Knowledge Management "Killer" Success Stories

Linked-In has a discussion group for chief knowledge officers. A discussion thread was started on the topic of "killer" stories where knowledge management had created value. The request came from a consultant who was trying to answer the skeptical senior executive's questions about the value of KM. Below is my contribution to the discussion. KM success stories are not widespread these days because high performing organizations have done KM long enough that the practice and the successes are embedded and part of the organizational culture. So I shared what I think are Canada's best examples of KM success stories.

By the end of this, if this sounds like advertising for the Conference Board of Canada's Knowledge Strategy Exchange Network (KSEN) ..... it is. Any organization in Canada serious about KM would get significant value by joining KSEN. I know I did.

The Conference Board of Canada has a KM CoP (Knowledge Strategy Exchange Network) that includes the big four accounting firms, KPMG, Deliotte-Touche, Ernst & Young, PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PwC), plus the Bank of Canada, the Auditor General of Canada, Hydro Quebec, the Business Development Bank of Canada and Farm Credit Canada. There are also law firms, various departments of provincial governments and cities involved in the network. The network started in 2001 and with a reorganization in 2003 has supported the exchange of practices and strategy for KM in these organizations in Canada.

As long time practitioners of KM, most of these organizations have significant KM success stories. You don't get continued investment and resources to KM year after year unless senior managers judge that there is value for the organization.

Some of these firms have world class initiatives in KM. For example, Farm Credit Canada has Communities of Practice that evolved to be a key feed of information for strategic planning. Think about it. Who is exploring what is coming over the horizon (for clients, for the practitioners in the CoP, for their organization)? A good CoP will be doing this. The impact of CoPs on executive culture led to a restatement of cultural values and an employee code of conduct. That's just Farm Credit Canada. Hydro Quebec has a deliberate and organizational wide focus on succession management that has driven their KM program. If the deep expert on trouble shooting electricity power line malfunctions leaves the organization, the North American east coast may be at higher risk of a brownout. So Hydro Quebec has had success getting middle managers to pay attention to KM in their work units.

KM is an attribute of high performing organizations and as a result, I doubt that you will find studies that can show definitive rates of return solely to KM. You will also find those high performing organizations paying attention to innovation, project portfolio management, employee recognition, business process improvement, organizational learning and corporate values.

Good organizations consciously do KM (even if they don't call it that). Less effective organizations do KM poorly. But in some fashion they all do KM.
"Killer" KM success stories are out there. But the organizations who are successfully doing KM are not bragging about it because "It is the way we work".

The Most Revolutionary Question, thanks to Fr. Conor Kennedy

What kind of future do you want for your children?

In 1975, while in Malawi, my fellow Canadian, Rick Sutton and I would hang out with a Roman Catholic priest from Edmonton, Alberta. Father Conor Kennedy was originally from Ireland but he hung out with the Canadian CUSO (now VSO) crowd. Rick and I were teaching high school in Nsanje, Malawi through CUSO's auspices. Rick and I had these in-depth discussions about third world development. Rick grew up in the tougher neighbourhoods of Vancouver. I was a country boy from southern Ontario. We sometimes had divergent opinions but common Canadian ideals of what development meant and did.

Father Conor Kennedy had a strong influence on those debates. We would share our CUSO discussions about how to make third world development work. Conor got CUSO funds and support regularly for his parish projects, not because it was Christian or faith-based but because he did some really good development work in his rural community in Malawi. Conor sponsored some primary schools that worked with the simplest of materials but opened doors to children without means for an education.

Conor has a Masters degree in Adult Education (from the University of Alberta, I believe). So when he talked, we listened.

In one of those conversations, Conor said something that has always stayed with me as the most revolutionary concept of what sparks and maintains development. Rick and I were talking about the difficulty of identifying and starting good development projects particularly in the oppressive and manipulative one-party state that Malawi had evolved to.

Conor listened to the conundrums of teachers who were paid by and working for the government and then responded with his solution. Conor had set up parent councils with the schools he was sponsoring. He said: " I just ask my parents what kind of future do they want for their children? Out of that conversation comes the simplest ideas for starting change in a community. We do those projects first and we keep revisiting that question to move onto the longer term, more complex projects."

Conor pointed out the powerful impulses created out of launching that perspective on development projects for the local community. How hard will parents work for the future of their children? Where does the local politician and the tribal chief want to be on those projects? Running to the front to be seen bringing value to the projects. Corruption? You might get away with stealing from me but don't steal from my children. The ferocity of mothers defending their children is not to be trifled with.

We have stopped asking that question about rural development in rural Canada. We have trouble asking that question at the international and national stage when nations and companies invest, invade and defend their futures based on their self-interests.

So:

What kind of future do you want for your children? What kind of future do you want for our children?

Back to Father Conor Kennedy. He still serves in Malawi with the Roman Catholic Church in the Dedze district. During the civil war in Mozambique, his parish was overwhelmed by refugees fleeing to Malawi for safety.

Before you brush off the Christian overtones of this man's work, read this from his days of sponsoring rugby in Edmonton. Conor is a Honorary Life Member, Edmonton Rugby Football Club.

A final word from Conor, where a lifetime in making development happen is summed up in these words:

"Integral Christianity, integral spirituality means ministry to body and soul. You can't divorce religion from the lives of the people. No way. Isaiah said that true religion in the sight of God is to look after widows and orphans. On the final exam, as I understand the Scriptures, we'll be evaluated on one issue: "I was hungry and you gave me to eat." If we don't score well on that issue we'll fail. Feeding people who are hungry is an absolute essential of the Christian church. Christ himself fed five thousand when they were hungry - and they were only missing an evening meal. We have to integrate development with our preaching. We must show that we're active in our Christianity and not just verbal. We must link religion and daily life and not just religion and Sunday worship."

Fr. Conor Kennedy, CSSp
Malawi, Africa

Sharing What Works

CompanyCommand is one of the U.S. Army's communities of practice. It is a space for commanders of companies (150 men) share and discuss tough issues of command.

The Canadian Forces has its own unit that focuses on lessons learned.

The U.S. Army may not be the first place where you would think to look for communities of practice or rapid information sharing websites. But the reality is that learning fast from what worked and didn't work is a critical skill set in today's army.

So there are strong reasons to pay attention to what the U.S. Army is doing and learning about knowledge management and fast learning. Here are some deep articles that get to the variety, processes and tools of knowledge sharing that the U.S Army is finding useful. Nancy Dixon (author of Common Knowledge) has been working with the US Army on the process side of its knowledge sharing and knowledge management. In her blog, "Conversation Matters", she has been posting some enlightening articles about her experiences in guiding KM in the U.S Army:

1. Company Command: A Professional Community That Works
   
2. If the Army Can Put Its Doctrine up on a Wiki, You've Got No Excuse
3. A Wiki for Generals
   
4. Do We Really Need So Many Kinds of Social Media?

The last article is especially enlightening in describing the processes and tools that a large organization legitimately needs to share policy, business processes, mentor, collaborate, innovate, challenge existing practice. Knowledge sharing does not happen in one space or with one tool. There are legitimate reasons for diversity and a variety of tools.

There is a Canadian connection to the U.S. Army's CoPs. Tomoye Community Software is a long-time software company supporting communities of practice based in Ottawa, Canada. Tomoye has provided the software to some of the key communities that Nancy Dixon talks about. Here are some of Tomoye's links to their analysis of the US Army communities of practice:

1. Company Command.
2. Army Logistics Net LOGNet Case Study

It is no coincidence that Kent Greenes is now part of Tomoye's Strategic Advisors along with Nancy Dixon. Kent started his work in knowledge management by focusing on fast learning by project teams for better performance as CKO for British Petroleum. He has pioneered the concepts of Peer Assists and Learn Before, Learn During, Learn After.

Organizations need to see communities of practice, information repositories and social media tools in the wider context of what is important and necessary for the organization to share quickly in order to execute and innovate.

A Conversation about Knowledge Sharing

Conversations can be entertaining or sometimes they are nothing to howl about. You be the judge!


Dr. Kirby Wright teaches a course in Knowledge Management as part of the Master of Arts in Communications and Technology at the University of Alberta. A team of his graduate students approached me for an interview as part of their project in the course. They have created a blog at kmcafe.org. Their blog is well worth a visit for a critical view (in the terms of a critique) of the state and future of knowledge management.

The interview is posted at kmcafe.org. Thanks to Carolyn Dearden for editing the interview down from 40 to 24 minutes. You get the nuggets without the sidetracks I can roam down sometimes.

So, if you are interested in my take on the state of KM, click on "KM Cafe chats with KM Expert Neil MacAlpine".

David Snowden's Seven Principles of Knowledge Management

David Snowden posted an update to his three rules (heuristics) for knowledge management. He has expanded them into seven principles. They are good reminders of the principles of knowledge sharing. They provide a starting point to examine conventional wisdom on how humans learn and share knowledge. Since my experience in KM is that I forgot the essentials on a regular basis, I regularly remind myself to review them.

David's post, from Oct. 10, 2008 is a good place to begin.

His seven principles are:

• Knowledge can only be volunteered not conscripted. (Here is my take on this rule of thumb).

• We only know what we know when we need to know it. (Again here is my take on David's rule of thumb)

• In the context of real need few people will withhold their knowledge.

• Everything is fragmented.

• Tolerated failure imprints learning better than success

• The way we know things is not the way we report things.

• We always know more than we can say and we will always say more than we can write down. And here is my blog on this essential principle; you can't understand social media without understanding David's principle.
  

You need to read David's posting to get the full value of these principles. Without a regular dialogue on these principles, I find I am bound to repeat my past failures.

You Have No Idea How Good You Are!

Tori Holmes, rowing the Atlantic Ocean

Sir Ken Robinson makes the case for creativity in the school. Watch the video to see what he thinks creativity looks like.

The simple reality is that youth and young adults are not challenged to find their real skills (usually not academic). Nor are they encouraged by parents, teachers and mentors to discover how good they really are.

Case in point: The young lady at the oars was 21, fresh from the Canadian prairies when she became the youngest woman ever to row across the Atlantic Ocean in 2006.

Tori Holmes is from Devon, Alberta, in the flat, dry Canadian prairies. She was keen about athletics but not an athlete. She was keen about studies and art but not an academic. In many ways, she was an ordinary student in high school.

What made Tori exceptional was her sense of adventure. When Tori finished high school, we knew Tori was not going to follow the typical path to university or college and studies. She headed out for adventure. In her travels through Australia, she met a kindred spirit, Paul Gleeson from Limerick, Ireland.

The two happenstanced onto the Atlantic Rowing Race, "the ultimate test of the human spirit". Tori was hooked and the two non-rowers learned to row a one ton rowboat. Tori is 110 pounds soaking wet.

The 2005-06 Atlantic Rowing Race from the Canary Islands to Antigua was beyond human limits. The tail end of a hurricane, two tropical storms and 3 low pressure systems created 40 foot swells. Six boats out of the original 26 had to be rescued. Tori and Paul, in a field of Olympic trained rowers, finished 13th in the race . To finish was an overwhelming achievement of perseverance and courage.



Tori and Paul's book, Crossing the Swell, launched on Oct. 4. Part inspirational adventure story, part travelogue and part romance, Crossing the Swell is an honest and intimate portrayal of what perseverance and commitment is made of. It is a terrific read and a bargain at $20 from Rocky Mountain Books (RMB) and Chapters/Indigo.

Tori and Paul invested in what they were good at, their sense of adventure, their commitment, their persistence. If we figured out what we truly were good at, invested $120,000 in a goal to leverage what we good at, would we have an amazing story?

Tori and Paul have an amazing story.



Now do the same from the organizational perspective. What is your organization, company, department really good at. Ask your clients and customers and partners. What they tell you may surprise you. And then take a look at Appreciative Inquiry to discover and build on how good your organization really is.

Jim Taylor, Roylat Corp Inc., has some practical guides and worksheets in Appreciative Inquiry to lead organizations through discovering how good they are. Jim Taylor's workshops are excellent introductions to build on the positive for change.

The Future of Knowledge Workers, a Survey

Termite Fishing: Collaborative Learning?

KM World magazine has a two-part report on a survey about the future of knowledge workers. Done by George Washington University and the Institute of Knowledge and Innovation it surveyed 125 professionals and executives. Executives and senior managers constituted nearly half of the respondents.

As you might expect, the top type of work in the future will be collaborative work (global consultancy, project design team, etc.).

The top rated skills for a young knowledge worker were team/collaborative skills followed specialized technical skills. The skills for future leadership were project management as the highest skill and expertise, followed by strategy and strategic thinking, and specialized expertise.

The top priority for new technology to support knowledge workers was collaboration tools. The range of tools described is daunting for an IT shop to integrate and support (from enhanced e-mail, search and portals infrastructure, virtual workspace tools and information processing tools for visualization, expertise location and business intelligence). Find that package in one integrated reliable software package!

For the future manager, enabling better decision-making and leadership support through content analysis and sense-making tools and business intelligence capabilities was identified. Those experienced in sense-making and business intelligence would likely argue that while software can help in illustrating trends and issues, the real work of sense-making and business intelligence is one of appropriately facilitated and focused conversations.

No one seemed to identify the challenge of on-going learning and tools that support learning, especially for new knowledge workers. While e-learning software may have reached the "trough of disillusionment", the challenge will be more acute in the future.