Posted by John Tieso on May 01, 2002 at 14:15:05:

In Reply to: KM cynic posted by Alison on May 01, 2002 at 02:37:24:

You have every right to be cynical (and even skeptical, if you choose)over the success of organizations who 'knowledge-manage' their staff.I believe you will find that there are no real success stories here.

However, the concept of learning organizations and the management of intellectual assets (knowledge and experience)does not have to seem like a gulag. The early concepts of KM saw it as an extension of process understanding, and a way to improve those processes, document them, and preserve the information on them over time for future employees to use. That could even include the records digitzation folks who were rushing to complete their electronic libraries.

Basically, KM recognized what process reengineering and other process improvement theories did not--you cannot separate the employee entirely from the process. if you do, the models and workflow become static and immediately obsolete. If you want those models to be useful over time, then you have to know not just what people do in a particular activity, but also how they do and why they do it in a particular way. it also helps to know the formal and information resource circles they use to validate what they do. All of thisis a part of a knowledge map that tells the whole story about activity.

In those firms that have recognized these things--Sears, John Deere, Caterpiller, E&Y, AMEX, etc,there are numbers of stories, best practices, and successful results that can be applied in other projects.

KM is NOT designed to create another set of 'cast in stone' procedures. it is designed to understand the work environment in a new way that fosters innovation and experimentation while understanding the bottom line requirements for success.

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