Welcome to the Gurteen Knowledge Log. In this blog I blog items of interest that I have found on the web, experiences or insights that I think you will find useful mainly but not strictly limited to the area of knowledge management and learning. Like the rest of my site - it an eclectic mix.
Yes I do it. I started doing it about ten years ago. And yes I too have something to sell at times. Ten years ago almost no one was doing it and I had many a debate with people who thought I was crazy.
Today many more are doing it and as Hugh MacLeod says in his post on Selling by giving in another five years it will probably be considered normal.
I am still surprised how few conference organisers have really caught on to social media and have learnt how to use it effectively. So much can be done with social media to help market an event but one of the simplest things is to agree and communicate a conference tag as early as possible.
At KM India recently tweeters had to guess the tag which resulted in two tags being used #KMIndia and #KMSummit which resulted in a lot of confusion.
This great post on Tagging and face-to-face events by John David Smith makes the case for conference tags and gives some solid tips.
Why oh why do we still use podiums at conferences? I was at a conference recently and there was no lapel mike available and no hand mike - just a fixed mike on the podium which meant I had to stand behind the damn thing, not walk around and not move my head too much. How can you relax and interact with your audience tied to the spot like that!
And then in South Africa, at a recent conference - again only a fixed mike on the podium but the podium was a large wooden one, at least four feet high maybe higher. Two of the African women who spoke were not much taller than the podium!
Take a look at the photo - yes there really is a speaker behind that podium! Crazy!
In this year’s letter Bill talk's about the importance of innovation for solving some of the world’s biggest problems and how he and Melinda see innovation as the factor that will make the difference between having a bleak future and a bright one. The letter explains how they decide which ideas to fund and talk about the benefits, time frame, and risks of each one.
If Bill and Melinda only achieve a fraction of their vision they will make a real difference in the world.
Also take a look at Bill's new website Gates Notes if you want to track what he is up to. He has also just started a twitter account and already has over 300,000 followers.
Blogging for knowledge workers: incubating ideas - Comments
I have long admired Lilia Efimova's work on blogging. If you are interested in what it means to blog within an organisation then I suggest you read this recent article by her on Blogging for knowledge workers: incubating ideas.
Here is a little taster:
Blogging is primarily known as an instrument for personal publishing, reaching a broad and often unknown audience without pushing content on them. While blogging is personal, most of its advantages are the result being part of an ecosystem, where weblogs are connected not only by links, but also by relations between bloggers. Those relations do not appear automatically: it takes time and effort before one can enjoy social effects of blogging. To sustain blogging before those effects appear it is important to find a personally meaningful way to use a weblog.
KM for Business: Managing successful KM projects to achieve business results - Comments
I will be visiting Jakarta once again in March where I will be leading a two day KM workshop with KM Plus - Learning Lead on March 10 - 11. This will be the third such workshop over the last few years and I will be sending out more information to those of you in the region in the next week or so.
I have yet to finalise my itinerary, so if you would like to invite me to work with you in any way or if you would like to meet with me informally for coffee, lunch or dinner please get in touch.
Detail of the workshop is as follows:
Topic: KM for Business: Managing Successful KM Projects to Achieve Business Results
Venue: The Boardroom, Four Seasons hotel, Jakarta
Date: March 10 - 11, 2010
Target audience: Directors, Managers, Business Profesional, and KM practitioners.
This workshop is a series of KM-Plus annual International KM events, which was started with Knowledge Cafe (March 2007), Social KM (July 2008), and now KM for Business (March 2010).
Alfie Kohn, children, rewards, motivation and KM - Comments
I have a huge respect for Alfie Kohn and have been blogging about him since 2002! But I have only just thought to look on YouTube for some video clips of him speaking. Well, I got lucky and found several clips from which I have created a YouTube playlist of clips from some of his talks.
Video Playlist: Alfie Kohn
This is a playlist of short video clips of Alfie Kohn speaking at conferences. Alfie writes and speaks widely on human behavior, education, and parenting.
Media Information:
Alfie demonstrates time and time again how our thinking is screwed up when it comes to the education and raising of children. This is bad enough. But the same habits and practices get carried over into the work place. We still try to punish and reward employees to "make them" to do what we want - even when there is no evidence that it works and plenty of research to show that it does not!
Video: Daniel Pink on the surprising science of motivation
Dan Pink examines the puzzle of motivation, starting with a fact that social scientists know but most managers don't: Traditional rewards aren't always as effective as we think.
I have long been saying that Universities are in for trouble - as why would a student get out of bed early in the morning to attend a boring lecture when he or she could watch one of the world's best professors on the subject deliver the lecture at any time of the day and night that they chose - maybe with a friend or two and a few beers.
Knowledge Management video competition. - Comments
So all you KMers who enjoy shooing and editing video - Patrick Lambe of Green Chameleon has announced a Make a Video about KM Competition. Go for it - it should be fun!
If you have not had the chance to participate in one of my Knowledge Cafes and have wondered what they are all about then I will be giving a 1 hour webinar about them for the Ark Group on 9th February at 16:00 GMT where you will have a low cost opportunity to learn a little about them.
If traditional incentives can have a negative impact, what's the workaround? - Comments
Video: David Gurteen on Incentivizing Knowledge Management
David Gurteen on Incentivizing Knowledge Management: David Gurteen talks on how incentivizing knowledge management kills intrinsic motivation and negatively affects true value of the practice. This interview was conducted by Alakh Asthana of eClerx Services at KM India 2009 in Chennai.
Media Information:
In this interview at KM India, I was asked for my views on "Incentivizing Knowledge Management". Well I explained the reasons for not doing it but did not suggest an alternative approach which was picked up in one of the comments by "firetangent". Here is my response.
So if traditional incentives can have a negative impact, what's the workaround?
First stop using them; they don't work and do great harm.
The problem with traditional incentives, rewards and talk of motivating people, engaging and empowering them etc. is that this approaches the situation from a mindset of "doing things to people". It says "they are lazy people; we know best and we will find ways of manipulating them to do what we would like them to do".
People see through this; they resist; they become cynical and it actually makes matters worse!
Here is my answer "Stop doing things to people and start to work with them!" Rather than "Hello I am here to help you!" (Oh yea!) Take the attitude "Hello, lets talk and see how we can better work together."
Its that simple!
But there is secondary issue here. Asking "how do we incentivise people" - makes the big assumption that they need to be incentivised. Yes, they may not be doing what you would like them to be doing but how do you know that the reason is lack of motivation. You don't. If there are problems then you will only find them out by sitting down and talking with them!
Interactive 5 day workshop supported by extensive eLearning program.
Workshop Leaders: Barry Hardy, Beat Knechtli, Pavel Kraus, Michael Wyrsch, Stephan Bohr, Douglas Weidner
Topics: KM Practices, Business Case, Strategy, Program Planning, KM
Frameworks, KM and Organisational Culture, Change Management for KM
Programs, Leadership and Competencies for KM, Knowledge Assessment,
Metrics, Enterprise KM, Process-oriented KM, Knowledge Mapping,
Benchmarking, Expertise Location, Search, Personal KM, Web 2.0,
Communities, Collaboration
I agree with him when he says that we are increasingly trying to document and control the world - to professionalise it, to require academic qualifications and certification. I find it a worrying trend. And I love Johnnie's labelling of it in all its forms as the tyranny of the explicit!
When I was at KM India 2009 in Chenna, Alakh Asthana of eClerx conducted a series of short interviews with me on a number of KM topics. Here is the first in the series on what I had to say about incentivizing KM.
Video: David Gurteen on Incentivizing Knowledge Management
David Gurteen on Incentivizing Knowledge Management: David Gurteen talks on how incentivizing knowledge management kills intrinsic motivation and negatively affects true value of the practice. This interview was conducted by Alakh Asthana of eClerx Services at KM India 2009 in Chennai.
We asked CLOs if their organizations encouraged reflection, because we know that if there is no reflection, there is no learning. Less than a third of them said that their organizations encouraged reflection. And that’s just encouraging reflection. You know that in most organizations it isn’t happening at all. That is suicide. If you don’t set aside time for reflection it will always be set aside for today’s immediate task.
To my mind, this is yet another benefit of open conversation and knowledge cafes in that they encourage reflection. If you are not reflecting, you are not learning!
Three of my favorite talks from TEDIndia - Comments
I hope you are aware of TED - to my mind one of the best sites on the web - maybe even the best. The speakers and their talks are outstanding. But I do hope you have been following the first TED event in India - TEDIndia.
So many good talks but just three I would like to share - the first two especially - as they demonstrate how individuals with a burning passion and a cause can make a real difference in this world.
One of my good friends in Singapore is Lt Col Karuna Ramanathan who is Deputy Head of the Center for Leadership Development in the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF).
I met up with him during my recent trip and we had lunch together. I knew he had been doing a lot of work with AARs but did not realise that the SAF had slightly modified the After Action Review (AAR) process.
He spoke about this at KM World and Robert Swanwick blogged about it in an article entitled 2-5-1 Storytelling. Take a look! The key difference is the bit about relationships and the final item "what was the most important takeaway from the event?" I rather like the changes and think I will adopt them myself when ever I facilitate an AAR in the future.
A talk by Dr David Vaine on 4th generation knowledge management! - Comments
Those of you who know Patrick Lambe of Straits Knowledge may also know his alter ego Dr David Vaine. Dr Vaine gave a short speech at the ACTKM Annual Conference Dinner in October earlier this year where he outlined the key features of Fourth Generation Knowledge Management, and dealt with the difficult question of managing the transition between Generation X and Generation Y in the workplace.
Here are the first three generations of KM according to David Vaine! Enjoy the video!
Ist generation KM pioneered by No Knuckles "making tacit knowledge explicit"
2nd generation characterised by David Green Teen "lets all just chat"
3rd generation characterised by Dennis Snowden "its all about complexity, complexity"
You will find other video talks from David Vaine and more serious ones from Patrick Lambe on Patricks blip.tv channel.
We cannot problem solve our way into fundamental change, or transformation - Comments
Whenever I run my Knowledge Cafe Masterclasses, a few people always have a serious problem with the fact that when run in its "pure form" there are no tangible outcomes of a Knowledge Cafe.
There are plenty of intangible ones, such as a better understanding of the issue, a better understanding of ones own views, a better understanding of others perspectives, improved relationships and genuine engagement and motivation to pursue the subject but no outcomes in the form of a decision or a consensus or a to-do list.
My belief is that the way we create conversations that overcome the fragmented nature of our communities is what creates an alternative future.
This can be a difficult stance to take for we have a deeply held belief that the way to make a difference in the world is to define problems and needs and then recommend actions to solve those needs.
We are all problem solvers, action oriented and results minded. It is illegal in this culture to leave a meeting without a to-do list.
We want measurable outcomes and we want them now.
What is hard to grasp is that it is this very mindset which prevents anything fundamental from changing.
We cannot problem solve our way into fundamental change, or transformation.
This is not an argument against problem solving; it is an intention to shift the context and language within which problem solving takes place.
Authentic transformation is about a shift in context and a shift in language and conversation. It is about changing our idea of what constitutes action.
Chris and Geoff's first book was Learning to Fly and I consider it one of the best books available on KM. This new book is of equal calibre.
We have been taught to look to "experts" for help and advice. And although we often do need guidance, we know more than we think. Given the complexity of our twenty-first century organizations it is dangerous to rely on external consultants who can never fully understand the richness of the context in which we work.
In this book, Chris and Geoff provide tools and techniques that allow us to tap into our innate capabilities and to do away with rather than automatically relying upon external consultants!
I love this story of TOMS shoes. So far they have given over 150,000 pairs of shoes to children in need around the world. The story is a great example of how you can create a for-profit business and still do "social good".
Blake Mycoskie, while on holiday in Argentina. and with no desire to get into philanthropy, met some kids who didn't have shoes and the idea was born. One man! One great idea!
You may be interested in this recent interview with Theodore Zeldin by Ana Neves. It seems it was me that put Ana on to Theodore and as many of you will know I love his work and quote him in most of my talks and workshops. You will find lots more about him on my website including some of my favorite quotes of his.
If you have heard Dave Snowden speak you will almost certainly have heard his children's party story. I must have heard it a dozen time or more and it get better with each rendition. Take a look :-)
You will find two more videos on the Cognitive Edge YouTube Channel and I gather from Dave that several more will be posted over the coming months.
So what is identity? What is digital identity and what is identity 2.0?
Until recently I had not given this a lot of thought but than I got talking to Serge Ravet about running a knowledge cafe at the MISC 2010 conference to be held in London in late January and he introduced me to the topic.
After a conference, have you ever left your name tag on by mistake and had complete strangers say hello to you.This happened to Scott Ginsberg some years ago and he decided to keep his name tag on. He has been wearing a name tag now 24 x 7 for over ten years and turned it into his trademark.
I wore a name badge once at a talk by Theodore Zeldin at the Tate Modern in London. It was a public event and I wore the badge so other people who were attending whom I had invited but never met would recognise me. I was the only one there with a badge and was surprised at the number of strangers who said hello and started up conversations with me. So I can emphasise with Luke's experiences.
I love it in hotels, restaurants, conferences etc when people wear name tags so I can address them by name. Its just so much more friendly and makes it easier to strike up a conversation. One criticism I have of many conference organisers is that the persons name is in very small print so you cannot read it, or the badge is covered with marketing logos so the name gets lost or those name tags you hang around your neck that always twist away from you so once again you cannot read the name. The best name tags contain the name only as BIG as possible and with the given name larger and in bold compared wit the family name!!
As I love to network and talk to strange, I like the idea of always wearing a name tag much of the time though I am not so sure about 24 x 7. Do I have the courage? LOL! I am not too sure. Do you?
Conversations at Starbucks: Say hello to a stranger
- Comments
I often work in a coffee shop. More often than not a Starbucks. For some tasks, I need peace and quiet, in which case I switch my phone off, drop my internet connection and focus on the job in hand. But for many tasks I find the background noise and the coming and going of a coffee shop or hotel lobby more conducive to say creative thinking. The distractions paradoxically help my thinking process.
And in public places I also get the opportunity to meet people; occasional people I know but more often complete strangers. I like to talk and have developed a few techniques to start conversations with strangers. Asking a parent about a child is always a great conversation starter or something as mundane as commenting on the weather. And its always easy talking with service people such as receptionists, waiters or maids.
But it always strikes me how hard it is for many people (including myself at times) to talk with strangers at conferences or lectures especially when the organisers have given no thought to helping facilitate networking and conversations.
In this article on Starbucks: Whats true cost of a Starbucks latte, Bryant Simon laments about the lack of conversation and community. If he owned a coffee shop it would have a big, round table strewn with newspapers to stimulate discussion.
The article concludes with Bryant saying "People want these conversations, people want to feel connected," he said. "I'm pretty sure about that." I am pretty sure about it too! What do you think?
Many of you will be familiar with the speed networking sessions I hold at the start of my knowledge cafes and workshops. Its a great way of breaking the ice and getting people talking and engaging with each other.
I often hug people rather than shake hands though usually only when I know them and more often with women than men. The Speed Hugging post by Steve Pavlina has prompted me to hug more. Its not that difficult even with strangers and like Steve suggests if in doubt I ask first.
I also need to achieve some balance and give hugs to more men. LOL
On best practice and thinking for yourself! - Comments
Dave Snowden frequently criticises the concept of best practice such as here in this article and in an article in Harvard Business Blog, Susan Cramm questions it too.
Steve Billing in his blog recently added weight to what David has to say. He comments that best practice" ignores the most important factor – the people who are working with the practice or model". He adds that "best practice and its forebear benchmarking both divert attention from the people and the context, focusing entirely on the disembodied prescription or model, as though it can be implemented anywhere and get the same successful result".
I am often asked for best practices in KM though what I discern is that what people really want is a prescription - a recipe they can blindly follow. But as I am so fond of saying "there is no substitute for thinking for yourself!" - in the complex real world of KM - there are no best practices; there are no simple recipes!
Steve says this "Instead of looking at best practice, focus your attention on the particularities of your situation, trying to understand all the factors at work, not just those prescribed in your model or best practice. Reflect on how your own participation is affecting, and is affected by, the way these factors are playing out in your organisation. That way you can help to make sure your attention is on what really matters so much more than a best practice or model – how you are others are interacting with each other and influencing each other in the process of getting the work done."
A little while back I blogged about the idea that we would do better not to focus on idealistic solutions but to focus on the small, pragmatic things that we could do on a day-to-day basis to move ourselves forward. I drew on comments by Dave Snowden, Stephen Billing and John Dewey.
Well now Johnnie Moore has blogged along similar lines see Behaviour change revisited. His post reminds me of a quote from Alfie Kohn that I oft use in my talks and workshops "An innovative, healthy organization requires that we work with people rather than do things to them."
I have just discovered Pecha Kucha - a presentation format in which a presenter shows 20 images for 20 seconds apiece, for a total time of 6 minutes, 40 seconds.
Looks like the driving force was similar to the one that inspired my Knowledge Cafes - a desire to avoid Death by Powerpoint.
I wonder if I could adapt the idea to create a variation of my Knowledge Cafe? But I cannot believe that they have patented the process!
The best definition of KM yet and some excellent guiding principals from Dave Snowden in a recent blog post.
The purpose of knowledge management is to provide support for improved decision making and innovation throughout the organization. This is achieved through the effective management of human intuition and experience augmented by the provision of information, processes and technology together with training and mentoring programmes.
Why do I like this? It starts with the purpose; the business outcome that you wish to achieve. And then follows through with the "how". To my mind, all definitions of activity should take this format. So if I ask "What is your KM project about?" The reply should not take the form "We are implementing COPs" but "Our aim is to improve innovation in R&D through the use of COPs". Start with the specific purpose and then the how.That way you don't get to take your mind off what you are really aiming to achieve! Its the "outcome" that is important not the "how". KM is a how not an outcome! That's why I always say "You don't do KM!".
KM should not be about "knowing more" - it should be about "understanding better". Better understanding leads to improved decisions and innovation. How do we understand better; how do we make sense of the world? Through conversation!
You may have noticed that over recent months that I have often referred to Stephen Billing in my newsletter or tweeted some of his posts. I found Steve only a few months back when I stumbled over his blog and instantly liked his work, what he had to say and the values he stood for and so it was a delight to have dinner with him the other evening in Wellington (thanks Stave for such an excellent meal and great conversation).
This is the power of the web ... I get to meet someone in cyberspace literally half-a-world-away and form a relationship that is later, often much later, cemented in a face to face meeting.
Steve is not the only one who does not like the idea of "putting people in boxes". Dave Snowden thinks that a special place in Hell should be reserved for the creators and perpetrators of what he considers the worst of these psychometric tests such as Myers Briggs. LOL
Personally, I find these tests a bit of fun; they do give a glimmer into people's personalities and are great for triggering reflection and conversation but they shouldn't be taken too seriously.
Do managers need to measure and reward trust? - Comments
Its not very often I "sound off" but the other day I tweeted a section of an article and tagged it as #RUBBISH and having been gently reprimanded, I agreed, backed off and tagged it #DISAGEE LOL.
To me, this not only seems impossible and a huge waste of time but it will almost certainly be "gamed" by many individuals. Value and respect trust - yes - but that's it.
In response, Johan Lammers expanded on the post in a comment which helped explain a little more but I am still not convinced. I think we need to stop trying to do things to people and work with them :-)
Are traditional rewards as effective as we think? - Comments
I think most of you are aware of my views on the rewards ... if not see what I have to say here on Measures Targets and Rewards.
And you may also have seen my little blitz on the subject in Twitter ... tagged #NOREWARDS.
I know many of you believe in rewards - from my Twitter Poll - well over half. But watch this TED video from Dan Pink and see if it changes your opinion at all. Even more compelling evidence that traditional rewards aren't always as effective as we think!
The iPhone: always on and always on you - part of you - Comments
A few weeks back I brought a new 3GS iPhone. Up until then I had an old Nokia handset. I had been putting off the purchase for a long time. I was happy with my dumb phone and did not see the real need for anything more. I knew at the back of my mind I was wrong but I did not realise how wrong!
Those of you with an iPhone will be chuckling by now as you KNOW just how wrong I was!
The iPhone is NOT a phone - it is a personal information, navigation, communication and connection device. It is THE most powerful Social Tool you can imagine. And like all Social Tools you have no idea what they can really do for you until you start to play with them.
I think what amazes me about the iPhone the most - is its potential. The device I have is impressive but I feel there is huge room for improvement.
Out of the box I get the following and more:
phone/sms
contacts database
still camera
video camera
voice recorder
all my music
most of my photos
a very functional browser
a storage device
And these are just some of the Apps I have downloaded so far (and I have yet to pay for an App):
Skype
Facebook
Twitteriffic and TweetDeck
Yahoo Messenger
Wikipedia
Dopplr
Google Maps
Google Earth
Weather (Guide)
Time Zone Guide
Currency (Convertor)
Several news feeds: Telegraph, Sky News, ITN News, NPR News
But it is the geolocation functions enabled by the iPhone's inbuilt GPS that seem to me to have the most promise:
Know where I am e.g. Google Maps
Let others know where I am e.g. Google Latitude and Plazer
Know where others are - both friends and like-minded people e.g. Brighkite and Whoshere
Know what is around me e.g. Nearest, AroundMe and WCFinder
Get directions to places e.g. TomTom
And then I have been playing with two apps
PicPosterous that allows me to take photos and automatically uploaded them to the web including Flickr, Facebook and Twitter
12cast that allows me to take 12 second video clips and automatically upload them to the web as a sort of micro-video blog - a video version of Twitter
So a whole new world in the making :-)
If you haven't woken up to the iPhone yet - then go out and get one tomorrow! Its only a matter of time before everyone has an iPhone or smart phone equivalent and we are all connected in real-time. The thing about the iPhone is that it is "always on" and "always on you". It becomes "part of you".
I think this technology will completely transform the way we interact with the world. And I can only just begin to imagine the implications of that!
This short video explains joint enquiry as a key way that as a change leader you can engage with your people when trying to generate change in your organisation.
This is a big part of what my Knowledge Cafe's about. It also reminds me so much of Alfie Kohns comment:
Many of the familiar principles of Quality management amount to an elaboration of this simple truth: an innovative, healthy organization requires that we work with people rather than do things to them.
This is the key ... "We have to stop trying to change people and work with them!".
Side note: I have referred to Steve Billing's work several times over recent months. I have never met him but that is set to change when I have dinner with him during my upcoming trip to Australia and New Zealand. I look forward to some great conversation.
Theodore Zeldin is most interested in conversations when we "discover what it is like to be somebody else, and what other people feel".
Watch this recent video interview with him where is celebrates his 76th birthday by inviting members of the public to a central London park to talk to strangers - a delight!
It does not matter if no one reads your blog! - Comments
I have long advocated that blogging is a thinking tool and not a publishing tool. And so many non-bloggers have looked at me as if I was crazy. I will say it again the only way you get to REALLY understand social tools is to play with them. Things then emerge that were not apparent by looking at them or reading about them.
If you don't blog and still don't quite get it - take a look at what Seth Godin has to say about blogs for example it does not matter if no one reads your blog! short video clip with Tom Peters. He is SPOT ON!
With the G8 expanded to the G20, the discussion of a new world order is underway. French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown called for a "New Bretton Woods" agreement in October 2008. Jean Dermine, INSEAD Professor of Banking and Finance called for a new international financial order. The World Bank has issued its World Knowledge Development Reports. The UN released major reports on Knowledge Societies.
My fear is not that this event will not happen; it WILL. I worry that the visionaries who have pushed the frontiers of financial measurement to include the variables of intangible wealth and intellectual capital may not have a prominent seat at the table.
What can WE do - collectively - to help shape the agenda?
A month or two ago I had a meeting at HMRC - the UK's HM Revenue & Customs. While waiting in the lobby I spied their mission statement and was quite impressed. Rather than say "We collect taxes." LOL It said this:
HMRC Purpose
We make sure that the money is available to fund the UK's public services.
We also help families and individuals with targeted financial support.
Ellen has recently published another book Counterclockwise. I have yet to read it but it looks equally as powerful.
She asks the question "If we could turn back the clock psychologically, could we also turn it back physically?" and answers that by opening our minds to what’s possible, instead of clinging to accepted notions about what’s not, can lead to better health at any age. The magic lies in being aware of the ways we mindlessly react to cultural cues.
What interests me here is that if our mindless reaction to cultural cues can exert such a strong influence on our health and well being what is the impact on our creativity and ability to learn and achieve things.
Michele Martin builds on a post by Meredith Levinson on a series of six questions to identify change agents and innovators during a job interview and adds four questions of her own.
These are great questions to consider about your working life, regardless of whether you are going to a job interview or not!
What do you do to build, manage and maintain your network?
If I Google you, what will I find?
What do you do to stay focused?
What do you do to stay relevant?
What innovative solutions have you created?
Walk (me) through a time when you administered change.
What important problems or questions do you see facing our industry? Your occupation?
What do you do to expose yourself to new ideas and new thinking on a regular basis?
What big mistake have you made recently and what did you learn from it?
What matters to you? What are you passionate about? What gets you up in the morning or keeps you awake at night?
I love the bit about being authentic and shaping your brand by sharing little bits of your life one tweet at a time. And using social tools to influence people and tell your story.
Although her advise is primarily aimed at independents and small organizations - I think if you read between the lines and consider yourself or your team as a brand then everyone can learn from what Juliette has to say especially KM practitioners and KM managers.
Instead of borrowing a book, you can borrow a person for a 30 minute chat. An east London library has 26 "human books" available. The aim is to confront and breakdown stereotypes. You can "borrow" a Muslim; a police officer; a person suffering mental health issues; a gay guy; or a young person expelled from school.
So the stereotypes might be religious fanatic; corrupt; unstable; promiscuous; rebellious and so on. It's about having frank and rich conversations with people and learning about different cultures or ways of living. It's about the "borrower" offering up what misgivings or fears they might have of a stereotype and the "human book" responding.
Violence, hatred and racial issues often occur when there is misunderstanding, ignorance and cultural insensitivity. Listening to the narrative of another person who is entirely different from you is a powerful experience. The Living Library challenges preconceptions through promoting dialogue.
I think this is a great idea - maybe I should borrow one of these "human books" and use them to seed the conversation for one of my London Knowledge Cafes - what an interesting thought :-)
I mentioned recently that I would be participating in KM Asia in November. The organisers - the Ark Group - have just announced great early bird deal - take a look at the early bird brochure. It expires on the 21st August.
Nick Milton: Knowledge Management is not an end in itself - Comments
If you don't already know him, I'd like to introduce you to Nick Milton of Knoco by way of a recent blog post of his:
Knowledge Management is not an end in itself. Companies do not exist for the purpose of propagating and advancing knowledge - they exist to sell products and services. But to the extent that competitive advantage relies on informed decision making within the business - knowledge management has a crucial role to play.
This is spot on and to my mind is one of the prime reasons so many KM initiatives and KM teams fail. They are simply not focused on the business.
But take a look at all the other material on Knoco's website (though I do wish Nick would lighten up and smile on his videos) - especially Nicks blog and his short KM videos - he has been very prolific of late and you will find a wealth of good KM material.
Google Wave: Wider release this September - Comments
Last week Google Wave was open to around 6,000 developers and Google is planning to send out an additional 20,000 invites over the next month. In addition, Google is planning to release Wave to 100,000 users beginning on September 30th. So register your interest.
There is a lot of interest in this product - if you haven't taken a look at it yet - I suggest you do! I am registered to be informed when it is ready and can't wait to get my hands on it :-)
Euan Semple: Short video clips on Social Media for business - Comments
Euan Semple was recently interviewed for GuruOnline.
Its an interesting format, fifteen high quality teeny video clips where Euan is asked questions about social media and working in a wired world. You can skip any of them and play the clips in any order. Its neat! And of course Euan has some great stuff to say about social tools. Well worth a watch.
I love all the little conversations I inadvertently have in Twitter - many of them via Facebook. They engage me and open my eyes to the world and help me realise that not everyone sees things as I do - either because they actually have a very different perspective or because a little bit of information or context is missing. Here is one example.
I recently re-tweeted a quote from Henry David Thoreau "David Gurteen RT @ThoreauPage: I came into this world, not chiefly to make this a good place to live in, but to live in it, be it good or bad."
To which I had a reply in Facebook (my Tweets automatically update my Facebook status) from Stuart Keeble an old friend of mine from my Lotus Development days: "I don't like this - but FB doesn't give me a simple button to press so I have to comment. Where's the challenge to humanity to leave a better legacy to our children?? Or do we suddenly lose interest in green ideals, in a sense of community and appreciation of diversity??!! "
This was my reply: " Stuart, how familiar are you with the works of Thoreau - if you are - read the quote again and think about what he really means and you may see it differently. If you are not familiar with him and you have the inclination, read Walden Pond and I think you will see it in a new light :-) And see http://www.walden.org or http://www.ti.org. Thoreau was THE original environmentalist :-)"
Stuart learnt a little about Thoreau here but more often or not it is the other way around and I get to do the bulk of the learning :-)
KM Asia, Singapore, 24 - 26 November 2009 - Comments
I will be attending KM Asia in Singapore this year (24 - 26 November 2009). I will be in good company with
Dave Snowden, Founder and Chief Scientific Officer, Cognitive Edge Pte Ltd
Mary Lee Kennedy, Executive Director, Knowledge and Library Services, Harvard Business School
John Girard, Associate Professor, Minot State University
I will be busy ... not only delivering a keynote talk but also running a workshop and facilitating a reverse brainstorming cafe. The theme of the reverse brainstorming cafe will be either "How do you utterly, totally destroy openness and transparency within an organization and ensure that people won't collaborate or share their knowledge?"
or "How do you totally decouple KM activities from the real work of the business and ensure that senior managers kill off KM and that others in the organisation despise you?" (Get the idea of the reverse thinking LOL!) I am hoping we will go with the second question as I feel this represents one of the greatest challenges that KM faces today!
I plan to spend a week or more in the region - so please get in touch if you would like to call on my services or simply meetup for coffee, lunch or dinner.
I will also be attending KM Singapore in Singapore in August.
I plan to spend a week or more in the region and may also be running a workshop in Jakarta or Bali - so please get in touch if you would like to call on my services or simply meetup for coffee, lunch or dinner. Those of you who know me - know I love to meet new people and to network.
I will also be attending KM Asia in Singapore in late November.
Bing - a new search engine from Microsoft - Comments
You might like to road-test Bing - a search engine from Microsoft that was unveiled by Steve Ballmer on May 28, 2009 at the All Things Digital conference in San Diego. Bing is a replacement for Live Search
According to Forester Bing Will Change The Face of Search as "Bing focuses on delivering answers, not Web pages" and "helps consumers make decisions, not just to catalog content."
I am going to start to play with it on occasions where I am looking to make "consumer decisions" and compare it to Google.
I hope you caught the announcement of Google Wave. Google Wave is "a personal communication and collaboration tool" announced by Google at the Google I/O conference, on 27 May 2009 and is expected to be released later in 2009.
Google would like the Wave protocol to replace the 40 year old e-mail protocol and so are open sourcing the protocol and the source code. People have been predicting the death of email for some time and Google Wave might just precipitate that!
It's only too easy to get over excited by a new product but Google Wave looks like a major innovation and its development is worth following closely. Sign up here to be informed when it is ready.
Dave Snowden said something recently that typified my approach to everything that I have done in life over the last 10 years or more.
Knowledge Management should be focused on real, tangible intractable problems not aspirational goals. It should deal pragmatically with the evolutionary possibilities of the present rather then seeking idealistic solutions.
Benner suggests that decreasing your reliance on a preconceived end or means of getting there can offer a new point of departure for new possibilities that were not previously available. To me, this applies as much to individuals in their personal lives as much as it does to people in organisations.
And then yet again I got to build on Snowden's original statement with this quote from John Deway that I found in the comments to the above post.
The ideal of using the present simply to get ready for the future contradicts itself. It omits, and even shuts out, the very conditions by which a person can be prepared for his future. We always live at the time we live and not at some other time, and only by extracting at each present time the full meaning of each present experience are we prepared for doing the same thing in the future. This is the only preparation which in the long run amounts to anything.
Dave Snowden on the seven errors of goverment - Comments
I have long heard Dave Snowden at KM conferences and workshops espouse his views on some of the serious mistakes that he feels governments make and I have always agreed. You only have to look at the disastrous consequences that measures have had on the National Health Service in the UK. The government 48-hour target of a few years ago which stated that patients should only have to wait 48 hours for an appointment to see their doctor was a prime example of one that back-fired.
Well Dave has recently starteed to document some of these mistakes. Here are his seven errors of governemnt - each one is explained more fully in his blog post.
You get what you measure, so if you set a target humans will achieve the target at all costs, ignoring context or the unstated goals that the outcome based target was attempting to achieve.
Outcome based measurement can make people far too comfortable. It's all to easy to achieve an explicit target, especially if you can turn off an empathy (or at least suppress it).
A mechanical approach is by its nature dehumanising in its effect on people and inhuman in its impact on society.
You waste an awful amount of resource just managing the measurement system.
We try and solve issues with idealistic fail-safe designs rather than allowing systems to evolve.
Re-organisation is a disease and an excuse. It's the knee jerk reaction to any failure that ends up breaking your jaw with the recoil.
Communication is all up and down the chain, ironically this mediates information to senior decision makers so they are immunised from the real data
they need, and also from the consequences of their actions.
He also makes the point that this all comes back to one fundamental error, namely we are treating all the processes of government as if they were tasks for engineers rather than a complex problem of co-evolution at multiple levels (individuals, the community, the environment etc.).
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Work on something that matters to you more than money.
Create more value than you capture.
Take the long view.
But to me this is key:
We need to build an economy in which the important things are paid for in self-sustaining ways rather than as charities to be funded out of the goodness of our hearts.
Basically, Wolfram Alpha is a “computational knowledge engine” for the web - an online service for computing factual answers. You can ask it factual questions and it computes answers for you.
Have a play with it and see what you think - its a brilliant concept and like most great ideas - rather obvious in retrospect. I agree with TechCrunch - I think it will be BIG!
When I was in Singapore last year walking near Clarke Quay - I saw that what I thought at first could only be a UFO. An amazing colourful craft swooping and diving in the night sky. But then I realised there were several of them dancing together.
I have been running the beta version for the last few weeks with no problems at all. What I enjoy about Chrome is its minimal user interface design and the fact that is blindingly fast and has some cool features.
If you have not got around to checking it out yet I suggest you do.
Three reasons not to aim for shared values - Comments
I originally tweeted this post of Stephen Billing's Three reasons not to aim for shared values a little while back. Stephen tells me that it resulted in a large number of people visiting his blog and as you can see from the comments it kicked of an interesting discussion.
Shared values are a complete fallacy and the pursuit of them will not help your organisation one bit.
I have empathy with some of Stephen's points but like several of the comments I feel there is a need for shared values but too often like many mission statements they seem trite and self serving and I am really not too sure they achieve a great deal.
Stephen has blogged on the subject again today More About Why Shared Values are Futile. What are your thoughts? Post your comments on Stephen's blog - not here - and join the conversation :-)
The greatest benefit of conversation is that it produces five categories of responses (answers, meta knowledge, problem reformulation, validation and legitimization), not just the answer. We get so much more from conversation, e.g. an unexpected insight, a sense of affirmation that inspires us to new heights or, equally useful, having to confront a realization that we've been trying to avoid; deepening the relationship with a colleague or the introduction to a collaborator we would never have discovered on our own; and on and on.
I suspect, there are even more then five categories. When you enter into a conversation, you are never sure where it is going to take you. Sometimes, you set out with a goal in mind but end up in a very different place. I always tell people at my Knowledge Cafes that it is OK to go off topic - if that's where the conversation leads you - don't resist it - go there - you never know what you might find. So I would add serendipity to the list of categories. What would you add?
ADVERTISEMENT: Online Master of Science in Knowledge Management program - Comments
Interested in pursuing a formal qualification in Knowledge Management? The MSc in KM offered by The Hong Kong Polytechnic University may suit you. Entering its 6th year of operation, characteristics of this program are
Balanced coverage of human and IT-oriented approach to managing knowledge at the personal, group and organisational levels
Suitable for knowledge workers in all industries and learnt concepts are widely applicable
True multi-media delivery with games, animation, peer-to-peer interactions supplementing online content and web seminars
To find out more about this program, please register to attend the next online information session:
7pm (GMT +8 hours), 2nd June 2009
I thought you would like to know that I will be chairing the knowledge sharing stream of KC UK 2009 8 - 9 June this year. This is the major UK KM event and the organizers - the Ark Group - have kindly offered all my readers a 25% discount. I attend this conference most years and have chaired it twice in the past. Its a great event and I look forward to seeing many of you there.
Later in the year, I will be speaking and running a workshop at KM Asia 2009 24 - 26 November in Singapore.
And you may wish to check out KM Australia 2009 4 -7 August if you live down-under. This must be the only major KM conference I have yet to participate in but one of the other David's Dave Snowden will be there giving a keynote.
I'd like to give a big thanks to Marja Kingma (@Marjakingma) for introducing me to BookCrossing - a great way of sharing books you no longer need.
I can't remember who but someone also told me about BookMooch. But I think I prefer BookCrossing as it is less effort.
I have not started using BookCrossing yet - but I do have piles of old business magazines. Every time I go out, I take one with me and leave it somewhere such as a train or a cafe! Hopefully it gets read again before being binned and finally recycled!
Jerry Ash has just gone live with his new magazine Smart People. You can view the first issue online or download it as a pdf.
The entire first issue of Smart People magazine is free, and all lead stories in subsequent magazines are unlocked for public access. The remainder is open to subscribers only.
Smart People Magazine turns corporate knowledge management inside out, brings the power of knowledge work to the mainstream and applies it to living, learning, choosing, creating and working. The power has always been there, and the Web has multiplied your knowledge a million times through the search, communication and social network capabilities of the Internet.
Its a great new magazine and I'd like to congratulate Jerry and his team on all their hard work. I am also pleased to say I am on the editorial board representing KM.
TEDx is a program that enables schools, businesses, libraries or just groups of friends to enjoy a TED-like experience through events they themselves organize, design and host. We're supporting approved organizers by offering a free toolset that includes detailed advice, the right to use recorded TEDTalks, promotion on our site, connection to other organizers, and a little piece of our brand in the form of the TEDx label.
Maybe not too surprisingly, I am still hugely enjoying my daughter Lauren's blog - The Curious Cat (Welcome to The Curious Cat, a blog about being curious, about all the little things in life that bring me pleasure and happiness: cooking, art, literature, friends and family, cats...).
I recently discovered TweetBrain - a complementary tool to Twitter. It allows you to post a question and receive answers from fellow tweeters. Others can vote on the answers given and finally you can choose what you consider to be the best answer.
Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather must recognize that it is he who is asked. In a word, each man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life he can only respond by being responsible.
In April 2005, BLU, the UK's Business Link University, which no longer exists, hired Fifty Lessons to produce a series of video stories for them and I was invited to contribute. They shot six short videos that you can view here on my website - little stories of mine relevant to KM.
I had loaded them to Google Video but Google is putting little effort into Google Video since they acquired YouTube - so much so they have actually lost many of my videos and I am having to upload them again to YouTube.
ADVERTISEMENT: Online Master of Science in Knowledge Management program - Comments
Interested in pursuing a formal qualification in Knowledge Management? The MSc in KM offered by The Hong Kong Polytechnic University may suit you. Entering its 5th year of operation, characteristics of this program are
Balanced coverage of human and IT-oriented approach to managing knowledge at the personal, group and organisational levels
Suitable for knowledge workers in all industries and learnt concepts are widely applicable
True multi-media delivery with games, animation, peer-to-peer interactions supplementing online content and web seminars
To find out more about this program, please register to attend the next online information session:
7pm (GMT +8 hours), 5th May 2009
Well, it seems there is some doubt about its future and a survey is being carried out.
The reason for the survey is to gather people's views on the site, the resources, its relevance to their work and also how they would like to see the site developed.
The future of the library is uncertain. It has already been made a static site and there is a real possibility that it will be closed. On the other hand if there is sufficient support it may be provided with a proper budget. So in addition to the above the survey is being carried out to:
Gather evidence on the value of the site, including case studies of how the library has impacted on people's work
Identify people that it would be helpful to include in the lessons learned review
Identify people that it would be useful to involve if the library needs to look for a new home
Gather information that would be helpful to pitch the library to a new host or funder
Generally stir up support for the library
If you have used this specialist KM library and found it useful could you please help out by completing the survey. It is short and simple and should not take long to complete.
I thought I'd share ten of my recent tweets for those of you who might have missed them. And for those of you not using Twitter - it gives you some idea of the richness of the tweets.
By the way, RT means re-tweet - a bit like forwarding an e-mail i.e. they are not my original tweets but those of others.
You can see a summary of these articles on my website with links through to the actual articles on the InsideKnowledge Magazine website. Or you may prefer to view them in full color on Scibd where they are also downloadable and embeddable.
You might like to note that all these articles including a short booklet containing mainly of them is available freely for re-use.
A recent article is one of my favorites Raising all the ships on the sea where I look at the concepts of the commons; the tragedy of the commons and the more recent concept of the cornucopia of the commons where use of a common resource leads to abundance rather then depletion!
Take a look and see what you think of this three-and-a-half minute rant about leveling the preacher-and-congregation model of learning from Jay Cross. I of course love it as you will recognize that is what my knowledge cafes are about. You can hear the story here of how I started the knowledge cafes in response to death-by-powerpoint presentations.
But also read the comments on Jays post. Some people do not agree with him. But note Jay is not saying that we need to get totally away from the teacher-student model of learning more that we need to shift the balance. Jay himself is in preach mode in delivering the rant and I am sure he was well aware of it. My Knowledge cafes also have a chalk-and-talk component.
And the comments about the road sign metaphor - its not that we need no road signs or no rules of the road but we need more balance. People need guidance at times but by and large we are quite capable of think for ourselves. Once again it is about balance.
What horrifies me is the "sit-and-git" style of teaching taken to extremes. Like the young Chinese woman in Norway who explained to me that when she was a little girl in China, she and the rest of her class were made to sit in nice neat rows and to actually sit on their hands to discourage them from fidgeting; heads up, chests out, facing the front of the class and be talked at! It seems they were not even allowed to ask questions!
To participate in KMWorld 2009 as a possible speaker or workshop leader, or suggest a speaker, please post your submission no later than April 15, 2009 at http://www.kmworld.com/kmw09/SpeakerSubmissions.htm
The event will be held 17 - 19 November 2009 in San Jose, California. I attended in 2007 and I am hoping I maye get to do so this year as well as it is one of the largest and most exciting KM Conference and Exhibition going.
The theme this year: "Resetting the Enterprise: Focusing on People, Talent & Knowledge".
I never encouraged my daughter to Lauren to blog even though I knew she loved writing and was a good writer. So I was delighted when she started last year. As a dad, I have loved her posts, as in each one I have learnt things about her that I have never learnt in conversation. That's part of the power of blogging! And then recently, I was delighted to read of my influence on her.
Some people know from the age of five or younger that when they grown up they want to be singers or doctors or accountants etc. I wasn't quite so lucky. My career aspirations changed every couple of years. I found lots of things interesting and could never fully commit myself to one passion. I just followed the advice my father gave me: "Do what you enjoy most" and with the back-up justification to all my interests that: "variety is the spice of life".
The excerpt is from a post is titled A life of domesticity: a worthy ambition? and in it she talks about her struggle to find a definitive career path. Later in the post she says:
So, I argue that my desire for domesticity can be classed as an ambition, and it can still be feminist because it is not about women conforming to rules laid down to them by their male partners, but about the freedom they have to be able to choose and the support and means they have nowadays to achieve it. With all this talk in the media of "Broken Britain", I think it is a rather worthy ambition and may I even go as far to say that it speaks volumes about the women who choose to pursue such a life. The slight question of taboo almost creates a feeling that I am embarking on a road less travelled! (Which I certainly like the idea of!)
I wonder what she will do with her life? I am pleased, that unlike earlier generations, she has the choice and as a dad I enjoy observing and supporting her. Follow your passion Lauren!
And if you read her post about the Lovely Sunday Roast - it was a great Sunday lunch despite the chilly gravy LOL.
One of the challenges for those of us who believe that we are at the beginning of a very significant period of change in how we see ourselves, our societies and our businesses is how to imagine what the future will be like. Having grand schemes and megalomaniac designs seems out of place with something that is in essence personal and intimate.
Part of me believes that we will get somewhere worthwhile if each of us takes the small steps that seem to make sense to us and that in aggregate these small steps will achieve something significant. The other part of me believes that this will confine us to thinking small and achieving less than we could and that without some inspiring, grander and more comprehensive vision we won't make much difference at all.
This ties in with concerns I have about making things happen in a world where making things happen is associated with old values and ways of thinking. How do you bring about significant change using conversations, influence and sticky ideas rather than command and control and grand plans?
In response, I shared with Euan one of my favorite quotes:
Children do not need to be made to learn to be better, told what to do or shown how. If they are given access to enough of the world, they will see clearly enough what things are truly important to themselves and to others, and they will make for themselves a better path into that world then anyone else could make for them.
Like Euan, I have been wrestling with these very thoughts for some years and clearly Dina has too. Coincidentally, Euan and I met up in London last week and briefly discussed the issue and we agreed to take a long walk along the river Thames in a week or two to discuss the topic. I am looking forward to it.
But I am disappointed to find so few KM people Tweeting. Twitter is one of the most powerful knowledge sharing and relationship building tools on the web.
I know I keep banging the Twitter drum but do go take a look and check out my list of KM tweeters! And follow me. I usually tweet several times a day on something of interest :-)
If you change your behavior, you change your mind. This is an idea I have believed in for some years and have tried to practice it, so its great to see Michele Martin blog about this having been inspired by A.J. Jacobs. This is the essence:
If you change your behavior, you change your mind. This is one of those deceptively simple, profoundly important realizations. It's the "fake it till you make it" school of thought that says if you want to become something different, you have to start by behaving differently.
We tend to think the opposite, that our beliefs must change first and then our behavior will come along later.
Much of professional development is about trying to change people's attitudes by "training" them that they should think differently. This is often unsuccessful because in many cases, we need to first change our behavior before we can change our beliefs.
I'm not going to truly believe in the power of exercise until I actually begin doing it. I have to start with acting differently and it's the process of engaging in new behaviors that helps me start to develop new attitudes.
But, interestingly, Michele goes on to talk about trust - a question that is often asked by KMers "How do we build a culture of trust in our organization?". My answer has always been just start engaging with people and trusting them. Michele says pretty much the same: Act trusting and trustworthy and trust in yourself and others will follow.
Dave Snowden also has some interesting thoughts on trust
(see his posting on Confusing symptoms with cause)
where he sees it as an emergent property of people working together and not something you can create as such or tell people to do.
These two views may seem opposed but I am not so sure that they are. Yes, trust is an emergent property of people working together but then so is distrust. Entering into a working relationship where by default you trust people (even if you are not too sure of them) is much more likely to lead to a truly trusting relationship than entering in to it with an attitude of lets wait and see.
Knowledge can only be volunteered, it cannot be conscripted.
We only know what we know when we need to know it.
In the context of real need few people will withhold their knowledge.
Everything is fragmented.
Tolerated failure imprints learning better than success.
The way we know things is not the way we report we know things.
We always know more than we can say, and we always say more than we can write down.
He has explained each one of them in more detail in his original posting on rendering knowledge.
Great stuff! But the key one for me is:
Everything is fragmented. We evolved to handle unstructured fragmented fine granularity information objects, not highly structured documents. People will spend hours on the internet, or in casual conversation without any incentive or pressure. However creating and using structured documents requires considerably more effort and time. Our brains evolved to handle fragmented patterns not information.
The real world is complex, fragmented and inherently messy and that is not necessarily a bad thing! As Dave says, we have evolved to handle that. Documents? A document is where knowledge goes to die. I think Bill French said this originally in the form email is where knowledge goes to die.
Six Reasons You Should Consider Reading Poetry - Comments
One of the reasons I love Twitter is that I trip across little gems like this one on poetry tweeted by Mary Abraham.
I have little artistic or literary inclination and my knowledge of poetry is limited though there are still one or two poems that I was forced to learn at school that I can still recite almost word for word such as: The Burial of Sir John Moore after Corunna by Charles Wolf and Adlestrop by Edward Thomas.
The joys of a Grammar School education! My old boys Grammar School in Worcester has recently merged with the Alice Ottley, a private girls school, to create the RGS Worcester & The Alice Ottley School Family. And to think in my day they did everything possible to keep us away from the girls but on the other hand my first serious girlfriend at 17 was from the Alice Ottley. LOL.
But I thought I'd share with a poem that has been my favorite for over 40 years.
With Annie gone,
whose eyes to compare
with the morning sun?
Not that I did compare,
But I do compare
Now that she's gone.
You are probably aware of my love of conversation and my belief in its importance in our lives. So you will understand why I find this blog Conversation Kindling by Jim Ericson so amazing. Here is what is says about it.
The purpose of this blog is to share stories, metaphors, quotes, songs, humor, etc. in hopes they'll be used to spark authentic and rewarding conversations about working and living fruitfully. There are at least three things you can gain by getting involved in these conversations.
First, you'll discover new and important things about yourself through the process of thinking out loud.
Second, you'll deepen your relationships with others who participate by swapping thoughts, feelings, and stories with them.
Finally, you'll learn that robust dialogue centered on stories and experiences is the best way to build new knowledge and generate innovative answers to the questions that both life and work ask.
At the end of most of the postings are some beautiful afterwords (quotes that relate to the post) and questions for conversation. And don't miss the post on Schindlers List.
What is the one idea at work which is more powerful than any other? - Comments
One of the things I love about my website is that it as much for me as for anyone else. For example, I have over 750 quotations on my site that I have collected over the last 20 years. Not any old quotes, but ones that personally move and inspire me and I wish to share with others.
I also post a quote of the day on most pages of my website and this is the one I noticed for today:
In every great time there is some one idea at work which is more powerful than any other, and which shapes the events of the time and determines their ultimate issues.
And it set me to thinking. What is that one idea at work today that is more powerful than any other? And wouldn't that make a great topic for a Knowledge Cafe. I must do it!
But this is the joy for me. Francis Bacon has provoked me to think about this but he has been dead almost 400 years! Another man that hugely inspires me is Henry David Thoreau but that's another story.
There are a growing number of LinkedIn Groups many of them dedicated to KM. There is no KM directory but here are most of the Groups (in no particular order) that I have found:
This might just be of interest to some of you - especially the photographers amongst you. Quite simply, for last few years I have been photo-blogging my life on Flickr. Mainly my business life but their is personal stuff too though much of it is restricted to friends and family.
Even I am quite amazed at the places I have been and the things I have done. It is so easy to forget. I wonder what I will make of this collection in ten years time!
You might want to think about doing it yourself - its so easy to do with a digital camera.
I am experimenting with a new Google application called Google Friend Connect - a tool that website owners can use to give their site a more social feel.
Take a look, you will find two widgets on most pages of my website including my home page. The first is a members widget that allows you to join my site, sign in and out, see other members, and use other social features and the second is a wall widget that allows you to post comments, or links to videos on my site.
Its a little like MyBlogLog which I also use on my site but Friend Connect has no where near the same functionality but then it is early days.
If you have not realized it already, LinkedIn has well and truly established itself as the de facto standard social networking platform for your professional life. LinkedIn is for professional connections. FaceBook is more for personal connections but for many people like myself professional ones as well.
Slowly, I am connecting with all my professional contacts via LinkedIn and have over 1,000 established connections. Why? It's the one place I can guarantee finding an up to date profile of the people I know and a means of contacting them.
Fort those of you who have connected with me - Welcome. Its great to see that many of you have only recently joined and I am your first connection.
If you have had an invite from me - please accept it. LinkedIn limits the number of invites I can send to about 2,000 and with 15,000 members of this community that restricts me a little!
If you haven't joined, you should. And please, if I have not invited you yet, invite me to connect with you.
You might also like to join the Gurteen Community group on LinkedIn but although it has several hundred members I am not making full use of it as yet.
Knowledge managers are always asking how they can obtain support for a KM project by demonstrating the ROI especially as the measuring the ROI of a KM initiative is so difficult.
This article by Susan Cramm on the Harvard Business Publishing website is about IT projects but I think is even more applicable to KM projects. This is what she says:
In most cases, the benefits outlined in business (proposals) are a work of creative fiction, and, once the initiative is approved, they are filed and forgotten.
Smart leaders don't waste their time with this. They play the game, but they know how to make the game worth playing. They understand that only 30% of IT-enabled business initiatives deliver as expected and that the other 70% are plagued with unclear business objectives, missing-in-action executive support and inadequate user involvement.
It's a ritual that needs to played! Susan then offers some very sound advise in my opinion. The words below, especially the ones I have highlighted in bold are KEY. In short, business life is political :-)
To build support, it's important to align the initiative to the overall strategic business objectives and to align the initiative to serve the selfish interests of the individuals who will be impacted most.
Recent research shows that our behaviors and habits are more strongly influenced by friends and relatives than we might imagine. Furthermore, it seems that behaviors, ill-health and even moods pass through friendship networks across several degrees of separation, and we are almost bound to "catch" them.
The research applies to our face to face social networks but what intrigues me is the unanswered question: What about our on-line social networks, mediated through FaceBook, discussion forums and the like? What influence do these networks have on our behaviors? I suspect they too have an influence albeit to a lesser degree.
In the article, they offer five tips for a healthier social network:
Choose your friends carefully.
Choose which of your existing friends you spend the most time with. For example, hang out with people who are upbeat, or avoid couch potatoes.
Join a club whose members you would like to emulate (running, healthy cooking), and socialise with them.
If you are with people whose emotional state or behaviours you could do without, try to avoid the natural inclination to mimic their facial expressions and postures.
Be aware at all times of your susceptibility to social influence - and remember that being a social animal is mostly a good thing.
So what to do? Well first I have merged; removed duplicates and sorted Patrick's lists and turned them into links to the individual's tweet page. This allows me and others to quickly click through to their page and check them out. See the list at the bottom of this page.
In clicking through on these folk - many are clearly not focused on KM - a place to browse, a place to start but not a top 80 by any means. And this is a general problem, as many KMers like myself and Nimmy tweet on a wide range of topics but only some on KM. So I am trying to remember to tag my KM tweets with a #KM tag to make them easy to find.
The criteria for my list? That's difficult, but mainly people whom I know and respect; who I follow myself and who frequently post good, relevant KM tweets even if they would not label themselves a KM person as such.
If you consider yourself a "KM tweeter" and are not on any of these lists or you know of others who should be here then please let me know.
So a first crack at my list. But note I will be updating it. (last update: rev 5: 31 March 2009)
David Gurteen's top ten KM tweeters (in no particular order)
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