The Future of Knowledge
Thursday, May 1 | 9:15 am
Presenter: Laurence Prusak, founder, Institute of Knowledge Management and currently distinguished scholar in residence and co-director of the Working Knowledge research program at Babson College
Larry Prusak is a researcher and consultant and was the founder and executive director of the Institute for Knowledge Management (IKM). This was a global consortium of member organizations engaged in advancing the practice of knowledge management through action research. Prusak has had extensive experience helping organizations in the U.S. and around the world work with their information and knowledge resources. He is the co-author (with Tom Davenport) of Working Knowledge and has consulted with many U.S. and overseas government agencies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
Here's a reaction
to Prusak's keynote from APQC's Jim Lee
Larry Prusak finished up
his keynote this morning, which I'd like to sum up in one word--challenge--and
four themes:
1. The monopoly of useful
knowledge is over!
2. New models of knowledge exchange have emerged that will change the way
organizations look in the future.
3. Virtual collaboration cannot provide the richness of in-person interaction.
4. Storytelling is better than MS-PowerPoint.
Larry's talk challenged
some long standing frameworks, "truths," and even some emerging trends. So in
short, he piqued the interest of everyone, regardless of their original
viewpoint.
Citing that historically
a "monopoly" of knowledge by Western civilizations allowed those to flourish,
today's access to information has democratized it, reduced its transaction
costs, and increased the value of true knowledge. So emerging economies, like
those in the
Changes in how knowledge
is socialized today directly challenges many organizational structures--the
hierarchical ones that is. Networks have proven to be valuable in removing
rigidity. Good to know that Larry sees the world the way APQC does!
Virtual collaboration,
while having value, cannot supplant the face-to-face context of knowledge
exchange. Prusak felt strongly that those not well connected in a physical
office environment (read: virtual workers), not only miss key opportunities for
knowledge sharing, but also have pretty sealed their fates in advancement
opportunities. As APQC's first virtual employee (after I was given CPR) I
quickly asked Carla about clearing out a cubicle in the office for me!
Okay, so Larry didn't
really say that storytelling is better than PowerPoint, but he did say that he
got rid of his bullet points over a decade ago.
Great stuff...but I'm
challenging Larry's challenge (at least the virtual worker one). What's your
take?
Outstanding presentation.. and afterwards something crossed my mind.. at this conference we've put a lot of emphasis on using KMEdge for comments and blogging etc.
Larry asked that if we can do so much on-line.. why are planes so full, why we were here at this conference in person, and whether people use virtual churches.
So, I'm sitting with Matt Sherman from Maple Leaf Foods and Pam Daniels from Starcom.. and I asked them.. "given that time is finite, what do you want to do more of while you're here - have productive learning conversations or type on your computer.. "
I'm sure you can imagine what the answer was..
So, we now have an interesting personal conflict..
Yes but -- its really not an either or choice. You can do both. Just not at the same time. Each can build on the other. I can share thoughts with you asynchronously and I can also deliver you a big data dump that you can read faster than I can talk. You consume that and then when we talk we have more to talk about. I prefer my right arm but I still love my left.
One of Larrry's comments was about Novartis re-architecting their buildings based on "knowledge principles".. if anyone has any more information on this it would be helpful.. we are about to begin a long term "retrofit" project to deal with our aging building, and our Facilities colleaghes have been asking about information, best practices, and case studies of organizations who have structured facilities for better knowledge sharing / collaboration.. any one have any pointers - references??
For the record, I just have to cite my new second line manager's experience. She is a virtual worker who lives several states away from the corporate heart in New York. She was a director not long ago, then was promoted to exec assistant of the 2nd most powerful exec in IBM, and was just promoted to VP. So in IBM, virtual workers do get promoted, and you don't have to move to New York anymore to be somebody in IBM. I don't really think her case is that rare.
We used to joke that IBM = "I've been moved," but the new joke is "I'm by myself," in my case in the back bedroom. But it doesn't feel like I'm alone. I'm constantly in contact and collaborating with IBMers all over the world. I couldn't get that in the office, and I would really miss it. A global network is an incredible personal asset.
Larry Prusak's comments were thought provoking. His question about what an organization would look like if it were serious about knowledge sharing was great. The idea that command and control structures won't be given up easily also resonated for me. Not that this is why I added my comment but did I win?
I agree that Larry's comments were thought-provoking. The shift toward democratization of knowledge is indeed a critical juncture in mankind's social and intellectual evolution.
In addition to simply stating the issues and challenges that confront us, I would have liked to hear suggestions for how to meet and respond to those challenges -- something constructive and actionable that I can begin to apply with my work team and integrate into our KM approach.
What I love about Larry is that he lights a fire and we all want to warm our hands (and opinions) there.
Thank you, Alice. I thought Jim was going to pass out.
PS Next year, let's have big wild panels of thoughtful provocateurs at a main session--with dozens of mics on the floor. other thoughts? We use Open Space approaches at our Knowledge Transfer sessions ---free form sessions, show up and talk about whatever you want, wherever it goes. I love them.
Or, after the conference we could devote some serious "themed" conversations here about some of these issues and get at "So what do we do on Monday morning?" once we feel we understand them.
I'm rambling. It's late. (and per Dale's point,I choose face to face when I can, then I sit here like Arriana Huffington the rest of the time :-)
Dale,
Re Novartis. here is a design firm www.degw.com that designs buildings as knowledge sharing space. There is a whole discipline around this. Steelcase and Herman Miller do a lot of research and you can find good stuff on their sites. (also checkout the workstation treadmill at Steelcase. I may have to get one of those.)
I just wanted to mention that a few people have commented on Larry Prusak's keynote in the KM Edge blog. If you're interested in seeing all the responses to this keynote, make sure you check out http://kmedge.org/2008/05/jim-lee-and-others-on-larry-pr.html as well as this page
I loved Larry's focus on "knowledge" and the value of it - agree, it's expensive. I think we all should spend some time really thinking about the differences - and making a BIG distinction - between "collaboration, e.g., knowledge sharing" and "knowledge application." Isn't the only way we see the value of knowledge is when it's finally applied to something that needs an improvement, a decision, a change, etc.? And isn't KM about providing methods and tools for us to apply knowledge? --Cindy Hubert
I enjoyed the conversation about social computing, generational differences, and social networking. Not to plug their books, but Jennifer Deal and Misti Burmeister have written great books on the topic of generational differences. Ms. Deal discusses that the generations basically have the same needs/wants/desires (in slightly different priorities), but the key is that each generation EXPRESSES those needs/wants/desires differently...
In terms of the new edge of km, I'm thinking that the "web 3.0" discussion will be something that km can be proactive about. If web 3.0 is the transformation of the web from a network of separately siloed applications and content repositories to a more seamless and interoperable whole, then as KMers, we might be able to add the 'connecting people' element to this discussion...
I enjoyed the speech that he presented. Very much and took extensive notes. I also found several links that might be of interest to others:
http://books.google.com/books?q=Laurence+Prusak&btnG=Search+Books is a link to all of Laurance Prusak's books.
http://www.laurenceprusak.com/ is a link to his web site.
http://sloanreview.mit.edu/wsj/insight/organization/2008/03/10/ is a link to an article he co-authored that looks at Knowledge Creation, Knowledge Dissemination, and Knowledge Application and provides suggestions for managing them effectively.
http://harvardbusinessonline.hbsp.harvard.edu/b01/en/search/searchResults.jhtml?Ntx=mode+matchallpartial&Ntk=Author%20Name&N=0&Ntt=Laurence+Prusak is a link to articles he has authored for Harvard Business Review.
I spoke to Larry after his speech and pointed out that both India and China have serious social class and governmental control issues, respectively, that are going to handicap the development of their knowledge worker economy. Other countries should not rely on these obstacles remaining fixed, but they do represent a source of friction for these two countries. He agreed with my point *and* chastised me for not bringing it up during the Q&A (guilty as charged).
Found an interesting article on CNN.com today about telecommuters flocking together in order to have other people to connect with while working:
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2008/news/workathome/
Here is a link to the Wikipedia page for the Black Swan, a reference from the early part of Larry's speech:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Black_Swan_(book)
There is an article on the MIT Sloan Review titled "Putting Ideas to Work" that Larry Prusak co-authored with Thomas H. Davenport and Bruce Strong. It does not appear that you have to be a subscriber to the web site to view. This is the same article that appeared in the WSJ on 10 Mar 08.
The link is:
http://sloanreview.mit.edu/wsj/insight/organization/2008/03/10/
I copied this short summary of the article:
The Issue: Knowledge management, in practice, has fallen short of its goal of transforming the way companies work.
The Problem: Many firms have focused solely on disseminating knowledge via technology, ignoring the other aspects of knowledge management.
The Bottom Line: Organizations need a broader management strategy, one that addresses how they are creating, sharing and using knowledge. The authors provide examples of all three.
One of the trends mentioned by Mr. Prusak was the "Democratization of Knowledge."
He stated "What is the result if everyone thinks they know everything? If time and attention are really such scarce resources, to whom do we listen to form our views of the world? Is there a natural mechanism to filter the important or truthful from the unimportant or heavily biased? How do the "best" ideas rise above the din?"
There is a related thought about this in one of the free articles on the web site for the Center for Generational Studies about the impacts of polarization on our society by Robert Wendover (speaker for from OJT to DVD). The link to the article is:
http://www.gentrends.com/what_is_polarization_doing_to_our_society.html
One idea that Mr. Prusak shared was that telecommuting or working from home was a non-starter. While I agree with his basic premise that one misses a lot when they aren't around the water cooler with their compatriots, I found his proof of that theory to be lacking. His proof was his finding that there are no execs at IBM who work from home. But earlier he had told us that IBM had an organizational structure that was too inflexible to meet the demands of today's business environment. So...if IBM is a bad organizational model, wouldn't it seem that one of the causes of that would be the same cause that leads to having no execs who telecommute? Does anyone know whether knowledge flexible organizations have telecommuters on the C deck?