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I have talked about this at a number of conferences and it has recently started filtering into conversations with fellow practitioners.

The space of the conversation relate to the perspective of the subject matter expert, particularly in corporate functions within organisations, and the tendency for them to create what is considered best practice within their field in an organisation without understanding the impact it could have, without understanding the bigger picture.

I have seen it happen with IT, human resources, finance, facilities management, marketing & communications, information management and even knowledge management.

Here is an example of what I have witnessed.

 The recruiting function within the Human Resources department of a midsize organisation sets a standard for the recruitment process within the organisation. this process is based on best practice and is designed to minimise risk to the business in appointing the best candidate for the role. This process usually takes around two months from submitting the request to recruit to having someone start.

The business operates an office in Perth and is providing services into the booming Resource sector. Qualified people are hand to come by and expensive and in demand. Unless you are able to snap up a candidate quickly, someone else will.

The HR department default to the process minimising risk to the business. But even recruiting a reasonable candidate is better than not recruiting anyone at all.

What can be a quite complicated undertaking is over simplified and reduced to a process when an exercise in problem solving applying principles instead of process could provide a better outcome. Allow people to understand the risks and give them the resources to make decisions and hold them accountable for them.

It is something I am reminding information management professionals about at very opportunity. Here is an example.

What's missing?

Here we have a content lifecycle for web content that is a process. Can you see what is missing? Look again.

All right. This is where web content management can actually learn something from records management. In records management they consider the USE of the record to be very important (although sometimes lost in a compliance haze). No mention in this standard of when, how or why the content is used to generate value to the organisation or to the public.

Driven from an outcome perspective (completed process) as opposed to a value perspective. Is it a quantitative versus qualitative scenario?

More thoughts as I cogitate on the some more.

Cory

I recently returned from a trip to Johannesburg in South Africa to present at the Share 2012 conference (@share4business). The conference is focussed on the aspects of adoption of SharePoint platform to achieve business outcomes.

I had previously been involved on the review panel and presented at Share 2010 and 2011 in Sydney and was invited to share again at Share 2012 in Jo’burg. The conference will be featuring in April 2012 in Atlanta (best of luck!).

There were a number of highlights for the conference for me that I wanted to share:

1. The crew at Eventful really know how to produce a great conference.

Notice I didn’t say ‘run’ or ‘put on’, I used the word ‘produce’. That is because it was a production. From the early research undertaken through round-tables with practitioners to identify the key themes to focus on,  then review and selection of speakers to share their experiences, to the great atmosphere that was created by setting up a great venue with awesome lighting and AV with good food and ample socialising opportunities which really got people in the mood and sharing. They have a talented and highly capable team who deliver in spades. Well done guys and girls! I look forward to our next time together. (Steve & Greg: I will always treasure our quality conversations about the Pony…)

2. A great bunch of speakers.

I was honoured to have the opportunity to present with some wonderful people at this event. It was great to meet and socialise with the likes of Dux Raymond Sy (@meetdux), Paul Culmsee (@paulculmsee), Sarah Haase (@sarahhaase), Ruven Gotz (@ruveng),  Jan Skjøy (@janskjoy) and Veronique Palmer (@VeroniquePalmer).

3. An awesome group of practitioners

I thoroughly enjoyed the questions, conversations, discussions, debates and jokes with the great people out there trying to make a difference in their organisations by leveraging the SharePoint platform. Good luck on your journeys.

If you are interested in seeing what I shared at the conference, you can see copies of the presentations titled The Bigger Picture and Core Business,  and stay tuned for future posts going into more detail.

Thanks again for a great time in Jo’burg!!

Cory

At a recent KM Roundtable meeting in Melbourne, Michelle Lambert shared her experiences with using a Livescribe Pen.

Using the pen and special paper, you can record your notes and drawings visually and (if you desire) record the audio of conversation that is going on at the same time. These are then synchronised so you can come back to a point in your notes and replay the audio at that point.

The big thing for me was that you could search your notes (the ultimate searchable notebook!!).

It has definitely gone to the top of my wishlist and may even be closer to landing in my hot little hands due to Amazon currently discounting the price of the pens.

With the exchange rate the way it is and next pay due Friday, there is a real danger of my cunning plan for global domination coming to fruition!! [insert maniacal laughter]

Thanks

Cory

Whilst going to pick up some milk and bread early this morning, I was listening to ABC Radio in Brisbane when a story came on that caught my attention.

The story was about how two major airlines in Japan had created museums about tragic air crashes (also an article in The Age).

They are open to the public but their target audience are staff on the airlines to show them a grizzly reminder of what can happen when things go wrong.

Stats quoted on the radio story cited that 55% of air crashes were caused by human error.

They are aware that most of the staff who were around when these crashes occurred (in the 80’s) are about to retire so a majority of current staff did not experience the emotional upheaval of working for the airline when the disasters occurred. 

By making it compulsory for staff to visit the museum, they are trying to get staff to understand the risks and consequences of what they do.

I wonder if such a display would catch on in other companies in other industries or other countries?

Cory

So here is the story.

I’m checking LinkedIn tonight and something pops up in one of the side columns in the space that shows any roles being advertised on LinkedIn that may match your profile.

Here are the details of the role. I have removed the title and the organisation until later in this post:

Type:

Full-time

Experience:

Associate

Functions:

Writing / Editing, Consulting, Project Management, Production

Industries:

Logistics and Supply Chain, Human Resources, Management Consulting, Publishing, Financial Services

Posted:

November 20, 2009 by ???

Job Description

Position Concept: 
[Company] is seeking highly qualified individuals with expertise in Supply Chain Management, Human Capital Management or Financial Management to produce and promote [Company] research content through the development of informational products focused on metrics, best practices, thought leadership, and case studies. The [Role] will support [Company’s] content strategy by developing and publishing thought leadership to [Company] standards and requirements. Thought leadership and related content pieces will be developed in support of member consumption, content and demand generation marketing requirements, and pay-per-click revenue-generating pieces. Examples of thought leadership that will be produced include white papers, articles, case studies, and other Web-centric content. The individual will work with [Company’s] research services, membership, and marketing departments to develop and deploy fact-based points of view and other thought leadership deliverables.

Responsibilities:
•Managing and delivering to [Company’s] supply chain, human capital, and financial management publishing requirements
•Maintaining and delivering to the functional content publishing calendar
•Coordinating input and research activities across stakeholders and subject matter experts
•Identifying primary and secondary research requirements in order to publish fact-based, differentiated business insights
•Developing papers and slide decks that present client-ready, compelling insights
•Delivering briefings to internal and external audiences
•Working with marketing and membership groups to deploy thought leadership content internally and externally through events, press quotes, articles, podcasts, and other media
•Contributing to the evolution of strategic thinking across assigned functional area

Skills

Qualifications:
•At least 3–5 years of experience writing content associated with the relevant functional area
•Advanced degree in relevant field
•Solid written and oral English, other languages a plus
•Demonstrated research and analysis abilities
•Strong project management and relationship management skills
•Ability to understand business structure, improvement, and decision-making needs within large enterprises in a way that allows the individual to extract relevance from existing research and frame information in a point of view

Ok. If you are still with me, there are two things that bother me about this.

1. Position Title
2. The Company

1. Position Title

I must say it was the title that first got my attention, but after reading the role description, I’m not sure of the accuracy of this role being called a Knowledge Manager.

2. The Company

Now understandably there are many different opinions of what Knowledge Management is and a fair number of different descriptions of the Knowledge Manager role. What frightens me the most is an organisation who is well recognised in the field and proclaims themselves as a thought leader in the space, such as APQC, could call such a role a Knowledge Manager.

What do you think?

(Role advertised on LinkedIn)

Cory

Just ran the group at KMRt through a few tools that are available our there in the wild wild web. These and others can be found in my delicious > tools tag.

• delicious – Social Bookmarking
• Prezi – Presentation tool
• Wordle – Visualising Text
• Many Eyes – Visualisation
• Gliffy – Online diagramming
• Creately – Online diagramming
• Dropmind – Online and offline Mind Mapping
• iSpring – Convert ppt to Flash
• Google Wonder Wheel – Visualising search results
• Etherpad – Realtime collaborative writing
• Dabbleboard – Online whiteboard
• Scribus – Open source desktop publishing

What have you seen?

Cory

I was really impressed today by something I spotted in someone’s office.

Here’s to achieving immortality.

Cory

I was in Melbourne today to start off a few days of workshops, meetings and KM Roundtable.

Today it was an afternoon with Nancy White and a few dozen members of the KM Roundtable.

Nancy took us through some of the concepts covered in the new book Digital Habitats written with Etienne Wenger and John D. Smith.

Key points included:

• There was a moment of clarity around the bands of Individual, Community and Network and some good discussion around the difference between communities and networks.
• Triangulation in looking at who and what you need (internal and external) to have on board to get things changed in an organisation.
• Understanding that you design for groups, that will be experienced as individuals
• Group Polarities:
  • Togetherness       -        Separateness
  • Participation          -        Reification
  • Individual               -        Group
• A fantastic spider diagram where you can look at the activities of a community that included dimensions of:
• Meetings
• Projects
• Access to expertise
• Relationships
• Context
• Community cultivation
• Individual participation
• Content publishing
• Open-ended conversation

Nancy used a set of cards in some of her activities to break the ice and spark conversation. They are the IDEO Method Cards. A set of 51 cards that have an image on one side and the description of a creative activity on the other.

I am still not sure why they use the word reification.

We have been designing a scorecard for CoP health. There was plenty of stuff to consider and I am asking our librarian to get a copy of the book as well as getting one for myself.

You all know I would rather talk about the people side of KM but I have had a few people asking me about my experiences with Sharepoint recently.

In particular people are looking for recommendations on resources and tips on configuring Sharepoint (not server and database administration). So here are a few I have found handy that I have stored in my Delicious bookmarks.

• SharePoint Sherpa (blog)
• SharePoint Community Portal (resources)
• SharePoint Team Blog
• SharePoint Joel (blog)
• SharePoint for end users (blog)
• Microsoft TechNet – MOSS 2007 Server (resources)
• Enduser SharePoint (blog)

See what you think and let me know of any others you might have?

Cory

In our organisation September means strategy time. I find myself in the unusual position of working in Australia for a US company that operates on a Nov-Oct financial calendar on a period (4 weeks, 13 periods a year) basis.

So I am discussing with people the best way to go about developing a knowledge strategy. There are a few key things learnt from previous experience which I thought might be good to share. I’ll add more as they come to mind. Feel free to contribute.

Knowledge Strategy Tips and Tricks

1. Use the strategy model your organisation uses

2. Show alignment with strategic objectives, don’t measure against them.

3. Balance above and below the line (new v’s renew)

4. Maturity model measures may be better than classic financial performance.

5. Show how you will support other peoples activities

6. Look for relatives; can you kill two birds with one stone

7. Clearly separate strategic objectives from tactical initiatives but show the relationships.

8. Depending on your environment, show bias: Every other strategy in the business is going to be concentrating on financial performance and customer intimacy. You need to balance this with the knowledge aspect. You may need to be loud to be heard above the hubbub.

9. Engage with your stakeholders, don’t just do it on your own.

10. Measure different things to the rest of the organisation. Everyone else is measuring profit and budgets. Provide some diversity.

11. Embed as much as you can in the overall business strategy instead of having a separate knowledge strategy.

12. Include initiatives that other areas are running that support knowledge management principles and objectives (e.g. HR may be running the Mentoring Program)

13. Mention things you are going to stop doing (not just about doing new things -stop, start, continue)

Cory