Posted by Denham on October 09, 2000 at 13:15:30:

In Reply to: Re: Advice required: Knowledge sharing report posted by Andy on October 09, 2000 at 11:07:45:

Andy,

Let me say right at the start that attention to content structure is not as important as support for the community, i.e. No amount of navigation aid, search functionality, taxonomy construction, thesaurus building or contolled vocabulary is likely to compensate for building alignment, having a clear purpose, allowing self-selecting, providing sanction for learning and connecting to cohorts.

I have found an issue based ontology [taxonomy, knowledge map, navigation scheme] to be the most effective for communities of practice. You start with a brainstorming session to surface concerns, issues and likely future focus points. Get the community to sharpen their boundaries around the key concepts (I use concept mapping), help them to come to a shared understanding and meaning for the key concepts (web-based facilitated conference) and their relationships. Develop a practice whereby the author is responsible for allocating [classifying, binning] his / her contibution, but allow this field to be edited by all. No publication (release!) until the piece has been allocated.

Keep the conversation around the issues alive as they will alter and change with time. Do not make this another hoop, but sow the seed it is essential for the system to function. The key here is the shared understanding of what the key issues mean!!

Other ontologies never seem to work quite as well as an issue based one (which brings focus and awareness, encourages dialog and stimulates feedback) e.g. divisional, imported from a dominant discpline, company wide generic, product related .....

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Follow Ups:

• Re: Structuring content Andy 04:37:55 10/10/00 (6)
  • Re: Structuring content Denham 09:21:29 10/10/00 (0)
  • Re: Structuring content Robert Benjamin 08:10:52 10/10/00 (4)
    • Re: Structuring content Andy 08:58:56 10/12/00 (3)
      • Re: Structuring content Robert Benjamin 04:44:22 10/13/00 (2)
        • Re: Knowledge Ecology, AI, Ramble Andy 05:16:32 10/13/00 (1)
          • Re: Knowledge Ecology, AI, Ramble Robert Benjamin 02:33:01 10/18/00 (0)

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