French cooking: Knowledge management à la cuisine gourmet

A pioneer in artificial intelligence tells of the slow but steady rise of KM in France.

By Eunika Mercier-Laurent

Julia Child wrote about mastering the art of French cooking, making the wonderful recipes and techniques of France available to everyone. Like French food, knowledge management is developing in the French way – evolving from years of change and becoming more readily available.
First time I heard about knowledge management was in 1991. I worked with Bull CEDIAG (Centre d’Etudes et Developpement en Intelligence Artificielle Groupe Bull) on artificial intelligence tools, methods and applications. Inspired by our worldwide experience in problem solving, we defined a global approach called Corporate Knowledge which allowed us to model, record, use and efficiently organise the corporate knowledge of an organisation.
We presented this approach to our top-management as a potential opportunity for new services and also as a ‘Groupe Bull way’ for organizing internal knowledge and talents in connexion with clients and partners. They refused to invest in this idea.
Previously we were involved in the European project, Knowledge Acquisition Design Systems (KADS), implementing the principles of genericity, modularity and reusability to build a knowledge models library. Pushed by real needs for an efficient collaborative tool for knowledge transfer and modelling in the field of blast furnaces,1 we built a toolbox called Open KADS in 1989. This project involved several experts working in several locations in France.
Already having a great experience in knowledge transfer and processing in France and worldwide, we were sure we were involved in knowledge management. Then one of our colleagues from Boston said: “You are wrong, guys; KM is not about knowledge processing, it is about company management.” Thus we began to learn even more about all KM facets and we discovered that KM is both and more.

Fusion cooking: KM from AI
During the ’90s we saw a considerable growth of KM in France. Beginning in 1993 we were pushed by Lotus to try to introduce the concept of collaborative work. Notes performance as well as computers did not allow demonstrating the real efficiency of collaborative work.
In 1994 we heard the first French tutorial on knowledge management given by Libero Maesano during the Avignon event on knowledge-based systems and their applications.
The same year I put ‘knowledge management’ and ‘build the future together’ on my business card. Each time I gave my card to someone I had to explain what knowledge management was.
In 1995 some pioneer companies, – Group Schneider, Air Liquide, CFM and SEPRO Robotique among them – began to introduce the knowledge management approaches incrementally.
Schneider’s starting point was the innovative idea of assisting the help desk system to be an enabler and amplifier of a new business. They imagined an online service for clients worldwide. A community of professionals grew very quickly, bringing together about 50 specialists from several departments, such as marketing, web, technical experts and customer service.
While American affiliate initiated an experience-based approach, the European affiliates decided to chose five pilot centres in France, Holland, Spain, Czech Republic and Italy. Go to http://xsl.schneider-electric.com/accueilInit.do for more information.
Air Liquide began with the management of researchers’ knowledge using a global approach. Two workgroups were initiated – one on innovation process management including patents analysis and writing and the second on competency management; the topics were linked.
CFM decided to build a case base including knowledge from field experiences in plane engine diagnostics. This collective experience of 10 years from 200 partners served to solve a given engine problem. In 1995 economists published a special edition of Revue française de gestion on knowledge management. That the same year AFCET2 organised a conference on the role of information and knowledge technology on the mutation of the industrial society.
The first ISMICK (International Symposium on Management of Industrial and Corporate Knowledge) organised by JP Barthes and J. Schreinemaker was held at Compiegne UTC (University of Technology Compiegne).
In 1996 CIGREF (Association of Information Systems Directors) initiated the interest group on KM directed by Serge Soudoplatoff. The first seminar of IIR on knowledge management brought together 20 persons and OECD published a document How to measure the know-how.
The same year I met Debra Amidon in Brian Newman’s KM Forum and we organised the launch of her first book3 in the Monet garden at Giverny.
The following year Échange et coordination recherche-industrie (ECRIN) initiated two groups on KM to share their experiences – on tools and on management to allow member enterprises and research centres.

Raising a soufflé, Stage 1
In 1998, the knowledge-based business began, strongly linked with the internet and the digital economy. The internet brought to light old existing technology such as groupware and workflow. Service providers offered business intelligence solutions based mainly on Internet engines.
Many companies, pushed by software vendors, tried to introduce KM as tools without taking into account the real needs of ‘knowledge cultivators’4 and the organization. Tools were often complex and users had to adapt them.
Knowledge management initiatives came from IT directors, pushed by software vendors on one side and wanting to preserve their power on the other. CKOs were IT professionals who wanted KM limited to IT using classic ‘data thinking’. In many cases the intranet was just used to share files or to share the few applications such as help desk, diagnostic, document management and competency management.
Middle management began to play the game but facing the difficulty of understanding and adopting tools, they stopped and continued their own databases. This period was characterized by failure to take into account the previous AI experience as well as overlooking knowledge transfer and the lack of ‘knowledge thinking’.
There were as many approaches as there were domains; each department had its own KM not connected with the others; for example, in 2000 La Poste had over 100 intranets.
EDF, having a great experience in AI, surprisingly defined its own database structure for several professionals such as maintenance, security and reliability, but nobody wanted to fill it because it was adapted to… nobody. To solve the problem, people were asked about their needs, the database was modified and knowledge sharing began.
In 1998 the first French KM Forum was organised by Tarsus Group and Valoris. We also noticed the growing interest for KM by document management specialists.
The first MBA programme on KM was founded in the same year at Marseille University by BI specialists. In 1999 R&D directors of main European companies wrote the European Industrial Research Management Association (EIRMA) report on KM, giving a quite good image of the situation in main European companies .

The soufflé falls again (retombé du soufflé), stage 2
Web 2.0 brought the second generation with wikis, multimedia social networks and basic semantic web. Some KM consultants who worked previously on databases and intranets switched to the social networks without having any experience in managing networks that would bring a real value to a company. Some said American methods were not adaptable to French mentality as an excuse for doing it the wrong way; some tried to import methods from other cultures such as the Japanese which is not compatible with French culture either.
Many began talking about second generation KM or about Enterprise 2.0, making links, building social networks and introducing wikis. Semantic web is still not available in the free search engines but in 1996 we suggested building websites using knowledge models for relevant navigation.
The current KM situation makes me think about the AI situation in 1994. AI addressed very difficult and complex problems. Commercial engineers were very enthusiastic and suggested solving any kind of problem with just one technique instead of understanding before doing. Maybe AI promised too much in some cases. Many industries applied AI techniques with success but they had no time to communicate about it, or they considered it as confidential.
As a result, many AI proponents stopped talking about AI. AI departments of large companies were renamed Advanced Information Departments. Today AI is inside robots, inside decision support and advice systems in many domains, in embedded systems, in electronics and serious games, in training systems, in data and text mining, in semantic web. Because it works, nobody mentions AI.
It is similar for KM. In the knowledge-based business period mentioned above, many people were enthusiastic about KM but many of them did not know what KM really was. They tried some tools and the results were disastrous because they did not understand that KM is mainly about humans. Many registered data and information to databases and then said KM was not working. Now, some of them tend to stop or rename KM activities instead of understanding what went wrong. For example, at Peugeot nobody is in charge of KM because the company claims KM has no immediate impact on the company benefits. Nevertheless they have at least two extranets – one for partners and distributors and the other for clients.
Books about the first generation explain why KM did not work, but their authors did not give the real feedback from experience before switching to the second generation. Many people in the companies are practicing KM because it is useful; it enables them to be more effective and more intelligent together.
Organizing extended company knowledge is the basic condition for innovation and global sustainability. Eco-innovation is the way to produce value from knowledge, to build a real knowledge economy and to preserve eco-systems at the same time. One of conditions is to acquire what I call the K-attitudes by doing.
I believe that KM is going to be embedded inside the knowledge cultivators as attitudes, a way of thinking inside extended organizations (holonomy).
The two main KM approaches are incremental and global. The first begins from specific problem solving. The sustainability sine qua non conditio (essential action) is considering the specific problem with a global view and global understanding of all influences and people involved (systems). Knowledge relative to problem solving can be reused for other activities such as training, design improvement or innovation.
In the second approach, the involvement of top-management and stakeholders is vital for the success of the global strategy. They need to elaborate a global vision and turn it into a strategy to apply in all levels of a company. A global knowledge flow built using knowledge thinking and including ‘intelligent technologies’ is the basis of the innovation process, the integrator of all company activities.
We can say that current practices in France are:

(Still) tool oriented;
Method oriented;
Problem solving oriented;
Activity oriented (regional development, document management, innovation management);
Strategic and global in very few cases.

Examples of KM in France
Group Danone’s KM programme was initially based on ERP software. According to F. Mougin, HR manager, and B. Benadati, director of development, organisation and knowledge networks, they switched from registering data files to discussions by managers for specific problem solving. They exchange videos on problem solving in different countries – for example a video telling a story of marketing people in France who were inspired by the concept of a product which succeeded in Brazil.
They also initiated the Little Book of Practices describing briefly the problem, solution, tangible advantages and a how-to guide.
Ernst & Young is an excellent example of introducing KM on strategic level. The Ernst & Young Center for Business Knowledge was created in 1993. According to Nathalie Dubuis-Hepner, chief knowledge officer, the French company was observing while E&Y affiliates around the world started to practice KM in 1993. A small team started some KM activity in 1995 but the real worldwide practice began in 1998.
Pushed by the 10 main affiliates and clients, E&Y defined a world KM strategy and organization and employed some youngsters. The arrival of the young employees was a critical point in the development of a global approach.
Michelin proved that a company can be much more clever when involving clients and competitors. When they invented the radial tire,6 they began to test the initial idea with one of their clients, Renault, on a small car, the Twingo. This experimentation helped them understand how to switch from invention to commercial offer. Then they decided to share the market with their main competitors Goodyear and Pirelli. This alliance enabled them to address 70 per cent of the market instead of 25 per cent alone. At that time, KM was not yet known.
At ST Microelectronics, KM is an attitude. People are not talking about but practicing it in all activities. Very early they understood that innovation is a key component for leadership; to innovate efficiently they have to organize and manage worldwide knowledge. ST’s InnovAction approach includes all global KM components such as ideas generation through collective intelligence and cross fertilisation.
The capacity to innovate is measured on a regular basis and open conferences bringing together the main world leaders, ST experts, clients, suppliers, key partners and ST ‘intrapreneurs’.
Publications, speaker presentations, workgroup output and storytelling are shared on-line. Technodays are organized to share experiences and to brainstorm. Best local ideas are valuated through presentations to their pairs and implemented into products or services. They practice real-time learning; their online courses also include creative thinking techniques, intrapreneuship seminars and innovation management programs. There is an ‘out-of-box thinking’ corner for informal exchanges on specific themes. Exemplary employees are valuated through a recognition system including among others, yearly ceremonies, special incentives, innovation awards and exceptional patents presentations.
In 2005 the French government launched the program Pole de Competitivité (clusters) whose aim is to bring together public and private teams to make research more effective and applicable, generating value. It could be managed using the KM approach with its common vision strategy and language. But it is not an easy task because they do not have the same goals and are not talking the same language – research people are interested in doing research and industrial problems are often very complex and solutions have to bring immediate results in term of revenues.
France is also DOM/TOM (overseas departments and territories): Guyana, Martinique, Guadeloupe, Reunion. We can find here some brilliants examples of global KM applied to training, to regional management, or technical expert knowledge management (IT know-how). There are also interesting examples of organizing flow of knowledge between small and medium enterprises in Bénin (French speaking) working in specific fields such as IT, to share experience, know-how and to collaborate on finding business opportunities.
Many of the new KM players are inside enterprises. These new actors of KM, educated by KM leaders, have a global view, practice K-attitudes and knowledge thinking, build knowledge flow to address the real company needs and are connected with clients, partners, distributors and research centres for more effective innovation and leadership.
Just like AI, KM is becoming ubiquitous. The same successful KM approaches can be applied at the individual level, in organizations, companies and for regional development. France needs to progress in the global management of intellectual capital – which is a very difficult challenge – moving towards becoming a knowledge society.

Eunika Mercier-Laurent teaches at several universities and engineering schools and does research at IAE University of Lyon, France. She is president of Innovation3D, the International Association for Global Innovation [http://innovation3d.fr/]. EML Conseil website: http://www.emlconseil.fr/ E-mail: eunika@innovation3D.fr

Endnotes

SACHEM – Decision support system for blast furnaces, probably the biggest AI project in Europe, still in use
SNECMA & General Motors, today member of group SAFRAN
Association française pour la Cybernétique Economique et Technique, now ASTI (Fédération des Associations Françaises des Sciences et Technologie de l’Information) http://asti.ibisc.univ-evry.fr/
The Innovation Strategy for The Knowledge Economy, BH
Eunika Mercier-Laurent replaced knowledge workers by more accurate word knowledge cultivators (jardinier de la connaissance)
http://www.michelinman.com/pax/