Getting Business Value from KM Strategies

Author(s)	David Gurteen
First Published	March 2001
People	Clive Holtham
Categories	Business Management; Knowledge Management; Strategy

Getting Business Value from KM Strategies

Introduction
There are many ways in which business value can be gleaned from KM Strategies but it is neither a simple nor a one-dimensional challenge. Deploying innovative technology or a new process alone will rarely be fully successful. There are many organizational dimensions that need to be taken into account.

This short paper outlines a step-by-step process that can be used or adapted to help ensure that your KM strategies are successful and deliver business value.

1. Identify the Business Objective
The first step is to clearly identify the specific business objective you wish to support with a KM initiative and understand why that objective will deliver business value.

2. Understand the Business Context
The second step is to understand the overall business context – the organization’s business objectives and business strategy. This is absolutely essential. All KM initiatives need to be designed with this context in mind else we are in danger of “doing the wrong things well”. As part of this analysis we need to understand the challenges and the barriers to the business strategy.

For example, it may be noted that your organization or department has a high attrition rate. If this is the case – then a knowledge sharing initiative that focused on the sharing of tacit knowledge may be a waste of time and a focus on the codification of explicit knowledge may be more appropriate. Better still – it would may more sense to tackle the root cause of the staff turnover.

3. Identify your Organizational Dimensions
The third step is to identify the organizational dimensions within which specific KM initiatives may be taken within your organization to support the obtainment of the business objective in mind and to ensure its success.

Examples of dimensions and possible KM initiatives within each dimension are listed below. For a specific business objective – not all of these dimensions will necessarily be relevant but the list forms a useful checklist and helps us think across the breadth and depth of the organization and how we might muster all our organizational resources to achieve success.

Environment

E.g. create an open plan office space or creativity labs to foster creativity

Human Resources

E.g. create appropriate reward systems – both hard and soft e.g. money and recognition

Organizational

E.g. change organizational structure; appoint CKO or knowledge managers; create new roles

Leadership

E.g. encourage leaders need to evangelize the need for change and to share and to lead by example

Corporate Communications

E.g. corporate newsletter to include article about the new initiative

Training/Education

E.g. run training/awareness courses on knowledge sharing

Procedural/Process

E.g. define new procedures that mandate information capture

Communal

E.g. set up communities of practice and/or communities of interest

Procedural Tools

E.g. use of appropriate procedural tools such as Project Management; After Action Reviews; Dialogue; Communities of Interest

IT Applications & Tools

E.g. deploy knowledge sharing applications, update existing IT systems to better capture information

IT Infrastructure

E.g. deploy an Intranet; deploy a groupware platform; set up specialized IT team to develop groupware applications

4. Identify Specific KM Initiatives
The fourth step is to identify the specific KM initiatives that we feel will help meet the business objective in mind within each of these organizational dimensions. In this step - the how should be answered at a high level and should not go into detail.

For example, if we identify that a sales team needs to better capture and share client information because we wish to improve the quality of client relationships then a specific initiative might be to implement a CRM system.

Later – in the final step when we have completed this analysis and built up the big picture we can come back and drill down to ask the “second level” how - "How will we implement a CRM system?" We need the big picture, as what we decide to do in other dimensions will color our detailed implementation decisions in the current dimension. In other words - this is a holistic approach. Everything is dependent on everything else to one degree or another.

Finally, having identified the initiatives - we should think hard about each of them and validate them by asking “Why are we proposing to implement this?” – that is about tying them into the business objectives and ensuring that they will indeed provide business value.

5. Identify the Barriers & Risks
For each of the KM initiatives above, as well as asking directly "How do we make this happen?" we also need to ask "What are the barriers?” and then in turn "How do we overcome them?" As well as “What are the risks?” and “How do we minimize them?” This will generate more initiatives that are required to ensure the success of the project.

So in the sales example above, we may identify that even with a CRM system in place that one of the barriers is that the salespeople do not understand the need to use the system. This is also a huge risk if they do not use the system! This barrier can then be addressed by a combination of hard and soft measures that may include education or modification of the reward system.

6. Implement
The sixth and final step is for each of the identified KM initiatives is to ask how they may be implemented in detail.

To continue with the CRM example, a specific CRM package would be identified and implemented along with all the other supporting initiatives to ensure its success – such as education, changes in remuneration system etc.

7. Involve Everyone
There is one final key element to this process. A major part of any imitative is to involve everyone in the above process. We all best know what information and knowledge we need to do our jobs; we all best know the constraints on our time; and we all best know the barriers to our effective working.

By bringing everyone together in a collaborative effort to discuss the challenges and discover the answers for themselves not only generates the most workable solutions but also crucially obtains the degree of commitment and buy-in needed to make the new ways of working a success.

Conclusion
The key message, I’d like to leave you with is that “Getting Business Value from KM Strategies” is not just about deploying some new technology or redesigning a business process - it is multi-dimensional. It is holistic. Failure to address any one of the organizational dimensions adequately may result in the failure of the whole initiative.

Acknowledgements The above process was adapted from work by Professor Clive Holtham and Nigel Courtney of the City University Business School.

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David Gurteen

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