KM Strategy and Planning
Book
(The link above will take you to the Amazon US store)
From Nick Milton and Patrick Lambe comes a practical handbook, full of examples and tips, for knowledge managers on all the steps involved in implementing knowledge management in a sustainable and effective way. The second edition is fully updated for the new ISO 30401 standard for knowledge management systems and contains new chapters on working with external standards and frameworks, engaging externally, and the links between KM and digital transformation. The book also contains seven international case studies from Mars, NASA, Petroleum Development Oman, Huawei, an oil and gas multinational, Huawei, the Singapore Youth Olympics, and the Public Works Department Malaysia.
This book will be an essential vade mecum for knowledge managers at different stages of their journeys. The first edition of this book was awarded has won CILIP UK’s prestigious K&IM Information Resources Award (in the print category) for 2019.
Published in the UK and the USA by Kogan Page, London and Philadelphia, in 2016. Second edition in 2019.
Article
Let’s be completely honest about this. Knowledge management is a fad. And like most things faddish and fashionable, it’s going to make you look good, it’s going to make you feel good, and it’s going to cost you a lot of money. The only thing is, in a couple of year’s time you are going to throw it aside and run after something else.
Posted on 18 January 2000
How-To Guides
I’ve always been wary of KPIs in knowledge management, because they appeal to a tangible measurement mindset that is easily distracted from the intangible and hard-to-pin down outcomes of KM efforts. I can’t tell you how may implementations I’ve seen where the measurements are diligently gathered and presented as tokens of success (number of documents, number of contributions, number of sharing sessions) when behind the metrics facade, the KM culture and rich sharing habits are as dead as a doornail.
But KPIs, used intelligently alongside “softer” evaluation techniques, do enable you to monitor progress and health in relation to your expectations as you move along your KM journey. And changes or spikes in activity or output trends can signal a need to investigate deeper. So if you take the KPIs with a big pinch of salt and remember you always have to interpret them, they can be a perfectly legitimate tool. So I sat down and wrote this guide to using KPIs.
The paper is in three sections: the first sets out some guidelines for how to use KPIs smartly. The second section gives ideas for sample sets of KPIs covering KM activities and tools as diverse as communities of practice, KM roles, and use of wikis and blogs. The third section is a template for drawing up your own sets of KPIs. The document is in Word format so you can cut and paste whatever takes your fancy (please acknowledge your source). A last word of caution: if you take the whole set of KPIs in this document, you’re taking too many! Leave some time and effort to actually do the work you’re trying to monitor.
Posted by Patrick Lambe on 8 September 2007
This paper catalogues the elements that need to be in place for sustainable KM practices within organisations. We now use it regularly when building KM Frameworks with our clients, because it forms a checklist of things to put in place, and gives ideas about KM-friendly changes to policies, governance or training support. Acknowledgements: we gratefully acknowledge the input of several ACT_KM Forum members in the construction of this framework.
Posted on 18 April 2006
Videos
In this video, Art Schlussel covers:
1. Introducing the US Army KM Principles
2. What do the US Army KM Principles cover?
3. How do the KM Principles support KM Implementation?
Posted on 11 March 2014
In this video, Art Schlussel covers:
1. How does the US Army build its KM Capabilities?
2. What is the US Army doing about KM Competencies, Education and Training?
3. What is the primary goal for KM Education and Training in the Army?
4.What sort of Skills need to be trained?
Posted on 11 March 2014
In this video, Art Schlussel covers:
1. What are the factors that support or inhibit KM in a military context?
2. How can the inhibiting effect of a Command and Control culture be addressed?
Posted on 11 March 2014
In this 30-min video Patrick Lambe describes the three key principles for developing an effective knowledge management strategy: grounding it in a thorough understanding of the organisation's business objectives and what makes it effective; an understanding of the organisation's culture and change readiness; an appreciation that KM is not a quick fix. In the last part he describes the structure of KM strategy building exercise that meets those principles.
Posted on 20 February 2014
This is a short 20-min tutorial on how to do a KM planning exercise using Straits Knowledge's KM Planning Toolkit. In a participatory session with the organisation's managers we look first at KM pain points, using the KM Diagnostic Cards, then at behaviours using the Organisation Culture Cards, then at any other KM-related insights that come through from discussion with the managers. The next stage is to prioritise a key cluster of issues to work on, and start designing interventions using our KM Method Cards.
Posted on 12 December 2013
In this 15-min podcast Patrick Lambe explains the importance of both formal and informal knowledge sharing mechanisms to support coordination, group memory and collective learning in teams and organisations.
Posted on 3 September 2010
This conversation with Nancy Dixon, recorded at KM Asia, 26 November 2008 (thanks to Ark Group) explores the issue of supporting "vertical" knowledge sharing - and important themes for designing environments and changing behaviours to overcome inhibitors to sharing that arise from power relationships, willingness to give up responsibility, and the availability and techniques and tools to help us do that.