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Frequently Asked Questions on Knowledge Management
Why do you need Knowledge Management?
What is the Return on Investment?
It's not enough to state that "brains are our most strategic resource" to justify Knowledge Management. KM must continuously be a key enabler of the goals of an organisation, ex.
- Mission Critical Questions.
For a company who's business consists of High Tech projects, the most important question was: "Have we already done this before? Who worked on it?
Can we improve the quality and efficiency of our proposals?"
- Support Strategic Change Programs
ensure collaboration at a Merger or Acquisition
improve customer satisfaction
get the employees in a new factory operational in 50% it used to take
- Improve Business Processes
80% of the questions of a client must be answered in 30 seconds
reduce down time of production installation
Reduce difference in calculated and actual cost of a design by 50%
It is only in such a framework that costs and returns can be calculated, and hence the profitability.
Our management focus is on cost savings. Can Knowledge Management help?
Companies have a lot of hidden overhead cost in communications and knowledge work:
- people spend more than 1/2 hour or more a day on e-mails. How high is the percentage of useless messages?
- people spend time on telephone and in corridor chats to find "obvious" information
- people waste time searching important messages or documents in their overcrowded "inbox" or chaotic public folders
Moreover, "spontaneous" knowledge investments do not yield enough:
- informal meetings produce good ideas, but they don't get shared let alone put into action
people go unknowingly to the same or similar seminars, but don't exchange their insight to make proposals that can benefit the business.
- people reinvent the wheel, because they don't know who already knows
Of what organisational dysfunctions are these symptoms?
- Knowledge Management makes the information and knowledge flows visible, more efficient and more effective.
- KM makes the hidden costs of informal knowledge work more visible and hence manageable.
- Or from the opposite perspective: not managing knowledge is like stopping the PC-help desk. The explicit costs may not appear anymore on the budget, but a lot of hidden "help yourself in the chaos" costs are made.
- Last but not least, let's learn from downsizing exercises in the late eighties and early nineties. The linear lay off's caused a lot of loss of core competency. This in turn caused a lot of costs, in increased downtime of production installations...
- On the other hand, a smart move back to core activities with the most knowledgeable and committed employees strengthen and rejuvenate an organisation. Not only does this reduce costs, but it nurtures the strength for the next stage of expansion. This requires a knowledge assessment of employees, teams and (informal) communities.
What are typical responsibilities of the function "Knowledge management"?
The function "Knowledge Management" mainly enables:
- the creation and support of Communities of Practice as the human foundation of KM
- Business Process Owners and Line Managers to manage the operational knowledge needed in their processes and departments such as documents and training.
- Top Management to have an explicit Vision, Goals and Scorecard for Mission Critical Knowledge and Core Competences.
- the Knowledge and Collaboration infrastructure including Groupware (with E-mail) and Intranet (with Portal's and Content Management Systems).
In this way, KM coordinates strongly with other functions that support KM such as Training and Education, Internal Communication, ICT, Quality Management, Organisational Development...
Do you need a distinct Knowledge Manager?
In any case, the function of knowledge management is mandatory.
- Typically the Knowledge Manager (or CKO - Chief Knowledge Officer) is a staff function to the General Manager or COO.
- But satisfactory results also exist when the function is added to a function that already supports Knowledge Management "avant la lettre", such as Human Resources or Quality Management.
Is Knowledge Management new?
Things like writing books, training and education have been around for a long time and witness a concern for Knowledge Management "avant la lettre". As a discipline, it adds the following vital new aspects:
- Communities of Practice (CoP's) are an essential organisational form to improve the ability of an organisation to change, learn and grow. They complement the hierarchy, which is the organisation of authorities, and business processes that offer high quality products and services.
- New applications of Information and Communication Technology, such as Intranets and mobile communication. This allows people that are separated in time and space to collaborate on knowledge intensive problems, such as the troubleshooting of a complex machine
A technician has a technical problem he cannot solve
He finds on the Intranet who is an expert that could help, and that is available
He calls the expert on his mobile phone.
The technician shows the machine via a webcamera.
They note their measurements, observations and findings in a chat dialogue.
They consult the technical manuals on the Intranet.
Once they have solved the problem, they store their case on the Intranet, so that this experience can be reused.
Later, the CoP examines the different cases and propose corrective measures to prevent such problems.
Look with new eyes. Separated disciplines, such as HRM, ICT, and Quality Management are now integrated to obtain important business goals.
How to start with Knowledge Management?
KM has much to do with reusing existing knowledge, and connecting the right people to improve the knowledge creation capacity in Communities of Practice (CoP's).
Is it not logical to apply the principles of KM on the introduction of KM itself? So, typical first steps are:
- Create a CoP where the practice is KM. The members are typically persons that have spontaneous energy for KM issues in the various disciplines. (See also: What are typical responsibilities of the function "Knowledge Management"?)
- Have a Sponsor in Top Management.
- Appoint a Knowledge Manager (see also Do you need a distinct Knowledge Manager?)
- Identify Critical Business Issues where KM can make a substantial contribution
(see also Why do you need Knowledge Management? What is the Return on Investment?)
- Identify Quick Wins.
- Identify existing Good KM Practices "avant la lettre", and inform the people that can use them for their business objectives. Document these practices on the Intranet of the KM CoP.
- Make investment proposals such as the appointment of a Knowledge Manager, stimulate other communities, improve ICT infrastructure...
Last but not least, you gain a lot by integrating the experience of setting up Knowledge Management elsewhere. To coach Knowledge Communities of Practice and Knowledge Managers is the core service of Warmoes & Associates.
What is the difference between Knowledge Management, Organisational Learning and Competence Management?
There should not be any difference in practice. They are a different side of the same coin. The distinction is merely historical because the discipline originated in different communities in the late 80's, begin 90's.
- Organisational Learning started from human learning with elements as team learning, vision creation and mental modeling.
- Knowledge Management got a lot of energy from the ICT oportunities
- Competence Management focused a lot on the inventory of skills and attitudes, and the instruments for recrutement, selection and training.
Today, Knowledge Management is the the most used term.
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