Knowledge Management: Addressing Business Imperatives

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Knowledge ManagementAddressing Business
Imperatives

• Vincent I. Polley

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Sound Familiar?

• Why do we keep having to re-learn this?
• How do I know where to find this knowledge?
• Someone mentioned that to me the other day now
  who was it?
• Someone must have done this before but who?
• When she left, she took all that knowledge with
  her.
• It was pure luck that I met him he had just the
  answer I was looking for.
• That went very well how do we repeat that
  success?
• We made this mistake in our other office, too.

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If only
If only we all knew what we each know. If only we
could find it when we need it. If only we could
learn who knows what. If only we never forgot.
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Knowledge Management

• What is knowledge?
• What is knowledge management?
• Why do KM? Why now?
• Examples Schlumberger/BP and The World Bank
• How to plan and implement a successful KM system

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Information Knowledge

• What is useful, what is not?
• What was the context? Where is it?
• Quality of materials
• Advice you have given
• Who has done it before?
• Who knows who?
• Who is the expert? Who is good, who is not?
• Presentation notes
• Missteps you have made
• Missteps others have made
• What has worked and what has not? And, why?

• Cases, Statutes, Treatises, Law Reviews
• Work product forms, samples, checklists and
  precedents files
• Corporate records (Articles, Minutes, etc.)
• Phone lists, calendars
• Law firm lists
• Presentations
• Legal websites
• Client information
• Policies
• Judges

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Knowledge Management Definition

• Systematic approaches to help information and
  knowledge emerge and flow
• to the right people
• at the right time
• in the right context
• in the right amount
• at the right cost
• so they can act more efficiently and
  effectively.

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A vision of how it works
The United States Army
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What does the Army know about hurricane
clean-up?
Prof. John Henderson Boston University 1998
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Organizational KM Drivers

• Cost Pressures
• Efficiency and Consistency
• Compliance Initiatives
• Flexibility and Responsiveness
• Training and Learning
• Recruiting and Retaining
• People
• Knowledge
• Workplace and Professional Satisfaction

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Examples

• Training new employees (e.g., making them more
  effective, faster)
• Control or reduction of external spending
• Use/re-use of work-product (whether internally
  developed, or by external service
  providers)efficiency, consistency
• Reallocation of lower-value work to junior staff,
  freeing senior professionals
• Being able more effectively to compete with other
  employers for quality professionals
• Anticipating an age bubble of senior,
  experienced employees who will be retiring
• Closing/opening offices moving staff closer to
  clients
• Adding new department services supporting new
  business services
• Facilitating more dynamic work-allocation among
  existing professionals
• Improving morale reducing attrition promoting
  career development

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Alignment Discussion

• What is driving the need for better knowledge
  sharing?
• Whats keeping the CEO awake at night?
• Whats keeping the business managers awake at
  night?
• Reducing cost
• Increasing efficiency
• Improving products services
• Making better, faster decisions
• Professional and career development
• Time to competence
• Post-acquisition integration
• Innovation
• Productivity
• Information overload
• What else?

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...and is there a KM component in possible
solutions?

• What are the critical processes that suffer most
  from information and knowledge gaps?

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Main Factors in KM Delivery
People (culture)
KM
Process
Technology
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Degree of Difficulty
People (culture)
Process
Technology
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Main Factors in KM Delivery
People (culture)
Process
Technology
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KM Elements

• Developing and using knowledge assets
• Organizing and presenting knowledge assets to
  users efficiently
• Systematically hosting tacit knowledge (who and
  what you know)
• Building and fostering communities of practice
  around operationally-important themes and areas
  of responsibility
• Enabling collaboration (within communities of
  practice and larger communities)
• Capturing and validating incidental knowledge
  produced as a by-product of community
  collaboration
• Nurturing a cooperative culture

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The Knowledge Iceberg

• Explicit knowledge
• written, codified, stored
• Conscious tacit
• things you know you know, things you tell others
• Unconscious tacit
• Deep knowledge things you dont know you know,
  instincts. Gold dust!

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Similar Initiatives

• Total Quality Management/Six Sigma
• Health, Safety, Environment
• These succeeded when they were embedded in the
  organizations culture.
• They became recognized contributors to the
  bottom line.

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Is KM Technology?

• No technology only helps facilitate KM
• Classic KM techniques (Peer Assists, Connecting
  People, AARs, Retrospects, and creation of
  Knowledge Assets) do not require technology at
  all
• Technology can provide a force-multiplier the
  tipping point
• Technology typically not more than 30 of KM
  costs

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KM in the Workflow
Teams and Departments
Leveraging Knowledge
Communities and Networks
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Schlumbergers Legal KM Effort

• Technology
• Communities of Practice

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Prior Projects Lessons Learned

• Alignment with business (and operations
  management)
• Make sure peoples names are attached to the
  knowledge (e.g., in Knowledge Assets)
• Burn some bridges!
• Communities work best when managed least

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More Focus On

• Training
• Basic KM techniques (AARs, Peer Assists,
  Retrospects)
• embed these in the process
• Reinforcing lessons and examples raise trust
  confidence levels
• Define KM roles
• Culture barriers vs. enablers

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Degree of Difficulty
People (culture)
Process
Technology
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Culture Shifting from Barriers to Enablers

• Knowledge is power
• Building empires
• Individual work bias
• Local focus
• Not invented here
• Outside knowledge
• Penalizing errors
• Not paid to share
• No time to share

• Power KnowledgeShared
• Building new relationships
• Team/collaborative bias
• Network focus
• No single-source solutions
• Seeking learning from others
• Learn from missteps
• Reward sharing
• Sharing is part of the job

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Getting the Balance Right
People (culture)

• Managing knowledge is 20 about technical
  solutions, and 80 about people management and
  cultural issues.
• Stephen Denning
• (World Bank)

Process
Technology
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How to do KM Efficiently and Successfully

• Be Systematic
• Assess
• Select
• Define
• Execute (and Train)
• Operate
• Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control

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Planning
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Planning
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Assessment Process

• Baseline (for improvement measure)
• Benchmark (for comparisons)
• Strengths
• Weaknesses

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Assessment Example
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Benchmarking Predictions
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BOSTON SQUARE - Specific Initiatives
Relative Difficulty
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High impact
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17
5
6
42
15
25
41
37
3
21
11
12
38
31
20
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Lower impact
Relatively easy
Relatively hard
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High impact
26
17
5
6
42
15
25
41
37
3
21
11
12
38
31
20
22
Lower impact
Relatively easy
Relatively hard
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For More Information on KM
Polley, "Share the Wealth What Knowledge
Management Could Mean to your Legal Department"
ABA Business Law Today Nov/Dec
2003 http//www.abanet.org/buslaw/blt/2003-11-12/p
olley.shtml and www.knowconnect.com
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Questions Discussion
More questions? Contact me.