Last
week, APQC had the pleasure to host Dr. Gerald (Jerry) Blanton as a guest
facilitator of our monthly KM community call. The central question that Dr.
Blanton raised during the call was: How do you know when you've reached the
limits of effectiveness of explicit knowledge? While the idea of codifying
tacit knowledge is a basic tenet of knowledge management, would it be a good
thing if all knowledge became explicit (even if that were possible)? Dr.
Blanton suggests no--that even the crush of existing explicit/documented
knowledge has reached diminishing returns and, in fact, become detrimental to
sharing and absorbing knowledge in practical terms.
Since the
exchange among Dr. Blanton and the attendees was so rich and varied, I've
decided to keep the discussion going here. Just as thought starters for
everyone (all are welcome to add to the conversation whether you attended the
call or not), I've included some of the questions, commentary, and ideas below.
Dr. Blanton asked:
- Is
there a cultural limit to the effectiveness of explicit knowledge
documents, and what "signs" suggest that an organization is approaching
that limit?
- What are
the necessary elements of an effective tacit knowledge sharing program?
- How can tacit knowledge sharing be used to complement explicit knowledge documents?
- What recommended
best practices have organizations used to improve tacit knowledge sharing?
During
the call, our attendees added:
- What incentives should be
provided to encourage people to enter and share information?
- What about "knowledge
conscious managers" and using communities of practice to diffuse tacit
knowledge?
- How do synchronous (e.g.,
face-to-face meetings) and asynchronous (e.g., video clips or discussion
forums) methods fit into the process of sharing tacit knowledge in support
of explicit knowledge documents?
- How do you get "type A"
personalities to heed the advice of others?
Okay, now it's your turn--when is too much too much?
My 2 cents:
On the cultural limit to effectiveness of explicit knowledge: my personal experience is that people are being left "on their own" to find the information they need. Signs of this are when people are repeatedly asking (the same) questions, though I have to admit, that documentation is often the first activity that suffers from cost cutting.
I think that some essential elements of effective tacit knowledge sharing are: 1) active participation of all involved parties, 2) properly facilitated K-sharing events, 3) challenging.
In my opinion tacit K-sharing should always be used in reference to facts that can be explicitly explained, like showing tests/examples during a science class/college while explaining what and why it happens.
CoP and collaboration are often mentioned as the glue for tacit K-sharing. I think people in the K-sharing area should focus on developing (virtual) "classroom" trainings. Practical examples, experiencing real life situations is often the best method. The reason for this is because it makes a bigger impression. Too expensive or not practical you think? Still better than jotting it down on paper and hoping they understand. Alternatively think about the increasing possibilities to do this kind of things virtually. Why do you think does the Air Force develop these expensive (flight) simulators?
One of the most important incentives for people to participate is by challenging them; learn their interests and believes and confront them with any anomaly.
"K-conscious managers" and CoPs are important to keep K-sharing alive (enablers), but in my opinion not key.
These methods are essential, and I believe that new tools, like eMeeting, will evolve and make it possible to apply these methods virtually. I strongly believe that the gaming industry will play an essential role in this.
"A-type" people are just another type of people, boxed by the community, who probably need a different approach for being challenged. It might be harder to do this, but there always is a way.
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Although the size of manuals matters (also for handling) I believe the way people can access the information they contain is more important. A good TOC and index/glossary already helps. A "logical" structure also, though logic can be subjective, so needs explanation. When manuals grow why not split them? Information must be accessible and presented in chunks that can be (easily) comprehended, which is different for everybody, so needs to be adjustable for the readers. Ditto when designing eLearning material for a virtual audience.
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I hope this helps to get a forum on this very intersting subject going.
Jan,
thanks for the feedback -- your experience is similar to ours.
I would observe that splitting a manual may not be the best solution. At times, information gets put in a manual because we have no other place to put it -- I suggest we look a little harder for the best explicit document for that information and then move that information out of the oversized manual. Splitting a manual may merely produce two doorstops instead of one.
r/
Jerry Blanton
Jim.. to the question "How do you know when you've reached the limits of effectiveness of explicit knowledge?" or as you put it "when is too much too much.."
Dr. Suzanne Zynger of Monash University recently suggested an interesting applied definition for knowledge management - "what you need to know at work when you need to know it."
In that frame, I'd say that there is too much explicit knowledge (information)when people can't find what they need when they need it. That could be for a variety of reasons: too much, can't find the right stuff, it's of poor quality, irrelevant, requires different experience set to make sense of, etc.
And of course, "too much" is based on an individual's assessment - we've all got varying capacities to identify, assess, consume and make sense of information. I don't see that a universal limit or benchmark is possible.
Jan, I've got to disagree somewhat with your statement above "K-conscious managers ... important to keep K-sharing alive (enablers), but in my opinion not key."
I belive that "k-conscious managers" are people who evolve cultural practices, recognition systems, business processes and systems, and technology/facilities infrastructures that explicitly encourage purposeful learning knowledge sharing, and the building of individual and workgroup capacitity to do same. In essence, looking at all aspects of business through the "lens of KM."
Without managers at all levels on side, any form of activity / project for improving knowledge sharing risk failing - as in a manager who discourages a staff member from participating in a highly relevant community of practice in favour of focusing on "real work".
One of the failings I think of many knowledge strategies/programs is not purposefully building knowledge conscious managers, who ultimately make knowledge management decisions or need to support them.
I also think there is a very close relationship between knowledge conscious managers and Facilitative Leadership. In The Art of Facilitative Leadership: Maximizing Others’ Contributions by Jeffrey Cufaude, facilitative leadership is described as:
- making connections and helping others make meaning
providing direction without totally taking the reins
managing content and process
- inviting disclosure and feedback to help surface unacknowledged or invisible beliefs, thoughts, and patterns
- focusing on building the capacity of individuals and groups to accomplish more on their own, now and in the future
Ultimately I think it all boils down to managers doing whatever is required to facilitate effective knowledge work, as defined by roles and responsibilities in organizational context. This strikes me as being a very inclusive approach covering everything from making information easier to create, capture and access, to improving group and team interpersonal effectiveness and collaboration though the explicit, systematic facilitation of group processes.
Therefore, if you subscribe to the notions that KM is just good management, and that a manager's role is to facilitate knowledge work, than facilitation as a fundamental mind set, and a key core competency, has even greater importance in today's knowledge based organizations than even the facilitation community has been promoting well over the last fifteen years.
Perhaps organizational management and leadership development programs need to explicitly identify, bundle, include and emphasize facilitation and other knowledge-conscious/facilitative leadership capability development opportunities.
Dale,
With respect to your entry for 5 November, in response to your comment:
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I'd say that there is too much explicit knowledge (information)when people can't find what they need when they need it. That could be for a variety of reasons: too much, can't find the right stuff, it's of poor quality, irrelevant, requires different experience set to make sense of, etc.
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There would seem to be a difference between too much explicit knowledge (e.g. manuals)/requires different experience set and poor quality/irrelevant material. The first two requires training and added tacit knowledge to correct; the latter two can be fixed by updating or improving the content of the manuals themselves.
I find your thoughts on 6 November a little more challenging. My concern is that "k-conscious managers" are in limited supply and efforts to ask a manager to change their leadership style can be difficult, particularly if the manager believes she/he was successful using whatever style they currently employ. (Have you ever tried to tell a micromanager that enough is enough?) Therefore you have to assume your KM program will have few "k-conscious" zealots, at least at the beginning.
I think the first step in a successful KM program is to make the program relevant to your business and easy to use. When I try to implement change, I usually start with Kotter's article on "Leading Change: Why Transformation Efforts Fail" from the Harvard Business Review, March-April 1995. My feeling is if you know what pitfalls you face ahead of time, you can take measure to avoid them.
Good article Jerry.. thanks.. if I'd ever read it in the past, I've certainly forgotten about it. And I agree with your split view comment re: explicit knowledge. In particular, designing documentation (whether online or print based) to improve usability for intended purpose.
And I think you're absolutely right about the limited supply of knowledge conscious managers, and the difficulty of personal change associated with leaving a historically 'winning formula' behind. Past success can certainly be an intoxicating driver of current/future actions - but as we all know, it also hampers valuable learning and really doesn't help with adaptability / flexibility in facing new, unique situations /challenges.
Without question, making a knowledge program or strategy relevenat to business is critical - otherwise there is no point in doing it. And despite the difficulties, I think building k-conscious managers is also crtiical to shift managers' view of a knowledge program/strategy as something done "to them" or (better case) "for them" to something done "with them." Because of the critical role managers play in an organization -- do not HR firms say managers are the #1 reasons staff leave or stay -- their active support and engagement in any knowledge (change) program / strategy is critical in making change stick. Therefore, building more knowledge-conscious managers should be a key element of change programs related to knowledge.
Dale,
thanks for your 17 November comments. You raise an interesting question -- how do you grow or mentor k-conscious managers? (Certainly APQC would say 'send them to us, we can make them k-conscious!') In my past, I have seen efforts to transform an organization to a new focus on quality only to have the internal resistance overcome senior management's vision. (Senge et al talk about sustaining transformations in "The Dance of Change.") It would indeed be an interesting forum to discuss how you create k-conscious managers? I suspect that many references touch on the topic, but a focused discussion might be worthwhile.
Jerry