Transferring Knowledge & Managing the time aspect

Comment : by Anonymous

These are the three challenges I see:
1) transferring knowledge (better teachers, better learners)
2) time (no one has the time to do it, or learn how)
3) disliking teaching/mentoring.

I think the last two might be overcome if people saw great results from their efforts to teach/learn, but I know that in my organization there is no system in place to help senior people become better teachers, and junior people become better learners. Senior people know what they do in each situation, but don't know how to articulate why they do what they do, and how junior people can translate it into any other situation. Thoughts on any resources for this?

Article : Two big challenges of Knowledge Management

I agree with the challenges mentioned the comment and in fact it was the first point 'Transferring knowledge' that I highlighted in my above mentioned article. To transfer knowledge, it must first be available then shared and shared knowledge must be used for an organisation to benefit from it. The difference is, said article deals with the cultural and system angle of an organisation while the above mentioned comment highlights the capacity and ability of people to share and use knowledge. To some extent the work culture of an organisation deals with the learning aspect. In a progressive work culture people would want to listen and learn. Their dislike to teaching and mentoring would be low to nil. But surely making better teachers and learners out of people working in an organisation is a tremendous challenge unless they are natural teachers and learners.

About Better Teachers

We do not need teachers in the traditional mould (class room teachers) to share knowledge. We need people who are willing to share knowledge (their ways, methods, wisdom, ideas etc.). If an organisation succeeds on this front then the next challenge is to help people articulate what they share. This is more of a glass ceiling than a concrete slab to break through. First, help people to share knowledge. Capture and channel appropriately that shared knowledge reaches people who may benefit from it. Let them pick the brains of the one who shared and learn from it. This way the person who shared gets better with his communication, those who need become better learners and the shared knowledge gets further enriched. Remember, learners can help people become better teachers.

About Better Learners

People learn when they are driven. Not everyone is self-driven and an organisation needs to play a big role in driving people to learn and achieve more. Create 'work challenges' that drive people to learn and raise the bar. Do not tolerate sub-optimum performances. Keep raising the bar of optimum performance with improvements in overall work performance. Leadership must set an example in learning. They cannot repeat their mistakes and close their eyes to knowledge available with the organisation when they want their employees to learn and use knowledge. Provide a learning environment where people are encouraged to learn. You cannot expect a person to learn from work when his request for a library is denied or for that matter executive / higher education is denied. Last but the most important incentive for learning is Respect, Recognition and Reward for knowledge shared. Absence of R-R-R will keep people far away from learning as not much is going to happen even if they learn and share their knowledge.

Related article link Supporting Ideation in a work environment

Integrate KM with business applications

The need for time will be felt when knowledge is shared in the traditional way. We can have daily / weekly sessions of knowledge sharing but then less will be learnt at those sessions compared with knowledge provided as the need for it arises. People at work would want to know what to do or how to do at a point of time. If they can be provisioned with the required knowledge at the click of a button or two there will be no need to push for knowledge usage or for that matter learning. But the challenge is in enabling it.

I was implementing my recommendations to improve 'Receivables' performance for one of my clients. We designed and developed a software that would double up as an intelligence system besides providing transactional and MIS support. We provided a field(s) for people to share their knowledge at various stages of the process flow and tagged them as 'Knowledge fields'. People can choose from standard text or type their own. They can share their ideas and views on what transpired and how they handled it. They could also say what they think or feel about a situation or how they expect things to go, especially with collections. These were stored for people to use in similar situations. Anyone who is performing a required activity can access knowledge stored specific to the activity being performed. People can also share general thoughts on how the work is performed and how they can be improved. This system was received with lot of skepticism but eventually turned out to be a beneficial one for the client. It helped people to learn how different customers respond and when they do what it means especially in the light of their subsequent actions. It's not always possible to do it the way I described. There could be work activities that involve no software yet demand involve knowledge acquisition and usage. How do we share knowledge in those cases and how do we use knowledge?

Knowledge management systems integrated with business applications help knowledge usage better than standalone KM systems. This however does not preempt knowledge sharing outside business applications. Corporate Blogs and Forums always provide good platform for people to share and learn especially in the absence of a software to input knowledge acquired. But KM fields in business applications help capture knowledge that is vital and critical for performance improvement.

If after all of the initiatives there still are people unwilling to learn or dislike learning then the organisation will be better off without them. You can work on people unwilling to share but not much can be done with people who are unwilling to learn.

Hope it helps. Good luck.

Supporting ideation in a business environment

"We are ideating"

These are the words uttered in an IBM ad by a person in response to a question raised by another person who walks into a big hall where many people are lying down. Now this itself is an idea of allowing people to take time to ideate. A senior executive in one of my client companies quipped, "if we follow this, then rest assured we will have lot of people volunteering to ideate; only that it will generate more snoring". Not that he is not impressed by the idea but just that he is far from impressed with his people. There are two things here, one you don't need to have a big hall for people to come, lie down and ideate and secondly ideation is not something to be thrown open for people take up voluntarily.

Ideation in business

Ideation is a process of forming and relating ideas while Ideating refers to forming a mental image of something that is not present or that is not the case

Businesses know the value of ideas but often they don't promote conducive environment for ideas to grow and get nurtured. Ideation process helps companies to generate ideas to address and solve business problems and support innovation. Knowledge management system helps a business to generate ideas as long as issues concerning sharing of knowledge are well addressed and people are open to share and use knowledge. In a way a KM system is a prerequisite for ideas to come through and surface.

Supporting ideation

Like many other things in a business, ideation requires necessary infrastructure, facilities and conducive environment for it to work. It may not be a continuous process and certain steps can be skipped if the motivation is greater. The diagram given below capture things those are necessary for ideation to take place in a business environment. It however does not cover the cognitive process that creates the idea. Click on the picture to enlarge it.



Some tips to kick start ideation in your organisation

• Encourage people to ideate and share their ideas
• Put in place a comprehensive knowledge management system
• Set up a full fledged central corporate library (Provide both hard and soft resources)
• Find ways to encourage people to use the library. Discourage people taking resources home.
• Encourage people to set up knowledge or say even Idea clubs to meet (online or in person), communicate, share and discuss issues, ideas and knowledge. Integrate it with the KM system.
• Set up corporate blog or publish periodic internal newsletters. Encourage people to contribute and reward valuable contributions.
• Add some fun element, wherever possible, bring together people, help them think and act

KM - Setting direction

Helping people to share and use knowledge is central to the success of a knowledge management system. However it is just not enough to have people who are willing and enthusiastic to share and use knowledge. What will you do when you have everything but clues in a treasure hunt? Not much, I guess. It is important for the top management of a company to set the direction and make people aware of the purpose of the whole effort and the way forward.

State the purpose

Sharing and using Knowledge can be very loosely understood if the purpose is not clear for people. What the system is set out to achieve must be answered in unambiguous terms. There cannot be many different purposes for a KM system but to harness knowledge assets that a company possesses to enhance business performance and achieve greater growth. But how well this message is carried across to people is important. It should clearly spell out that the KM system is in place for the common good and rewarding for all stakeholders. Efforts should be made to make people understand that it is a friendly system that encourages rather than the one that forces people to use it. When a KM system starts from here in unambiguous terms, it will have more passengers with it than is the case otherwise. Start it with a bang and make everyone aware of the KM mission.

Set the focus

Once people see the purpose half the job is done. But then not all that people know are important or needed by a company. There will be a chaos and waste of energy and effort if the focus is not set. A KM system in a company could have multiple focus areas but then not all will be focusing on everything. Depending on the role people / departments play and expectations of the management focus should be set for different groups and individuals. More details within each focus area would further help people to come forward and contribute to greater benefits of the organisation.

Clarify 'Knowledge'

Purpose is clear and focus is there, can people still get it wrong. One is tempted to assume that people will know what to contribute. But then it's worth the time and effort to clarify what knowledge is, to people who matter since the term knowledge is often used in a very broad sense. KM literature is full of definitions of 'Knowledge' and how it is different from data and information. It is important that Knowledge as claimed should be actionable and result in benefits for the organisation. The diagram given alongside captures the knowledge gaining process and when the edge can be gained.

If knowledge, as claimed, passed through the above process and passes the 'actionable and benefits' test then it will sharpen the competitive edge of an organisation.

When people will share and use knowledge?

In sports, we often say 'he/she is an enigma' when performance falls flat despite high promise. It applies to businesses also. Many businesses under perform due to the gap between knowledge acquired and knowledge used. Nowadays companies understand the importance of knowledge and how it can help them gain or sharpen the competitive edge. They are trying with KM systems, and software play a huge role in that. Software help companies to capture, store and channel knowledge. But knowledge sharing (converting the tacit form into explicit one) and using the knowledge in store are outside of the software systems. These two aspects of knowledge management require people to have faith and trust besides other facilitating systems.

Conducive environment for knowledge sharing

I have had numerous interactions with people on this issue and what motivates or demotivates people to share knowledge. The diagram given alongside captures those responses and my own observations. It tells us when knowledge sharing will take place or in other words the diagram captures the environment that facilitates knowledge sharing.

Listening ears - This is paramount for knowledge sharing. When one learns about an issue or has a idea to share he needs a listening ear. It is men at the front who knows more than the men in corner rooms. Irrespective of where someone is and what he does, he must be listened to when he comes up with an idea, solution or even a problem. Each piece of information thus received should be assessed for its worth and treated accordingly. When one knows his words found a good ear, he will be motivated to share more.

Formal record - It is important that each piece of knowledge shared and found useful must be recorded and due credits given. This further improves a person's faith in the system.

Feedback / Action - Was the knowedge acted upon? What is the status? Into the dustbin or to the penthouse? Feedback is important as it acknowledges and is also a way of respecting the person who shared the knowledge.

Recognition of contribution - When knowledge shared is useful and to be acted upon the same should be recognised and the person concerned be given public credit. Depending upon the importance and criticality of knowledge shared, the concerned person be made responsible for action or be rewarded in other ways.

Career growth - Count knowledge sharing for promotions and other recognitions. Rewards are fine but almost everyone would love to move up the ladder.

Direction - Last but not the least, direction. Lack of direction can kill a KM initiative. It's just not enough for a CEO to know the direction, everyone must know. Otherwise databases will be full with less or none to act upon. What? Why? How? Where? must be clarified to help people contribute better. Direction alone is a subject for many more posts. I will do it at later.

Making people use knowledge

The other challenge of KM, as we already discussed, is making people use knowledge. Primary reason for people to not use knowledge in public domain could be the credibility of knowledge shared. To make people use knowledge shared and feel comfortable and confident in doing so, one may ensure that following are taken care of.

Certify knowledge - Once a knowledge shared is accepted as useful then the same should be certified by an appropriate authority. This is more vital for a knowledge that is yet to be used or tested.

Proof / Evidence - Show evidence of work or benefits of a knowledge acted upon. This helps people to adapt it faster with confidence. More such evidence; more confidence in using new knowledge.

Do not penalise - When a knowledge acted upon fails to yield positive results, do not penalise the one who used it nor the one who shared it. Learn from the failure as that's an opportunity to improve things. But never forget to reassess the status of 'knowledge' in question and inform concerned people.

Reward / recognise - Reward and recognise people who show enthusiasm to test uncharted territory and use new knowledge shared. Publicise successes and learn from mistakes

When you develop a knowledge management system, remember to keep above points in mind. KM system is not just software but much more than that. People must be prepared, nudged, helped and cared to share and use knowledge. If two big challenges of KM are tackled well then other challenges, if any, can be handled with much more ease.

All the best.

See the earlier post on KM 'Two big challenges of Knowledge management'

Two big challenges of knowledge management

"when a person joins an organisation he/she is obligated by the terms of employment to use and share the knowledge in his possession for the benefit of the organisation"

Knowledge is central to the success of a business. But then knowledge acquired (recruiting people) does not automatically translate into knowledge shared or in use. People, the carriers of knowledge, rarely volunteer to share their knowledge to the greater good of the organisation. Some people (viz., owners) treat this as a betrayal. This kind of thinking hardly helps the situation and knowledge further retreats into the shell.

Knowledge acquired is not knowledge shared and used

Knowledge gained from schools pares in comparison to knowledge gained out of experience. It takes quantum leaps with exposure to work environment, people, situations, challenging positions, problem solving, failures etc. A person starts at say K0 and travels upwards to Kn. This gain in knowledge helps people to establish themselves firmly in an organisation and determine their career advancements, emoluments etc. Asking an employee to share his knowledge for the common good, without proper systems to facilitate it, is tantamount to asking him to lower his guards. Just like a company that wants to grow, every individual wants to grow. How many companies are willing and volunteering to share their knowledge for the greater good of the industry or economy and run the risk of blunting their competitive edge? There may not be an agreement to that effect, one may argue, but the case is similar when the context shifts to employees and an organisation. A worker cannot machine a component if the lathe is not there. Likewise an employee cannot be expected to share knowledge voluntarily if knowledge assisting and supporting systems are not in place.

Knowledge captured is not knowledge used

"We have a KM system in place and recently bought a KM Software to take care of it"

You may have heard those words from many CEOs and managers. The truth is you cannot buy a knowledge management system. A KM software is not the be all and end all of a KM system. It just is a part of a KM system. It serves a business as a means of storage and retrieval. To store, something has to be entered. Even in the case of 'explicit knowledge', if completely captured in the software, it has to be used by people.

If making one share knowledge is challenging enough, making another to use that knowledge is equally difficult. Quite a few things like ego (I can do better than him), lack of trust (What if he is wrong?) and lack of training & sophistication (How to use that software? Looks too cluttered. Where is what?) can come in the way of using knowledge in the public domain of an organisation.

Any business organisation that wants to harness its knowledge assets must successfully jump over two challenging hurdles and thereby

• help people to share knowledge
• make people to use the knowledge shared by others

To prepare to overcome these hurdles read the post 'When people will share and use knowledge? linked below.

When people will share and use knowledge?

I will be happy to have your feedback and know whether my posts are helpful.

Thank you.