Posted by Kees de Vos on August 04, 1999 at 08:25:36:

In Reply to: Where are the hard (business) arguments? posted by Martyn R Jones on August 03, 1999 at 19:07:46:

Martyn,

in my opinion you would not be out of line, you would actually have a very good point, and a valuable contribution by stating your perception of the information exchanged.

In this Forum indeed has a tendency to find problems, instead of solutions, which could lead to a pretty sceptic view. On the other hand I beleive nearly all participants are devotees of the KM concept (and maybe they try to prevent euphoria by focusing on the problems).

My opinion? Yes KM can be done. KM has as many footangles and problems as you wish to identify.

On the HARD business arguments: in my experience KM is VERY context-specific. A lot depends on current organizational culture, systems (not just IT) in place, strategy, goals, etc. EVERY organization can benefit of KM but nearly all in a different way. I could list a lot of SOFT business arguments, but why copy the arguments of many other authors? And besides that managers want to hear HARD business arguments (see Reilly Atkinson's posting of his encounter with the manager of Schlitz), which in my opinion are dependant on the context (organization. product, service, market) the client is in.

In my opinion I tend to see a cultural issue as well. In the US a consultant has to "sell" his views/product/services to a manager, in Europe managers seem to have a strategic view of KM themselves and are searching for a sparring partner that fills up their "blind spots", hence perhaps my emphasis on bottlenecks and footangles (to identify my own blind spots).

I hope this will not be viewed as "nortern european intellectual imperialism and aggression" :-). If it is, please explain to me what gave you this impression, as it is not the kind of feeling I would like to imply in my communication.

• Help me sell more Schlitz!

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Follow Ups:

• Re: Where are the hard (business) arguments? Martyn R Jones 16:43:15 8/04/99 (2)
  • Re: Where are the hard (business) arguments? John Tieso 13:59:28 8/09/99 (1)
    • Re: Where are the hard (business) arguments? Martyn R Jones 05:31:26 8/10/99 (0)

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