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In search of understanding 28 Jul 2011
David Gurteen wonders whether better knowledge necessarily makes for wiser decision making.
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Quality control 30 Jun 2011
The organisation’s information quality journey began in 2002 when Russo began tracking error rates in the data that Tele-Tech Services provides to its customers to see if they could actually measure accuracy rather than just claiming it. The initial findings were good, with accuracy rates (calculated from the number of errors detected by the quality control process divided by the number of files) running at 99.75 per cent.
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When voluntary becomes optional 1 Jun 2011
One of David Snowden’s dictums is that knowledge can only be volunteered, it cannot be conscripted. This is a good reminder of the fact that knowledge is personal. It resides in people’s heads, from which it cannot be forced.
However, there can be a middle way between voluntary and conscripted. Knowledge cannot be conscripted, but it can be requested, and sharing knowledge can even become expected.
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Leading by example 1 Jun 2011
There are multiple ways an organisation can define its culture. A more conceptual approach looks at outcomes. For example, an organisation could state as its goal a phrase such as ‘our culture is one where people feel free to do the right thing,’ or ‘in our culture ethics always comes first.’ The challenge of course is then to define how to get there.
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In the know 10 May 2011
One of the discussions that I often see come up in knowledge management (KM) circles is ‘who makes the best CKO or senior knowledge manager?’. Is it best to appoint an internal person or to hire someone from outside the organisation? Which is more important – knowledge of KM or knowledge of the business?
I lean strongly towards the business experience. Let me explain why.
KM is extremely context dependent. You cannot pick a prescriptive recipe off the shelf and follow it. You need to really understand your organisation; the business objectives, its strategy and how it really works.
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Slimming down 10 May 2011
The new reality for all organisations, whether public or private, is that all business processes need to be optimised.
With the world economy contracting by three per cent in the next 18 months every organisation must manage information as an asset throughout its operations, developing leaner information processes to deliver better intelligence. This will underpin the retention of competitive advantage during tough times.
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Four four two 1 Mar 2011
New Year, new challenges. But the more things change the more they stay the same. I was skimming through a KM report which brought it home. It concluded that after all these years, while the technology has matured, the biggest barriers to effective implementation remain cultural – such as organisational politics and the need to change working practices.
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Eight questions: Part III 1 Mar 2011
It’s been about fostering a better understanding of the people and behavioural sides of KM. There are two books that are a must-read for anyone in this area. The first is Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel Pink. In a nutshell he says that we need to be careful about how we reward people because, by and large, rewards don’t work.
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Flirting with disaster 1 Mar 2011
Would you consider Apple CEO Steve Jobs a failure? Maybe the biggest in the world? Probably not. But he is almost certainly someone who has failed. And because he has been prepared to fail and, more importantly, to learn lessons and understand intelligence provided from these failures, he is now one of the leading thought leaders in the world of business and leisure technology.
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Sleeping giant 1 Mar 2011
The paradigm of a knowledge-based economy is not neoteric to India. The country’s past contributions to philosophy, medicine, science and technology, mathematics and astronomy support the view that the sub-continent has been a leading knowledge economy for centuries. In real fiscal terms, India was the largest economy in the world in the first millennium, producing approximately one third of global gross domestic product (GDP). By around 1500 its share dropped to 24 per cent – as China quickly played catch-up and Western Europe’s share of the pie began to grow.
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