A Short Course in Knowledge Management
By Jerry Ash
 Introduction
When the chief executive
of a state association left his post to assume the responsibilities
of President and CEO of a national organization, he told his
fellow state execs he expected "continued disrespect."
He got it.
By "disrespect,"
the chief executive meant he wanted to continue the free and
open dialogue he had enjoyed with his colleagues at the grassroots
level.
His emphasis on
communication soon generated an avalanche of faxes, sharing the
association's political events and day-to-day policy development
with constituencies across the country. In the spirit of "disrespect,"
his colleagues responded bluntly: "Stop the fax machine!"
At the time it was
just a good-natured test of a new association executive's management
style. But in another part of the business world, significant
events were taking place that mirrored the association exec's
dilemma. Fortune 500 companies had spent billions of dollars
installing information technology and developing communication
networks that would meet the challenge of the Information Age.
They too were disappointed in the outcome. Computers and file
cabinets became choked with unused data and information which
were rarely accessed by workers who were uncertain about their
roles and overwhelmed by the enormity of it all.
It was not news
in the association world that information and the need for networked
intelligence is at the center of what an association does. But
when the industrial world awoke to the fact that the worth of
their companies depended largely on what they knew in an exploding
new knowledge-based economy, the earth moved.
Managing knowledge
and information suddenly became as important as managing financial
capital or physical plant. As industry urgently searched for
ways of managing the knowledge asset, it became clear that the
old military command-and-control model of the industrial past
would not work in the knowledge era. And the knowledge asset,
for the most part, wasn't exactly corporate property stored somewhere
in the company warehouse. It was to be found in the heads of
its knowledge workers. Although not yet expressed in financial
statements, employees became assets, not liabilities - they held
the knowledge.
Because the knowledge
asset has been elevated in the business world, associations no
longer have a captive market. Paul S. Forbes, founder of The
Forbes Group, Fairfax, Virginia, a strategic management consultancy
for associations, observes that historically the principal product
of associations has been information. "But with the explosion
of the World Wide Web, associations' lock on information has
been pried open and their constituents increasingly demand net-time
knowledge that won't wait for snail mail or the next convention."
The challenge to
associations runs even deeper than technology. Big Six accountancies,
executive management consultancies and countless communication
specialty groups recognize the stakes and have jumped on the
bandwagon.
Add to this phenomenon
an accelerating demand for speed in the processing of knowledge.
Ken Derr, chairman and CEO of Chevron, said: "Every day
that a better idea goes unused is a lost opportunity. We have
to share more, and we have to share faster." A report in
January, 1998, by the U.S. Labor Department reveals that the
race for knowledge also impacts the nature of the work itself.
A two-year study shows that up to 70 percent of workplace learning
is accomplished on-the-fly, calling into question the value of
formal training programs that are presented in their own good
time and costing as much as $50 billion annually.
This is the environment
in which associations now work. It is full of threat: that members
in search of knowledge may find the association less relevant
after they turn to another knowledge resource. And, it is full
of opportunity: that members may discover renewed and increased
value in an association that becomes an effective partner in
the knowledge chase. Whether an association is a winner or victim
depends on whether it is quick to understand and respond to the
new environment. Clearly, an association must learn how to do
more, better -- organize, manage and deliver the right stuff
on time, at the right time.
Associations will
have to adapt quickly. They will need to rethink what they're
doing, how they're doing it and why. They'll need to tear down
barriers and antiquated processes; replace them with a systematic
approach to knowledge-sharing based on the dynamics of a changing
knowledge market.
From lessons learned
by early adopters of knowledge management, we know we need to
understand what knowledge is, find out who has it, reorganize
operations to nourish and manage it, change the work culture
to support it and build knowledge networks around it.
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Understanding
knowledge
With stocks trading
on the international market at an average of six times their
companies' material worth (Microsoft at 15 to 1), the business
community is keenly aware that its value is more deeply embedded
in what it knows, not what it owns. This revelation extends to
all organizations, whether profit or not. But the bigger shock
comes with the realization that an estimated 80 percent of the
knowledge asset isn't owned. It's not in computers; it's not
in file cabinets -- it's "rented." It clocks out every
night when the employees go home.
Knowledge, then,
is people-based. It's information that has been processed, analyzed,
distilled and packaged by the human mind.
Information is not
knowledge. That became painfully clear during the Information
Age when organizations invested heavily in information technology
only to find themselves drowning in vast in-house caches of meaningless
and unused data. Now they are inundated externally with even
more mega-tons of information, unfiltered on-line. Organizations
that do not understand the difference between knowledge and information
will fall once again into the technology trap.
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Auditing knowledge
If knowledge is
an asset, it has to be managed just the same as the financial
and physical assets of the Industrial Age were managed. It is
estimated that 70 to 80 percent of what our workers know is hidden.
We don't know what we know and we don't know who knows it.
Can you imagine
such a scenario in the Industrial Age? If an organization didn't
know what its tangible assets were or who had them, it was likely
headed for bankruptcy? Even though much of knowledge is intangible,
it is the primary asset and the knowledge audit is an essential
precursor to managing it.
Here are some of
the basic questions of a knowledge audit:
- What does your
organization know?
- What doesn't it
know?
- Who needs to know
it?
- Who knows what?
- Are they inside
or outside the organization?
- Do your leaders
understand knowledge?
- The value of knowledge?
- Are they leading
by example?
- Does your organization
systematically organize and transfer knowledge internally?
- Is it systematically
acquiring and sharing knowledge outside the organization?
- Are you creating
new knowledge?
- Are you leveraging
knowledge to benefit your members and the association?
- Do you measure,
assign value to the knowledge asset?
- Is your work environment
knowledge friendly?
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Restructuring
for knowledge
One of the reasons
our knowledge is hidden is a top-down and fragmented organizational
structure. With few exceptions, associations will discover through
a knowledge audit that they are poorly organized to do business
in the Knowledge Age. Unless they've recently restructured with
knowledge management in mind, their operations are likely patterned
after the top-down hierarchies of an industrial past.
Knowledge-focused
industries, such as IBM, Monsanto, Dow Chemical, and the management
consultancies, have already begun a transition from the old "command
and control" model to a decentralized, collaborative approach
more conducive to innovation and knowledge-sharing. Associations
will need to consider the same. Managing the flow of knowledge
requires a much different strategy than managing the movement
of parts on an assembly line.
The organizational
structure of a knowledge-based association will abandon the linear
organizational chart and replace it with a modular structure
similar to that used by Monsanto's Life Sciences Company. Functions
will replace departments in a cluster of interconnected modules
that encourage interdisciplinary collaboration and the natural
formation of knowledge networks. It will form an organization
without walls that reaches across internal barriers and outward
to embrace members, non-members, even perceived competitors.
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Changing the work culture
If confusion isn't
the best description of today's work culture, it will become
so when knowledge workers hear that the new management strategy
considers knowledge and knowledge workers as valuable assets
and that knowledge management calls for everyone to break out
of the old work patterns to initiate, innovate and share knowledge
freely. Forgive them if they are suspicious.
For most of their
professional lives, they have fit themselves comfortably into
professional pigeon holes where they do their best to meet the
performance standards of narrowly-defined job descriptions. They
have left the "big picture" up to the "front office"
and taken comfort in the fact that their jobs are secure as long
as they do their assigned tasks and keep their noses out of other
people's business. Further, workers have assumed that the more
they know the more secure their jobs are. This culture discourages
out-of-the-box thinking and abets knowledge hoarding.
Then their faith
that individual knowledge would protect them was shattered during
the era of business process reengineering. Cost accountants saw
the most knowledgeable workers as an expense, a liability that
could be eliminated through down-sizing. As a result, many organizations
pushed large quantities of their intellectual assets out the
door. Those who were left saw an ugly message - knowledge is
a liability both to the employer and the employee. Worse, knowledge
hoarding may have been replaced by a new culture of knowledge
hiding!
Into this cultural
confusion comes the knowledge movement. Although some associations
may not quite fit this worst case profile, some of it will likely
apply. History will have to be overcome.
Management consultancies
have first-hand knowledge of that fact. Before they began selling
knowledge management consulting, they tried to practice it. International
networks of consultants were expected to communicate through
newly-created computer networks by sharing their own problem-solving
experiences with other consultants whose clients had similar
problems. They didn't. That's when the cultural barrier became
clear. Consultants, after all, are in the business of selling
their own knowledge; so, why share it, even with one's own colleagues.
And besides, they were far too busy working with their own clients
to take time out to help other consultants help theirs.
Changing the culture
will be the most difficult step in creating a knowledge-based
association. It must begin by establishing (or reestablishing)
an environment of trust and mutual benefit.
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Building knowledge networks
Knowledge management
cannot be layered on top of an already-existing work process.
In an open, knowledge-based organization, interdepartmental cooperation
and collaboration must become an integral part of the daily routine.
Teams will not be appointed; they will form naturally in a knowledge-friendly
environment through the free flow of information and ideas, leading
to common goals that are dependent on the interaction of skills,
knowledge and resources of cross-functional groups (not teams).
Individuals will
not only be aware of "the big picture" but actively
involved in shaping it from the bottom up. No longer will the
organization's best thinkers wait for directives from on high.
Groups will not be limited to staff participants. In fact, knowledge
networks should provide an interactive link with every conceivable
knowledge resource, not the least of which is the members.
When members become
directly involved in the interaction of a knowledge network,
they will be the communicators -- not the recipients -- of communication
and they will be much less likely to yell "stop the fax
machines." In fact, they will be actively involved in solving
problems not pointing to them through the traditional market
study approach to member satisfaction.
While knowledge
networks are forming naturally in such a positive environment,
the systematic management of networks will be essential if all
this energy is to be productively directed toward the goals and
objectives of the organization. We can just as easily be overwhelmed
by "knowledge overload" as information overload. Knowledge
itself is a seemingly limitless resource, but handling knowledge
has its limits. Strategic thinking, planning and action are just
as important in selecting and managing knowledge networks as
in begetting committees. Decentralization must not mean disorganization.
The knowledge-driven
organization needs leadership from the governing board, the chief
executive and the management team. They will be the knowledge
champions. At the same time, someone will have to assume the
important new role of knowledge manager and it will be difficult
to find the person who will fit the position profile. Colleges
aren't turning out knowledge management professionals just yet,
although a few business programs are beginning to offer the course.
Meanwhile, the new knowledge manager will likely be found in
one of those old pigeon holes we hope to abolish.
Information management
specialists see the opportunity and many are campaigning for
the knowledge manager's job. But while they talk "knowledge,"
it sounds too much like "information" -- remember,
80 percent of knowledge isn't in computers. Human resource and
education professionals have some of the skills needed by a knowledge
manager and they are moving up to the position. But they too
bear the burden of narrow backgrounds.
One answer to this
dilemma might be the formation of the first network, made up
of a blend of talented people from operations, human resources,
education, communication, member services, marketing and information
services. No one person possesses all that knowledge, but this
little network would. Then the network coordinator (they don't
have "chairmen" authority figures) could act as knowledge
manager. That would not only provide a solution to the problem
but demonstrate the very purpose of knowledge networking.
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Utilizing
computer technology
Even though this
article warns against the "technology trap," information
and communication technology has an exciting role to play as
the great enablers of knowledge networking. But they are the
medium, not the message. Once human networks are formed, the
application of interactive technology can succeed because it
will be layered on a new knowledge community with a need for
the mutual sharing of knowledge and ideas. The power and effect
of knowledge will be amplified far beyond the limits of time
and space and the association will be a valuable resource in
the virtual world.
Technology is such
a vital player that leaving it until later would be just as fatal
as letting it dominate the initiative. Educating computer techs
to the true meaning of knowledge cannot begin too soon and selecting
computer consultants should be based in part on their ability
to pass the quiz -- define knowledge; describe the role of technology
in managing knowledge; tell us how much you know about our knowledge
needs.
Getting started
There are those
who believe that knowledge management is just another fad. They
are wrong. It is as certain as the knowledge economy and the
prevalence of the knowledge work that demands it. There is much
yet to be learned about managing knowledge, but a wait and see
attitude will seriously jeopardize the future of any association.
Now is the time
to get started. The knowledge audit is a good beginning. It will
help develop an understanding of the knowledge need and assess
the capacity of an association to be the knowledge leader in
its field. It will defeat fear of the unknown and set the wheels
in motion for strategies, planning and action which can retain
the association's position as the premier source of expert knowledge
and information for its members.
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