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A "Community of Practice" (CoP) is defined as an informal network of people engaged in a particular profession, occupation, or job function who actively seek to work more effectively and to understand their work more fully. CoPs can span institutional structures and hierarchies; they can work across business units or even across company boundaries. While traditional knowledge management approaches attempt to capture existing knowledge within formal systems, such as databases, communities can prove to be more effective for knowledge sharing and transfer and, in particular, for problem solving. CoPs can be dynamic and can last for as long or as short a time as their members need them to exist. They tend to be self-forming and self governing, but at the same time there are certain formulas, techniques and tools that can facilitate the creation and operation of dynamic, productive communities. <br><br>
For KM, the significance of the term is that it places knowledge management in the hands of practitioners. In this sense, it makes a profound statement about what KM is, about who is doing KM. "Communities of practice create the horizontal connections that enable the practitioners themselves to become knowledge managers." (Etienne Wenger) <br><br>
The previous seminar on "Communities of Practice in Action" gave rise to a whole new community of its own, with participants making the effort to keep in touch with each other afterwards. We are expanding on the successful model to include more interactive sessions. <br><br>
I chaired the first of these events for Unicom Seminars in 2003. The event is very interactive with plenty of time for discussion and to learn from each other. If you are interested in 'getting going' in Communities of Practice I'd highly recommend it. <br><br>
The normal price is £550 but is reduced to £350 for members of my community.
Flickr Slideshow: ECKM 2006
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David Gurteen
Giving a talk at the Graduate School of Bangkok University, January 2008.
I help people to share their knowledge; to learn from each other; to innovate and to work together effectively to make a difference!
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