday season. However, it was quite refreshing to turn off the computer and take a total break. I know 2008 is going to be an interesting and busy year, so now I am refreshed and ready to get back into it.

In a recent scan of RSS feeds, I came across an interesting article in the McKinsey Quarterly, discussing Eight business technology trends to watch in 2008. They are:

1. Distributing cocreation
2. Using consumers as innovators
3. Tapping into a world of talent
4. Extracting more value from interactions
5. Expanding the frontiers of automation
6. Unbundling production from delivery
7. Putting more science into management
8. Making businesses from information

If you have read Wikinomics, you would probably be familiar with a lot of the thoughts and views expressed here. However, what is good to note, is that when they get into a McKinsey type publication, then you know that there are more mainstream (read traditional) businesses beginning to think about their implications and how to proactively captialising upon the change that is happening now.

What does the Future of Management look like to you?

I have just been rereading a post by Gary Hamel on his blog Management 2.0 called "What does the Future of Management look like to you?". He asked a question a while ago:

Looking twenty years out into the future, what one characteristic—principle, practice, or structural feature—of the “modern” industrial organization will appear to be the most antiquated or anachronistic?

It is interesting to see some of the responses he has received to that question. Whilst the responses are made with the frame of Management, the views and observations equally apply to organisations holistically and reflect the rise in importance of Social Capital and the demise of "command and control" structures that is even occurring today.

I previously have covered the move to a networked world and we are seeing more organisations start to consider what this means for them. More importantly it is also revealing that there is no one right answer / solution to the impact this will have. This says to me that we need to embrace the complex world in which we live, acknowledge that we don't know the answers and look to understand the present in order to influence our future direction. We need to make sense of our environment today if we are to be successful tomorrow.

Will this make sense and resonate with a lot of people today? Probably not, but I am willing to wager that as change remains the only constant and the goal posts shift even faster, the organisations that thrive will have made this shift in mindset.

Change this.....

I recently came across a site in my web travels called "ChangeThis". I found the content presented in a range of formats to be refreshing both in the viewpoints presented and the way in which they are tabled. I always am willing to view different perspectives with an open mind as it broadens the way I think and injects new thoughts.

ChangeThis is creating a new kind of media. A form of media that uses existing tools (like PDFs, blogs and the web) to challenge the way ideas are created and spread. The authors state that they are on a mission to spread important ideas and change minds. In the same vein as TED they are certainly on an exciting journey.

I encourage you to have a look!

What is your conversation strategy?

This is a question that I typically pose to people when discussing what is a relevant frame for Knowledge Management. What I am trying to do is to take out all the complexity and jargon that is sewn into "KM speak" today. The essence I am trying to get to is that we are looking for the context around information that exists in our many "knowledge repositories" in order to distil the knowledge that exists. To do that means that we must connect, and the easiest way to do so is through conversation, be it face to face, phone, teleconference, blog, wiki or any other medium.

I have just finished participating in a three day KM conference for my organisation. It was interesting to see the tension building between a content versus a context focus. Yes it was acknowledged that both were necessary, but the willingness to step up and shift the focus towards connecting our people was fraught with inertia. Comments such as my day job is 100% commited to content - how do you expect me to do more, the organisation politics will not allow us to make a difference in connecting people any day soon, we are like an oil tanker, it will take years not months to shift our focus were not uncommon. I must also admit to being very open and forthright about my views on this which was an attempt to at least polarise the debate. Over a few drinks in the bar I was told that I was on one extreme end of the spectrum i.e. connecting people and others were at the other end with a myopic focus on content and that we needed to end up somewhere in the middle. Whilst I don't disagree, the issue from my perspective is that change is happening so rapidly, that the window of opportunity to get up the learning curve and be innovative is rapidly closing. We need to develop a "safe-fail" not "fail-safe" environment in which we can conduct experiments with our people and see what works in our culture i.e. use of wikis, blogs, social networks etc. What did encourage me though, was the number of people who saw the opportunities to discuss these types of issues as extremely valuable. Feedback was that more informal time for connecting would be useful in future meetings. A number of conversations focusing on this tension between content and context have commenced and I sincerely hope that they will continue now that everyone has gone back to their day jobs.

Well I have now moved onto India for some local KM meetings. I only just got used to the Philadelphia time zone and now I am having to readjust again as I am blogging at 4.30am....

Interesting who you meet - on a plane

I am always amazed by the interesting people you meet on planes. On the Sydney to Auckland leg of my current trip, I struck up a conversation with "Bob from Austin". Bob has retired and is spending his time seeing the world. A quiet spoken gentleman, but one with a wealth of knowledge and insight. We spent three hours talking about the world, how complex it is getting and about my view of a networked world. Bob certainly was well read and indeed versed in Web 2.0. What I found rewarding from this conversation was to see a gentleman who had seen major change in his lifetime able to provide perspectives I had not considered and indeed add new trains of thought to my thinking. One "gem" that I picked up was in our discussion about narrative and story telling. Bob is greatly concerned about the the use of narrative by the media as a thinly veiled way to project the opinion of certain interest groups. He rightly pointed out that narrative is only as good as the experiences being shared. Many people are more willing to provide their opinion rather than tell a story about an experience which will significantly skew interpretation.

Well three hours certainly flew by (pardon the pun). I am looking forward to seeing if there are any other interesting characters to be met in my travels - I will let you know!

Profound Knowledge in an Networked World

I just came a cross a posting in Value Networks by Jay Deragon titled "Profound Knowledge in a Networked World" His opening paragraph:

"The Relationship Economy will require transformation of knowledge, management, media, technology and individual participation.The prevailing cultures that are driving all business must undergo transformation.  The "system" of relationship networks can not understand itself. The transformation to the Relationship Economy requires a view from outside."

certainly has struck a chord with me, as this is the fundamental idea that I have been putting foward in our move to a networked world. Jay goes onto talk about the transformation of the individual as part of a "profound knowledge of the networked world". When reading how he sees an individual being transformed, it certainly mirrored a lot of my experience in changing the way I looked at knowledge in a networked world. Also, in talking about the relationship economy, once again People are at the centre - not technology.

On another note, I will be taking a "short break" from blogging for the next two weeks as I venture to New Zealand for some skiing - hopefully the gods will be kind and bring some healthy snow showers in the coming week!

On the Road.....

It's been a little while since my last decent post - life's been rather hectic since KM Australia! I just have been on a whirlwind visit to Hong Kong and Kuala Lumpur which has put me out of contact more often than not.

I previously mentioned an ONA project that I was doing for an organisation in China. Since then I have been invited to talk about ONA and how Enterprise 2.0 can be used for collaboration, at their annual conference in September where all senior execs from across the country attend. This certainly continues to validate my belief in organisations becoming more network centric. I will post the presentation on slideshare if I can get permission.

On anther note, I have recently been involved in a Cognitive-Edge project called "The Future of Volunteering" where we are looking to uncover the drivers of people volunteering, the policy implications of such and provide recommendations to government. This is a milestone project in that it will be the first time that the Cognitive Edge tools and processes have been applied to explore an issue of critical public policy. We will be using the Cognitive Edge Sensemaker suite as part of the process. I intend to blog more on this as we get further into the programme of activities. This is a really exciting project to be involved in!

Finally :) I will be speaking at a conference Public Relations Summit 2007 in Melbourne (21/22 August) with the MD of Dow Jones Asia - Bruce Macfarlane. The topic we are talking on is The rise of "Turbo Capitalism" and the impact on decision making. This should be an interesting presentation as it really is focussing on the implications for decison making by changes in the way information and knowledge transfer is occuring today. We are intending to make this more of a discussion between us, and try to involve the audience in the discussion.