by Jill Austin, Director, IM Practice
We’ve been talking and hearing about knowledge management for years. It was an idea that was ahead of its time, in many ways. Companies tried to implement mega-KM projects that were really destined to fail because they were trying to boil the ocean. Most solutions didn’t have a good answer to the ‘What’s in it for me?’ question – something busy people will always ask.
Several things have re-energized the quest for corporate knowledge management. One is the emergence of social media, providing better tools for building collective intelligence. Another is the influx of a new generation of workers who expect (demand?) knowledge sharing and a collaborative work environment. Related to that is the tidal wave of Boomers retiring – and taking their 30 or 40 years of experience with them. It’s a truly scary prospect having all the knowledge walking out your door.
Over the past few months, I have been reaching out to organizations in Ottawa to find out what KM initiatives they have underway. Everyone likes to talk about what they’re doing and everyone is hoping someone else has a better idea.
One suggestion I’ve heard is to form a KM community of practice (CoP) in Ottawa. I think we need one that is open to everyone and is not sector-specific (not just public service or NGO’s, for example).
This is the place to go to ask who’s doing corporate wikis and how are they working out? What are you doing to capture lessons learned and best practices? What policies have you instituted for staff about use of social media tools?
MicroWorks is willing to host a CoP site to help get things started. Face-to-face meetings would be great, too – maybe find a nice pub for get-togethers!
If there is someone in your organization who is interested in knowledge management, please send them this blog.
If you’re interested in sharing experiences about managing knowledge in your organization, send us an email: admin@microworks.ca. Give us any ideas you have about what you’d like to do and how you’d like to do it.
Looking forward to hearing from you!