Knowledge Unplugged The Deakin Portal

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Knowledge Unplugged The Deakin Portal

• Professor Brian Corbitt
• Deakin University

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Introduction

• In the modern higher education setting academics
  and general staff and students are trying to
  grapple with the increasing global nature and
  accumulation of knowledge and the vast qualities
  of information and knowledge that are created and
  stored daily.
• Knowledge is at the heart of much of todays
  global economy and at the micro level, at the
  heart of our higher educational institutions.
• Managing knowledge has become vital to success.

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Introduction

• There is a need to manage knowledge in different
  ways and incorporate their knowledge into
  structure and processes, which assist those in
  the institution.

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Introduction

• In 2003 Deakin University introduced the first
  phase of what is known as the Deakin Portal.

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The Deakin Portal
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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• The introduction of portals into universities has
  been as a result of mixed motivation.
• On the one hand some universities have introduced
  portals because it was accepted from about 1999
  to 2002 that portals were the way to go. They
  were replacing intranets.
• They were seen as a means of creating new
  structures which would enable large organisations
  such as Universities to in some way produce a
  clever solution to a problem that has existed
  since the mid 1990s.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• The problem was essentially too much information,
  too many services and therefore the desire to
  provide solutions of this for students and staff.
  
• However, invariably the solution was driven by
  the need to introduce a technology and it was
  subsequently driven by the technology.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• At Deakin we have taken a different approach in
  terms of introducing a portal and what the portal
  is about.
• It is essentially in our view, a means of
  unplugging the knowledge that exists within the
  University.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• Knowledge is important as is the management of
  knowledge in institutions such as universities
  because it makes a difference.
• It enables the organisation to ensure growth and
  inevitably create value for those that use it.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• There is a belief in the literature that getting
  knowledge management right brings substantial
  benefits to an organisation.
• But what are these benefits?
• Are they something that you just expect because
  you have created a knowledge management system or
  introduced a portal?
• Or is there an expectation that you can drive
  benefits from a system by putting in place a tool
  that will enable knowledge to be made available
  to more people?

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• The Deakin Portal is a means of incorporating
  knowledge.
• It is a means of recognising innovative ideas.
• It is a means of trying to keep information up to
  date.
• It is a means of implementing continuous quality
  improvement.
• It is a means of being able to deal competitively
  with other like institutions.
• It is a means in some cases to, reach world
  class or exceed world class.
• All of these things are utilised in many
  University strategic plans as the reasons why
  they use them.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• Knowledge is pushed through the portal rather
  than enabling knowledge to be pulled through that
  structure and it is this direction that we are
  tyring to drive what is happening at Deakin.
• We want the users of the portal structure to
  demand what knowledge they want, what
  capabilities they have, or that they want,

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• Pulling knowledge is very very difficult.
• Push is something that is deeply engrained in our
  society.
• It has been very much a part of the higher
  education system in Australia to push activities,
  push technology, push solutions onto students.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• We need to do some things to encourage a pull
  environment to unplug the knowledge which is in
  use in the University.
• We need to dismantle individual barriers.
• We need to have an acceptance in the University
  that knowledge is power.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• Successful knowledge management programs rely on
  sharing not hoarding.
• Knowledge sharing starts by taking the time to
  help others and this invariably means that we
  need to introduce a culture of cooperation,
  rather than a culture that knowledge is power.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• The second thing we need to do is align the
  individual motivation of each stakeholder in the
  University in which an administrator or general
  staff member or a student to align their
  individual motivation with corporate goals
• To come together to avoid hoarding.
• To increase the gains that come from co-operation
  and to set high or world class targets to
  encourage acceptance of external knowledge and to
  foster the personal engagement and responsibility
  for peoples own ideas.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• This cannot be done by introduction of a portal.
  
• It has to sit beside the introduction to
  implementation of strategic planning and the
  introduction of operational planning and at
  Deakin we have done that as well.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• We need to put in place incentives to increase
  cooperation.
• These incentives can be can be financial, they
  can be personal, they can be driven by other
  forms of status.
• We need in a sense then to create a new scenario
  for knowledge.

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Knowledge Unplugged - The Deakin Portal

• What we have to do is embed into the portal a
  culture
• that knowledge can be character building.
• That knowledge can be unplugged by encouraging
  people to transfer knowledge, to self re-enforce
  the notion that knowledge transfer is good.
• To accept that knowledge wears out and that
  content has to be changed and accept that
  spontaneity is a fundamental part of what occurs.
  
• The serendipitous nature of knowledge management
  is a key component of the nature of a portal.
• Knowledge cannot be generated on demand but
  developed spontaneously.