Answering the “Knowledge Management” Challenge
How can we manage our collective knowledge so we can be more effective at what we do?
For decades all organisations have contemplated the following question: “How can we manage our collective knowledge so we can be more effective at what we do?” — being well aware that knowledge is their most valuable asset. These companies and institutions then engage in an attempt at implementing a knowledge management system — quite often letting their IT teams be the champions of such projects. As many of us have experienced first hand, a shockingly large proportion of those attempts fail and become deserted.
The way I see it, we get it wrong right off the bat. We might get better results if we change the question to this:
How can we be an organisation where knowledge is shared and connected so that it improves our collective practice?
Instead of a top-down approach, I find that each one of us needs to work out the answer in the context of our teams and our organisations (no silver bullet). The following four layers of human systems, as described by Stelio Verzera, is a good way to illustrate my point:
Real change in how a group operates lies in the deeper layers (people and culture), but this is a hard task. On the other hand, changes to tools, processes and even competences are relatively easier to carry out (or, forgive my language, to deploy). The downside to tools and processes is that this change is more superficial and less likely to stick around.
1- People
We are but teams of people working together (purpose), and the development of our practice (mastery) is very specific to each individual. We breath information in and breath knowledge out as we do our work. This is the very beginning of any efforts in knowledge management. Some people will be more inclined to curate and share their knowledge, the same as some people will never do so, for a range of reasons, and that’s ok too. Heard of working out loud?
2- Culture
As a group of humans come together to work under a shared identity, such as a company, they start forming a culture, or “how things get done here”. For a range of reasons, some organisations are safe spaces for people to try things out and speak up. On other organisations there are invisible barriers to sharing.
3- Competences
Like most things, practice makes mastery, and such is the case with collaboration and knowledge sharing. Teams and organisations can take on this practice in a very intentional manner to improve how to communicate, how to hold accountability, how to provide feedback and yes, how to capture and share knowledge.
4- Tools and Processes
The last layer of human organising contains all the processes and tools we use to do what we do, which varies enormously between organisations, between teams and from person to person. Every time I worked on knowledge management with a group or a company, this layer has been the default go-to for almost all of them.
What do you believe in?
Some people believe companies are machines, with processes and functions, striving for efficiency and competitive products. With that mindset it is tempting to focus on a new IT development for knowledge management which, equipped with the right HR processes and deployment programmes, can make the machine even better. Other people believe, like me, that organisations are complex systems that behave rather like a network or an organism. In such case, how can these beautiful networks be better at creating meaningful connections between individuals (increasing the degree of the network)? How can we encourage links between clusters for cross-pollination of best practices (brokers)? How can practitioners come together around complex problems and experiment and share their learnings (the learning organisation)? How can we make it easier for many of us to leave traces of our work for others to find and build upon (stigmergy)?
I suspect we are finding better answers to these questions in the layers of “people” and “culture” and a bit less so in the areas of “competences” or “tools and processes”. Like plugging a USB cable, we have been doing it the other way around all along.
Change in our individual workflows and our shared team culture is naturally slow and painful, and can’t be deployed in the same way we deploy a new process or tool. In this light, the question is how do we start.
How do we start changing the way we manage our collective knowledge?
Do not be tempted by developing a process and try to deploy it. Do not be tempted by choosing tools and protocols. You will be shooting yourself in the foot. If you, like me, believe that real change starts with people and culture, the answer is to create the right conditions for individual action in a way that directly benefits the individual. There will be some early enthusiasts who will lead the way. If the conditions at your organisation are right, these people will build reputation and start connecting with each other. Some teams will start working out loud and sharing knowledge. And from there the knowledge network will start growing and cement value-creation structures.
First elegant steps
- As an organisation, your role is to share a vision, to build awareness and to support early adopters. You create strategy and you are the sponsor of change. You provide legitimacy and reward achievements. Your role is not to decide the tools, or write down procedures. You don’t have to check the quality of what is shared. In short, you behave under adult-to-adult conditions.
- As an individual, your role is to understand the whole and make sense of your work within that context. You don’t create knowledge for the sake of creating knowledge, you create knowledge as you do your work. As you do so, you make sense of it in the context of the bigger picture, your organisations strategic objectives, and you capture and share that knowledge in any way you see fit, so that others can benefit from it. You will connect with your peers and provide constructive feedback. You all improve your practice together.
Three exercises to get the ball moving
I am aware that this all sounds abstract and it still doesn’t provide clear first steps. For which reason I collected three good exercises to apply these principles to your reality. They can be done in a team or individually, and you don’t need any specific software to do them. In fact, I like them better when done with pen and paper.
About me
I’m an organisational transformation facilitator who works with organisations seeking to empower their teams to innovate and transform business strategy. My focus is on collaborative and agile practices, knowledge management and collective intelligence. I’m fascinated by networked organisations, distributed leadership and innovative governance models, and their ability to transform traditional companies into adaptive and purposeful organisations.
You can contact me at manel@greaterthan.works or simply check out our work at Greaterthan.
