Corz and Effect

Moving on

2009-02-19T23:11:00.003+10:00

I have found a new home over at Wordpress.

Make sure you update your feeds (All two of you. That includes you Mum).

New site at corzandeffect.wordpress.com .

Goodbye clunky blogger. Hello smooth wordpress.

See you on the other side.

Cory

The wheel

2009-01-18T22:33:00.001+10:00

wheel
Originally uploaded by corza

A snap from my mobile of this traveling landmark.

This wheel is set up and hangs around for a couple of years and then moves on.

I will have yet to give it a whirl. Hopefully I will remember before it moves on.

Currently stationed at Southbank, on the river in Brisbane.

Cory

Does the journey matter?

2008-12-15T08:04:00.003+10:00

We now tend to work in an outcome focussed world.

'I don't care how you do it, just deliver the outcome.' or 'It's up to you how you do it.'are phrases that come to mind.

Now I'm all for the freedom to choose the best way to deliver. I'm a big fan of the term 'fit for purpose'.

But I think when faced with a choice, people will tend to choose the easy option.

Surely we learn most from the journey, not the destination.

So what if an instruction contained information about the sites to see on the trip as well as the destination?

Cory

Personal versus professional social networks

2008-12-11T08:12:00.006+10:00

It is amazing the number of social computing 'experts' there are out there. Takes of back to the days of search engine optimisation experts who just entered some meta tags on your pages and submitted the site to numerous search engines.

I don't claim to be am expert in this space but I don't think it takes much to learn what these tools do and what products are available.

So anyway. There have been a number of requests made in our organisation for up to have a presence on Facebook, a Ning group etc..

Reasons range from 'our competitors are doing it' to 'gen Y demands it' all of which are based on opinion not demand or benefit.

In some of the discussions I have had with people I have noticed a blurring of the lines between personal and professional social networking. There seems a belief that you can use any social networking solution to cater for professional networking groups.

[getting up on soap box] I am of a mind that there does need to be a seperation of powers when it comes to personal and professional life. Yes there will be a few bridging relationships where you work with a friend or a collegue becomes a friend.

Maybe other people are more open to sharing and the lines between professional and personal are blurred.

I start having issues when you want to put a professional group on a personal networking site. Some have heard of the work the Deloitte have done in utilising Facebook as a professional networking tool. This has been done with the main proviso that the profile that staff use is a professional one. This does not preclude them from having a personal one but the professional one is the one that gets connected to the group.

When someone comes to me and says 'we need to be on facebook' I congratulate them for making such a decision and then try and work out exactly it is they are trying to achieve. Assumptions get made. People have only heard of Facebook so they believe that is what must be used.

Personally, I am a big fan of LinkedIn for professional networking. Now that they have provided more social computing tools (group discussions etc..) it is evolving into the professional networking tool of choice. I also maintain a profile on Plaxo (glorified address book) to pick up other people in my network who are not on LinkedIn. I also have one on Xing but nothing seems to be happening there. I belong to several Google Groups (preferred) and Yahoo Groups. I share my travel on dopplr, photos on flickr, slides on slideshare. I have my personal network on Facebook. Oh... and I blog here (when I can), tweet here and also on Yammer.

Thanks

Cory

Open Source KM

2008-12-01T23:41:00.001+10:00

aka: Practicing what we preach.

When I first got interested in knowledge management (2002) I did a bit of research on the internet looking for methods, frameworks, theories and tools (some call them 'recipes'). What I ran into was a lot of "We have what you are looking for and are more than happy to do it for you for $X,XXX an hour/day."

Now obviously there is the need for people to have a career and be paid for their services. But having come from a computer technology background I understood that knowledge could be openly shared and people could still get paid (a lot).

So after becoming aware of the the Cynefin and Cog Edge work and this being published under creative commons instead of copyright, I held a hope that there are KM people that actually practice what they preach. That is openly share what we know.

Now you may of may not agree with me but the way I see it is Dave and his posse have been developing techniques in the sensemaking space and improving on them.

So why can't we do this with other aspects of sharing and using knowledge. Yes I'm aware of issues of IP and alike but I don't see these raised in the forums we participate in both face-to-face and virtually.

So what if this was harnessed? There are a 1,001 ways to do it. What if we took what we try to do (successfully or otherwise) either at work or with our clients everyday, and proved that it can work in our own discipline?

There are fragments all over the place. In forums, books, blogs, white papers, articles, video, audio and of course in people. What if we did the unthinkable and all contributed to knowledge technology (this is using technology in it's original form talking about knowledge of a technique)? How can we provide people with a map of what knowledge management could be? A body of knowledge.

I don't even want to talk about computer technology (yet).

I don't want to go near the IM/KM debate because it is not a debate. It is merely different perspectives. Though they may be different, they are still valid.

I am keen to here you thoughts on the validity of such an endeavor.

Cory

Starting a KM Program

2008-10-30T21:54:00.002+10:00

At the recent 2008 actKM Conference, Matt Moore sat down with a few practitioners and consultants and asked what advice would they give to someone starting up a KM program.

The results are some inciteful comments and there is also a contribution from me.

Thanks for pulling it all together Matt.

Enjoy

Cory

Visual Wiki

2008-10-16T21:08:00.003+10:00

In a recent presentation given by Arthur Shelley at the 2008 actKM Conference, he spoke about the use of wikis in an educational environment for not only learning about knowledge management but doing it using KM practices.

At one stage Arthur spoke of visualising wiki information. I have been looking into this for a while and specifically the offerings from ThinkMap and The Brain.

Arthur mentioned on one of his slides the work being done on Thinkbase.

It sits on top of Freebase providing a visual map of the information provided in the right frame, showing the relationships with other information and information which has similar relationships or facets.

I'm looking into ot a bit further and will hopefully remember to let you know how I go.

Thanks

Cory

actKM Day 2 (and that's 50)

2008-10-16T15:37:00.008+10:00

Wow! My 50th post!

As you are probably aware I am not the most frequent of bloggers so to get to 50 is a bit of a milestone for me.

After recovering from an evening of fun a frivolity (actKM Collaboration Cabaret) it was back to the uncomfortable chairs for another day of sharing and learning.

Day two was another great day at the 2008 actKM Conference with highlights including:

Serena Joyner wrapping up the actKM Collaboration Cabaret. A great effort at pre-conference collaboration mixed with social activities at the event. We have to do this again next year.
Laurie Lock Lee gave an insight and example activity of Value Network Analysis. I had read up on this a while back but had never attempted one. Good props and interesting exercise tp help produce a Partnership Scorecard. Thanks Laurie.
Matthew Hodgson shared his perspective of the evolution of KM.
I got up and danced around (presentation).
Dave Snowden shared some interesting perspectives on narrative and storytelling and shared some of his current projects. Always a delight to hear Dave's stories. The man can talk.
The day was finished off with a Reverse Brainstorming Activity facilitated by David Gurteen. A good fun exercise although I am not too sure about the whistle. Every time it was blown I looked around to see who had been fouled.

It all ended too quickly and I eagerly anticipate the next opportunity to get together with my peers again. Thanks to all those who attended. It was great to get aquainted and to reaquaint. Well done to the organisers. You guys dun real good!!

I was just uploading my slides from yesterday's workshop when I came across this wonderful little Presentation Pack widget they provide (funnily enought it's called the Egowidget) that allows you to package up the presentations you have on slideshare and present them in your blog.

| Get your Presentation Pack

Fun for the whole family.

Cory

actkm08 - Day 1

2008-10-14T12:58:00.002+10:00

Great day today.

Highlights?

My first time seeing David Gurteen in the wild. Did well. First half was basic for me but set a platform for those who didn't know what Web 2.0/Enterprise 2.0 is. I like the evolution of KM he described - from technical to social. Presentation
Good case study on developing a knowledge strategy using narrative input from Dr Jane Chrystal of Central Western Catchment Authority.
Matt Moore as brilliant as ever on KM ROI and his experiences. Presentation
Discovered a new way to use the KM Method Cards by Straits Knowledge. It was a version of Dominoes where each person was given a number of cards and one was placed face up on the table (a big table is required). Each person had to place a card next to the upturned card and show or 'sell' it's relationship. If you can't put a card down then you have to pick up a card. Some interesting discussion and 'selling' took place. Got very interesting when you had to put a card in gaps and it had to match on all sides. It was good to familiarise people with the cards and the KM concepts.
Arthur Shelley told us about his use of wikis in education at RMIT. Good stuff!
Eye opening presentation from Andrew Campbell of Tripplehelix on climate change and the role knowledge sharing needs to play.
Graham Durant-Law showed us the work he has been doing on Business Network Analysis. Good stuff. Have seen this before at the KMRT.

Fun and frivolity tonight with the collaboration cabaret (more about that tomorrow), then I am on just before Dave Snowden tomorrow afternoon.

Wish me luck.

Cory

actKM Conference

2008-10-02T22:21:00.005+10:00

In a couple of weeks I will be making my way down to Canberra for my first actKM Conference.

I was unlucky not to go last year and kicking myself because it got some rave reviews.

This year they asked if I would like to do something at the conference and I suggested I would like to run a Peer Assist on doing After Action Reviews. This will provide people with a "2 for 1" in using a technique to research another technique.

As a lead up I have circulated a request to submit your experiences in implementing/planning/running/participating in AARs. Feel free to share as many of your war stories as you like.

You can also collaborate on the conferences Ning site.

I hope to see you there.

Thanks

Cory

KM Maturity Models

2008-09-02T10:04:00.003+10:00

I am on the hunt for an open source KM Maturity Model. I am looking to do some benchmarking with colleagues and we are wanting to use a common model.

Here are a number of models and assessments I have come across so far:

APQC KM Maturity Model: More on implementation maturity (roadmap) than capability maturity.
David Skyrme KM Assessment: 10 areas of assessment
KMMM: From Siemens AG. 5 levels of maturity, eight areas of assessment (50,000 Euro?! There goes my KM budget.... for the next 5 years!!!)
KM Self Assessment (Learning to Fly; Collison & Parcell) 5 levels, 5 areas.
KMmm by TKCI: 6 levels, 4 areas
5iKM3 KM Maturity Model by TCS: 5 levels, 3 areas.
MAKE Awards: 8 areas
European KM Forum KM Assessment Model and Tool: 8 areas

What have you used/found and how useful was it?

I am keeping notes here. Feel free to add.

Thanks

Cory

Gliffy

2008-09-01T13:45:00.003+10:00

I was doing a comparison of a few different open source content management tools when I came across this little gem as a plugin for Confluence.

It's called Gliffy and is an online diagram drawing tool. Free version allows you to share 5 drawings with other users.

The beauty was having it in the wiki environment and it following the wiki way of being able to edit content on the fly. No longer is this just the realm of text. Now we can be modifying diagrams as well.

Cory

2008 Australian KM Salary Survey

2008-08-18T22:00:00.002+10:00

After exhausting avenues for trying to discover comparative salary levels for KM staff (and myself) I have decided to run my own KM Salary Survey and see what happens.

If you are a KM practitioner in Australia then please particiate in the Survey.

Depending on outcomes, we'll see if we do it again or with a wider scope.

Let me know of any feedback or questions.

Thanks

Cory

KM OZ Conference

2008-07-23T09:41:00.005+10:00

My 1st 6 months - KM Program

Here is a copy of the slides I presented at the KM Australia Conference yesterday.

I wanted to do the presentation using the mind mapping software (iMindMap) but had issues with bringing up sub-maps in the Presentation View.

Conference was good. Caught up with some KM buddies and made some new ones along the way.

After talknig with a few Engineering related KM people will be looking to set up a group to collaborate on industry specific challenges. We'll see how it goes.

If anyone saw the presentation and has any feedback I'd be glad to hear it. Always looking for opportunities to improve.

My 1st 6 months - KM Program

view presentation (tags: knowledge management)

Thanks

Cory

What's on the menu?

2008-07-18T15:06:00.007+10:00

I have just had a stimulating couple of days doing some knowledge based process design work with a team in Perth.

At the debrief session in a cafe this morning, one of the team members noticed the following message on the menu.

It reads:

Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works.
You do more of what works. If it works big, others quickly copy it.
Then you do something else. The trick is the doing something else.

The quote is credited to Leonardo da Vinci (but I have my suspicions).

Nice work.

Cory

Accepting things at face value

2008-07-01T13:32:00.002+10:00

After some discussion with a colleague recently where some teachers are now not accepting references from improperly referenced sources (Wikipedia included), I came across the following quote and found it interesting.

Concepts that have proven useful in ordering things easily achieve such authority over us that we forget their earthly origins and accept them as
unalterable givens.
Albert Einstein 1879-1955

Enjoy.

Cory

Its all in the cards

2008-06-26T21:48:00.002+10:00

Í saw something interesting appear on the Green Chameleon blog the other day and quickly followed up by buying the pack of cards that it mentioned.

Instead of trying to write the manual on knowledge management, it's seems Patrick and his cohorts have gathered together many of the pieces of the KM puzzle and allow you to put them together in a way that makes sense to you in your situation.

The pack is split into three major types of cards that deal with Approaches, Methods and Tools with the Methods cards broken down further into five sub-groups of Interview, Group, Process, Packaging and Events (index sheet). Trust Patrick to come up with a semi-taxonomy for KM items.

The cards contain brief information on the item but also show relationships to other cards in the pack.

I am very excited and have already ordered a second pack to pass onto a KM colleague. I see these not only as a learning tool to get people to understand KM better but a good way to cluster pieces around a challenge to find the right mix for one or more solutions.

Make sure you get yours quick smart.

Cory

Time on a plane

2008-05-13T22:04:00.003+10:00

I do a bit more travelling these days and on a trip from Melbourne to Sydney the other night the 'entertainment' (probably a repeated episode of Myth Busters/Two and a half men and the news) was busted.

This resulted in a large amount of noise being generated in the cabin from conversation. People talking to strangers. Interesting discussion between a 40 odd gentlemen and an early twenties lady behind me. Two colleagues talking work gossip in front. Rabi across the aisle and me on my own (I need the leg room). It did allow me to catch up on some reading over the din.

Maybe we need to turn off the 'entertainment' to allow some real conversations to take place in our organisations.

Cory

Collaborating outside the firewall

2008-05-08T22:08:00.005+10:00

I had been asked recently to share my knowledge of some of the collaboration/sharing tools that are out there (beyond the firewall), available for little or no cost and differ from the 'classic' social computing apps (wikis & blogs).

So here are a few I have been stashing away in my favourites when I come across them.

Aps
Google Aps - www.google.com/a
Mind Mapping
Mind42 (mind for two) - http://www.mind42.com/
Mind Meister - http://www.mindmeister.com/
Diagrams/Visualisation
Sketchcast - http://www.sketchcast.com/
Many Eyes - services.alphaworks.ibm.com/manyeyes/home
Swivel - http://www.swivel.com/
Groups/Discussion
Google Groups - groups.google.com/
Yahoo Groups - groups.yahoo.com/
Grouply - www.grouply.com/
Tangler - http://www.tangler.com/
Sharing Documents
Google Docs - docs.google.com
Slideshare - http://www.slideshare.net/
Sharing Images
flickr - http://www.flickr.com/
Sharing Books
Library Thing - http://www.librarything.com/
Sharing Links
del.icio.us - del.icio.us
digg - digg.com
Networks
LinkedIn - http://www.linkedin.com/
Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/
Fidg't - http://www.fidgt.com/
Ning - http://www.ning.com/
Xing - http://www.xing.com/
Wiki
Google Sites (Aps) - sites.google.com
wik.is - http://www.wik.is/
Wikispaces - http://www.wikispaces.com/
Wikimatrix - http://www.wikimatrix.com/
Blog
Blogger - http://www.blogger.com/
Wordpress - http://www.wordpress.com/
Live Journal - http://www.livejournal.com/

I have come across a number of these tools by monitoring a few blogs/feeds, groups and email newsletters including:

XML Daily Newslink - xml.coverpages.org/newsletter.html
actKM Forum - http://www.actkm.org/
Online Facilitation Group - tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/onlinefacilitation
ComPrac Group - groups.yahoo.com/group/com-prac

Thanks

Cory

Free Resource

2008-05-01T12:17:00.002+10:00

Always happy to come across a free resource. Yes the quality varies but this one seems to have some value.

Quantum²

Quantum2 is the Thomson Scientific leadership development program for information professionals. It provides the resources to help you transform your organization...the power to lead change.

Thanks to Denise Cadman for the introduction.

Cory

Which knowledge to use?

2008-04-17T14:40:00.006+10:00

I have had a picture in the front of my notebook for a while now and finally had the opportunity to turn it into something a bit more presentable.

Original Sketch

Slides

It talks to a concept along the lines that people make subconscious decisions about what sources of knowledge and information they will use to find answers.

This ranges from a person's own tacit and explicit sources, personal networks, local resources (team mates, team folders, colleagues) to enterprise wide sources and beyond the walls of the organisation.

It mainly talks about some of the factors that effect which sources people decide to use. These can be based on trust, ease of access, ease of use, reputation and previous experiences.

No empirical evidence to back this up. Just a concept I thought about a while back that makes sense for me. What do you think?

Thanks

Cory

I knew it...

2008-04-15T08:36:00.002+10:00

Bobbing in the torrent of feeds I found this little beauty from the New York Times.

Writers blog till they drop
By MATT RICHTEL
Published: April 6, 2008
SAN FRANCISCO — They work long hours, often to exhaustion. Many are paid by the piece — not garments, but blog posts. This is the digital-era sweatshop. You may know it by a different name: home.

I now feel vindicated in only doing the occasional post when I have the
time. It's purely for health reasons.

Cory

Speaking of Google...

2008-04-02T21:41:00.003+10:00

You know how you have those friends that send youstuff that gets passed around on the tide of email? And most of the time it is either chain emails, kittens doing stupid things or depp and meaningful quotes?

I have a couple of those and occasionally they come across something that surprises you.

I received such an email today and it was a presentation containing some photos of the Google Zurick offices. I love the ski lift meeting rooms. I was amazed and immediately started thinking about what we could be doing in our space to provide fun environments where people are happy, productive, collaborating and sharing what they know.

What can you do in your space? Have you seen environments that you think would be so cool to work in? I want more. Send them to me (cool workspaces that is, not the stupid cats).

Thanks

Cory

It has finally arrived - Google Sites

2008-03-24T13:21:00.002+10:00

A while back I started a little site on Google Apps (www.auskm.com) combined with a group on Google Groups. This is a private group of people who are involved with the coordination of a variety of groups related to Knowledge Management in Australia.

Whilst having a look at Google Apps today I noticed that they have finally added the long awaited Google Sites functionality. This is based on JotSpot that Google bought over 18 months ago and had since been integrated below the radar.

This probably doesn't mean much to people on the surface but what it means in the market is that Google is now offering a wiki solution. Imagine for a minute what that means?

Thanks

Cory

Defining KM

2008-03-20T22:55:00.002+10:00

Ray Sims has recently done some work on collecting 43 definitions for knowledge management.

This has been a recurring theme on the actKM list that gets debated every now and again.

It is interesting when you plug them all into the Many Eyes toolset from IBM and see what the tag cloud looks like. Also try the two word view.

Thanks

Cory

Using patterns

2008-03-19T22:34:00.003+10:00

I reflect on an enjoyable day where I have been refreshing my knowledge about First Aid.

It has been near on 20 years since I undertook my last First Aid course and I still remember going along with my mother and a number of her work mates to several weeks of night classes at the Emerlad Ambulance Station.

I can say the recall on a few things was there and some were even displayed without concious effort (putting a person into a recovery position).

Only a few things have changed and in a more simplified matter. It was a contrast to have an instructor which took an outcome approach. Where as in the past training had been quite pedantic on how to bandage and where to tie a sling, this approach was more about 'fit for purpose'.

The one thing that did ring with me though was his marking of the end of day quiz. The instructor would have spent no more than half a second in browsing the results of the 10 question multichoice quiz to ascertain a persons score. For those of us who passed (> 8/10) this was supported but for those who did not do so well, they questioned how the instructor was able to arrive at the mark with only a cursory glance.

His response was along the lines of "I have marked thousands of these tests and know the pattern of the answers." He was comparing the pattern of valid answers with what appeared on paper as opposed to item by item comparison and validation.

I found this quite refreshing and look forward to the second and final day of my First Aid refresher.

Thanks

Cory

Two sides of the same coin

2008-02-22T21:46:00.004+10:00

I had a fantastic conversation today with the Manager of our strategy area. This is the first opportunity we have had to talk face to face since I started two and a half months ago and was thoroughly enjoyable.

Our conversation ended up highlighting two sides to the same coin in relation to the role of a Knowledge Manager.

On one side of the coin we talked about the "influence gig", the evangelist. The role of the manager to work with parts of the business on developing their understanding of knowledge management and the benefits it can provide as well as supporting the development their strategic plans. This is an enterprise wide activity that not only involves the areas of the business that are delivering to customers but also the corporate service aspects of the business (HR, IT, Finance etc..).

On the other side there is the "service provider". Supporting the business by providing the services, knowledge and tools they need to execute their strategies and deliver quality outcomes.

At this point in time I am a team of one and not necessarily able to excel in either of these areas whilst Í am constantly spinning the coin. It is an ability to be able to switch between strategic and operational roles but it is not necessarily a sustainable endeavour.

So in developing our KM strategy I need to look at this balance. How can I provide in the role of advisor and supplier? What roles and resources will we need? It will be through some great conversations, like the one today, that I hope to collaborate with my stakeholders and consumers on a suitable solution.

Thanks

Cory

Done and dusted

2008-02-19T18:34:00.002+10:00

It has been a great couple of days at the conference where I have met some new KM friends.

Thanks to all those who attended and participated in the discussions.

It has been thoroughly enjoyable and I look forward to catching up in the future.

Thanks

Cory

In Melbourne

2008-02-13T16:15:00.004+10:00

I find myself in Melbourne for most of next week presenting and attending a conference on Facilitating Knowledge Transfer and Retention in the Modern Workplace.

I'll be posting my presentation on Understanding the new breed of employee to Slideshare after the event for those who might be interested.

If you are attending let me know and come and introduce yourself. I'm not shy.

Thanks

Cory

QKM Forum

2008-02-13T16:12:00.002+10:00

For those who may not know, I am currently championing the Queensland Knowledge Management Forum as it's Chairperson.

Currently we get together for coffee on the fourth Thursday of the month and track down any KM gurus to share their knowledge when they come through town.

The group has an online home at http://au.groups.yahoo.com/group/qkm.

So if you are in Brisbane and you have an interest in knowledge management come and say hello.

Thanks

Cory

Anecdote coming to Brisneyland

2008-02-13T13:50:00.002+10:00

It doesn't happen too often so when it does it's good to jump up and down and make some noise.

One of Australia's (and the world's) leading players in the narrative field are coming to Brisbane.

Anecdote are holding one of their workshops on Narrative Techniques in Business in Brisbane on the 27th of March 2008.

Highly recommend participating in the one day workshop with some of the leading people in the field guiding your learning.

Tell 'em I sent ya.

Cory

Earth Hour 2008

2008-02-12T23:10:00.000+10:00

Earth Hour 2008

Get on board.

Cory

Intro to social computing

2008-02-12T16:19:00.001+10:00

A colleague plucked up the courage to approach me today and ask about how I keep up to date.

They have a major issue with email overload and are a little technologically challenged.

After a bit of discussion around the details of the issue we had a look at some blogs, RSS Feeds and social tagging tools.

It was then I tied a few threads together (Chris Collison - Social Bookmarking made simple...; Patrick Lambe - Blogs can calm the raging sea; Matt Moore - You've got (more) mail; Chris Fletcher - Do you RSS?) and ended up directing them to some great short intros to various social computing tools at Commoncraft including:

Blogs: http://www.commoncraft.com/blogs
Wiki: http://www.commoncraft.com/video-wikis-plain-english
RSS Feeds: http://www.commoncraft.com/rss_plain_english
Social Bookmarking: http://www.commoncraft.com/bookmarking-plain-english

Great way to communicate the meaning without a camtasia screenshot fest.

Cory

which wiki?

2008-01-16T21:24:00.000+10:00

I have recently been reminded of a search I undertook in early 2006 when hunting a free hosted wiki service for the QKM Forum.

A question was posed on the actKM mail list by Adrian Young in the Office of Road Safety in WA, to assist in his quest for finding a hosted wiki solution.

I had to share one of the sources of my research, http://www.wikimatrix.org/. A nifty little site that compares a large number of wiki suppliers in a number of criteria.

We ended up going with Wikispaces and it hasn't dissapointed. Record of conversation can be found on the new actKM wiki.

Cory

Describing CoPs

2007-12-18T22:54:00.000+10:00

Well I have finally surfaced after near two and a half weeks of handover and introductions in my new role. I think my brain will have stretch marks once I finally digest it all.

I was delighted to spend some time this evening catching up on some of my favourite blogs when I came across a post on the Anecdote blog about communities of practice (CoP or COP).

The article covers some ways in which people have described the purpose or key concepts of CoPs.

This reminds me of a catch phrase I have used for a few CoP frameworks.

Share, Learn, Grow

Share describes both the sharing of questions and issues as well as successes and answers.

Learn describes the open mindedness of people to personally learn, support the learning of others and the learning of the group/organisation.

Grow describes the outcome that can be achieved if you share and learn. It is not necessarily a tangible growth (quantitative) but can be a growth in knowledge or in maturity.

It may not be everything to everyone. I like it.

First Steps

2007-12-03T14:51:00.001+10:00

Well today I start a new job. I am now the Knowledge Manager for PB in Australia Pacific.

I will be spending the next couple of weeks getting up to speed with what they have been doing in this space and developing some strategies on moving forward.

Wish me luck...

Collaboration & Research Tools

2007-11-23T16:32:00.001+10:00

I was asked by a few people recently as to how I find stuff and what tools do I use (I'm a bit of a researchaphile).

So I through together a quick lunch & learn session today, got some great feedback, so I thought I would share it that little bit further.

Here is a list and some brief descriptions of the tools.

Collaboration Tools

iGoogle (View RSS Feeds)
Google Notebook\
Google Docs
Our internal Sharepoint Environment) – Wikis & Blogs (Cory’s Blog)
Google Groups

Research Tools

Google Books
Google Scholar
Wikipedia
Books24x7
EBSCOhost / Emerald Insight
Corporate Executive Board – Premier Portal

Other

Technorati – Blog ratings
Del.icio.us – Social Tagging

If you know of any others you have found useful, let me know.

Thanks

Cory

Doing the Do

2007-11-22T14:33:00.000+10:00

To finish off this trifecta I'll share my thoughts on the third piece of feedback I provided to Project Managers of our Enterprise PMO after analysing their Post Implementation Reviews.

Along with Blind Optimism and not identifying True Learnings, I provided feedback related to a Focus on Doing.

This is based around the Deming Cycle of continuous improvement where you cycle through the stages of Plan, Do, Study, Act (AKA: PDSA, PDCA).

What we noticed was PMs were given a small amount of lead time for Projects ("You have funding, now start delivering.") and quickly moved through Planning to actually Doing.

Unfortunately instead of taking time to Study the outcomes and performance of the Project and then take steps to Act on identified improvements, The PM was usually quickly given another assignment ("bench time costs money" chargeback mentality) and asked to deliver in line with some phantom deadline arrived at to fit in some schedule somewhere.

So a majority of time was spent in doing with very little planning and virtually no study and action.

'True' Learnings

2007-11-22T14:18:00.000+10:00

Following on from last post I will continue on with the second point I made in presenting feedback to a number of Project Managers in an Enterprise PMO upon studying a number of their post implementation reviews.

Last post we talked about Blind Optimism and how despite PMs having the worst project in the world, they tend to be blindly optimistic about the outcome of the next.

This time I want to talk about the identification of 'true' learnings.

what I had discovered from studying a number of Post Implementation Review reports is that where challenges were faced during the delivery of a project, the workaround that got them over the line was highlighted.

Now this knowledge has value and can provide someone who finds themselves in a similar situation, a description of the experience and decision to hopefully improve their chances of success.

What was glaringly omitted is what I termed the True Learning. I described the true learning being the actual root cause of the challenge faced. By describing this you can give the gift of foresight to a PM by allowing them to be aware of the root cause and pre-cursors to the challenge in order to mitigate the risk of it occurring.

We have introduced After Action Review (AAR) questions and the 5 Whys technique to help people identify these root causes. But it is not just enough to identify them. We need to ensure they are shared and available for people who are no longer Blindly Optimistic.

Blind Optimism

2007-11-01T22:15:00.000+10:00

After running a final After Action Review (AAR) for a project today the Project Manager (PM)approached me and asked me what are some of the key learnings that I see in common with other projects I have facilitated reviews for.

Over the past two years at Suncorp I have facilitated workshops (what used to be Post Implementation Review (PIR) and the smaller more frequent AARs we are now moving towards) on over 60 projects.

I told the PM of a presentation I made to a forum for our Enterprise Program Management Office (EPMO) a couple of months ago after being asked by my Manager to share our most common lessons learned to the group of PMs and other project staff.

This responses to the presentation I made were diverse. From some I got denial "You don't know what you are about." from others a "I'm not sure about that." as well as "I hadn't really thougth about that." to people congratulating me on speaking out about systemic issues in our processes, capability and culture.

There were three key trends I identified are listed below. You will notice these trends do not relate to process but instead are more cultural and behavioural traits. In this post I will look at one specifically and then discuss the others in future.

> Blind Optimism
> Not identifying 'true' learnings
> Focus on 'doing'

Blind Optimism

In most cases I discovered that despite the fact that the last project the PM ran went pear shaped, having various challenges that caused time, cost, resource and scope blowouts, they tended to take an optimistic approach to the new project citing that they "didn't think it would happen again" or "assumed the problems had been fixed" or took a 'she'll be right mate' attitude to the next project.

Now don't get me wrong. We are talking about medium to high complexity projects of a medium to large scale and cost, so the likelihood of coming across the exact same situation where you could apply the exact same solution and end up with the exact same outcome will not happen that often. I am not saying we needed to be pessimistic and intentionally plan for a worst case scenario. All I am asking for is a realistic outlook.

Consider there is a risk that the same troubles may occur and mitigate/treat the risk. Find out what other people had experienced and learn from that experience. Don't go in blind. Undertake some Knowledge Exploration.

A capital idea

2007-09-29T22:28:00.000+10:00

This week saw me start a new role, be offered another role and be invited to participate in some psychometric testing for yet another role. When it rains it pours.

But aside from that, I took some time out of a busy schedule to have hot chocolate (don't drink coffee) and some stimulating conversation with other Brisbane based KM practitioners at the KM over Coffee event that the QKM Forum has once a month.

After introductions and some initial discussion I raised a perception I have of how companies measure their performance. I drew the following diagram on a piece of paper.

It seems at the moment that everything is brought back to dollar amounts. Activities or programs undertaken in organisations that have a human capital or intellectual capital focus seem to have their performance measured financially. How much did we make? How much did we save? Did it effect the share price? What is the financial value/benefit?

I can understand why this is the case. It happens that financial performance is one of the very few performance indicators that transcends industries, geographies and scale. Profit, share price, assets, liabilities. All are measured in dollar amounts. It creeps into the knowledge management space because you find you have to talk in these terms to make sense or get the attention you require.
Example - Lessons Learned
How many times have we seen reusing knowledge/experience from previous activities expressed in terms of "We saved $X million", "We reduced our costs by half", "Our income increased by $Y".
Now I know a number of people have been trying to get organisations to adopt metrics for human capital, intellectual capital and other areas, that are not converted to financial terms. But there is a long road ahead to get them to any sort of level that has them even appearing in Annual Reports.

Cory

Something different

2007-09-22T05:47:00.000+10:00

From Monday I start a 3 month stint with Suncorp's Leadership & Organisational Development team. in the People & Performance (HR) Division.

The role - People & Performance Adviser.

The responsibilities - Working on the Culture & Change Stream of the Integration Program facilitating the merger of Suncorp and Promina.

The biggest challenge is going to be managing the change in over a dozen organisations across the Suncorp Group in Australia and New Zealand.

The diversity is both exciting and ominous. Lets see how we go.

Misunderstanding Information Management

2007-09-13T16:04:00.000+10:00

As part of a recent organisational restructure I noticed the naming of a unit called Group Information Management.

Was this the answer to the questions I had been asking a number of people as to how we are managing information, records, files, content? Would they be able to provide me with the skills and advice I needed in developing taxonomies, information pathways, navigation structures and metadata?

The short answer is no.

Upon further inspection I discovered that this is the team that was previously named Management Information Services and they provide a number of services including data warehousing, data analysis, report generation and trend analysis.

How is it so easy to confuse Information Management with Business Intelligence?

How hard does this now make it to find the people who will provide standards for information governance, when there is already a unit called Group Information Management, who don't necessarily manage information?

Has anyone else come across similar issues?

Thanks

Cory

Making Decisions

2007-09-09T23:38:00.001+10:00

On Friday a colleague and I delivered a workshop for our staff on making decisions.

We took people through a few approaches, frameworks and tools around decision making including Six Thinking Hats, our internal Design approach, SCAMPER, Force Field Analysis and a few others.

We had a good conversation around approaches to decision making and mainly talked about:

Autocratic
Democratic
Participative
Consensus.

The main discussion was around saying that despite the fact we may have a default approach, at any time people will use all of these approaches to achieve the desired outcomes.

Dave Snowden of Cognitive Edge is about to have a co-written article published that he has written about on his blog, about different management styles that are more successful than others in simple, complicated, complex and chaotic environments (Cynefin Framework).

I suppose it's up to people to be aware of alternative approaches and also to be self aware of the situations they find themselves in. All too often people just do things that have worked for them in the past with very mixed results.

The number of times I have heard people at conferences saying that if people just follow a simple process or do things the same way it will guarantee success starts to grate on my nerves. This may be right in some cases but definitely not when you are playing in complex space.

Blogging Conference Blog

2007-09-07T20:28:00.000+10:00

Just caught wind of the this event happening in Brisbane. Could be quite interesting.

There is also an event space on Facebook.

Thanks

Cory

Adopting KM in a PMO

2007-08-31T20:44:00.000+10:00

I recently presented a case study of adopting knowledge management practices in a Project Management Office (PMO) at the 2007 KM Australia Conference in Sydney.

You can have a look at a copy of the slides on Slideshare.

Some comments on the NSW KM Forum.

Thanks

Cory

In the Know - Presentation at PMOz

2007-08-31T14:20:00.001+10:00

WEll in teh wee hours of theis morning I set off for the Gold Coast to present a session on personal knowledge management for Project Managers at the Annual PMOz Conference.

My session happened to be the first cab off the rank at 8:30am after the annual dinenr the night before. All this said had a pretty good turnout considering there were 3 other streams running at the same time and had the room full.

The presentation was entitled In the Know: Knowledge Management principles and practices for Project Managers and had a focus on talking about the sorts of behaviours and capabilities we have been developing in the Corporate Projects Division at Suncorp.

The presentation is actually on my other computer and I will try to upload it to slideshare later tonight.

I spent most of the session describing the human systems (culture, learning, reflection, self-awareness, emotional intelligence) that are needed and some of the techniques we have been using including:

Peer Assist
After Action Review
Communities of Practice
Social Networks
Research

Most of the questions at the end of the presentation related to what technologies we are using.

Got some good positive feedback from the Chair of the session and several attendees.

An interesting morning.

Thanks

Cory

KM Entities in Australia

2007-08-29T11:02:00.000+10:00

Perhaps you can help me?

I am trying to collate a list of Knowledge Management related groups and organisations in Australia. A 'map' if you will.

Through my research I have come across a few groups but have seen a number pop up recently that I was not aware of.

If you would like to help me out I have set up a space on the actKM Discussion Board to do some initial collaboration.

The results will be communicated to the actKM List and hopefully made available in a sustainable form (wiki).

I am hoping to provide a map for KM people to practice what they preach and identify peers they can engage with.

Thanks

Cory

Ten KM Tips

2007-08-29T09:50:00.000+10:00

A number of people have commented directly or indirectly (Sathya Pandalai, Stephen Collins, Stan Garfield, Matt Moore, David Carlisle) on a post I made to the actKM Forum discussion list last week.

This has motivated me to dig up my old blog, dust it off and make a commitment to update it at least weekly (don't hold me to that).

So here is the original post of the Top Ten KM Tips I provided to a friend. These are things I have picked up over time. I am not claiming them all as my own, they are what I talk to fellow KM people about when we get together. I am sure I will come up with more. Feel free to add comments.

Today a friend of mine (non-KM person) ask me the following question through facebook:
"If you had to give your top ten tips on the best strategies for knowledge management in an organisation, what would they be??"
After thinking a bit, here was my rushed response.
Depends on what the organisations strategic intent is. Depends on what your organisations strengths are and the corporate culture.
Apart from that, here are a few tips. (Most of these relate to change management and could be considered for other initiatives/programs).
Manage the Change. Undertake any of these activities from a change management perspective, even IT related ones. Don't just manage the change around the initiatives
People before Technology. Spend money on travel and socialising before technology.
Behavioural Change. People have to be open to supporting new/different practices. They need to adapt to change. They need to see the value to them/others.
Organisational Culture. Depending on what the corporate and people culture is like will depend on whether KM efforts will survive. Examples could be that reward structures are personally focused and support a competitive environment so people may not be inclined to share.
Strategic Alignment. Activities need to support the direction and priorities of the organisation. This also assists in getting things approved/endorsed.
KM in the wild. Find out where knowledge creation and sharing is already happening in the organisation and study it. Learn why it has been successful (don't just copy it) to help design other activities.
Technology is an enabler. Design the process/system and then look for technologies that enable this. E.g. Don't install a wiki and then look for what you can use it for. Work out what you want to do and then see what tools are suitable to support it.
Adopt KM Principles. Don't introduce separate KM processes. Modify your business processes to adopt KM principles.
Don't stop at the first solution. Consider different options, methods, frameworks and see what works. Experiment.
Motivation. It's not necessarily about reward and recognition. You need to find out how to motivate people to play the game.
What would your tips be?

Thanks
Cory

Talking with the Masters

2006-03-06T22:21:00.000+10:00

I had the pleasure and good fortune to have a cup of tea with Karl-Erik Sveiby this morning whilst he was in Brisbane after a conference and in between meeting with clients and associates.

I may have been a bit excited as I did a lot of talking for the first half hour in letting him know of my situation and circumstances concerning my role in Suncorp's Corporate Projects Division as Specialist Knowledge Management.

During a moment of lucidity I asked him what he was currently working on.

He told me of his new book coming out in June which is based on a number of Indigenous Australian Tribes on the NSW/QLD border, looking at how they have shared and maintained their cultural knowledge over thousands of years without written record an in some cases without a common language.

He said it started out as a study of the sharing of cultural knowledge but has ended up a work on society sustainability. I look forward to reading it. (Preview)

Living Knowledge

2006-03-06T21:55:00.000+10:00

I have been thinking about an idea related to the debated topic of the difference between information and knowledge.

Some have said that Knowledge can exist in an Explicit (tangible - Eg: documents) format and a Tacit (intangible - Eg: thought) format. I even believe the camp who also talks about Implicit Knowledge, knowledge that is tacit but has the potential to be transferred successfully to explicit.

Some say that once knowledge is recorded explicitly then it becomes information. Some say the management of information is only the vehicle, the contents could be then data, knowledge and/or information. As the original definition implies, information is data 'in formation' (giving structure).

I like to think of knowledge as having two states. Static and Dynamic. Static knowledge is the knowledge that has been recorded. It is in stasis until 'digested'. Then it becomes dynamic. It can be flavoured by the recipients own knowledge and experiences and then perhaps they create further static knowledge or transfer the dynamic knowledge through socialisation.

Change through New Comers

2006-03-06T17:35:00.000+10:00

A discussion with a colleague last week has got me thinking about a particular tactic for introducing the adoption of KM practices and use of KM tools and activities in an organisation.

It mainly revolves around ensuring that staff that enter the organisation are given the "Upsized Value Meal" briefing of KM practices and tools combined with anecdotes and examples of the benefits gained from utilising them.

When people enter an organisation it could be said that they are more receptive to change in that they are entering a new environment and are (hopefully) prepared for a new culture and environment (don't know if anyone has conducted research on this).

What's more, there is usually an elevated level of enthusiasm and motivation when a person starts a new role in a new organisation (again don't know if any studies have been done). They may be more receptive to suggestion on ho to make it easier fir them to get work done and they may be more open to believing in the benefits that KM practices can provide as opposed to veterans who may be treating things as the 'new fad' or 'latest craze'.

Allocating Time to Share on Projects

2005-09-24T19:23:00.000+10:00

I have recently been thinking of a concept whereby Project Team members are allocated 2 hours a week devoted to knowledge sharing. There are two primary activities to be undertaken during these two hours.

The first is asking peers and known experts to share their knowledge and experiences in the area they are currently working on.

The second is to make themselves available to other staff to provide assistance relatd to their capabilities and areas of interest/expertise.

This knowledge sharing can take many forms including:

participation in communities of practice (online/face-to-face)
searching information/knowledge respositories (Intranet/Internet)
contacting experts/providing referrals (networks/yellowpages)
creating/renewing knowledge assets

One of the main issues usually raised with this model is why the sponsor should pay for the time spent by project staff on these activities instead of productive work. The answer I would give is that the time spent on these activities allows the combined knowledge of the staff's network and resources to be utilised on the project directly or indirectly. This means the wealth of knowledge of the entire Unit/Department is at the disposal of the project to access learnings and reducing the risk of re-inventing the wheel.

I will put some more thought into it when the opportunity arises.

Corza

Cory Banks

Motivation to Share and Learn

2005-09-16T10:47:00.000+10:00

Doing what little one can to increase the general stock of knowledge is as respectable an object of life, as one can in any likelihood pursue.
Charles Darwin

The issue of how we undertake the cultural change to get people to share infromation and knowledge, as well as gain experience and learn new skills, comes down to how we motivate people into participating.

There are those that espouse that incentives are needed to reward those who undertake the correct behaviour. You could even go as far as to punish incorrect behaviour.

This is only one aspect of motivation. Unless you know the preference of individuals as to what would motivate them to participate in sharing and learning, then single point schemes will not result in wholesale change.

Sure you can start with one method of motivating and get a certain percentage involved but you also run the risk of providing a 'disatisfying' situation for others.

Ability is what you are capable of doing.
Motivation determines what you do.
Attitude determines how well you do it.
Lou Holtz - American Football Coach

When working in Scotland a couple of years back I was involved in a diverse program of providing motivation for Contact Centre staff to stay in the job (www.four-frogs.com). The program was wide reaching and included some of the following activities:

An analysis of each persons individual reward profile to ascertain what incentives and rewards would be suitable for them
Theme Days (more than one for each day of the year)
A Point System that were aquired through participation in games and activities and 'cashed in' for rewards
Ongoing monitoring of how staff were 'feeling' - After each call staff were asked to rate how they felt on a scale of 1-5 (1 terrible - 5 fantastic)
Trigger levels for each person to acertain when an intervention needed to take place - When an agent hits rock bottom and may give a number of 1 or2 scores in a row, the team leader would be notified (electronically), consult with the persons reward profile and intervene with any number of tools (take a break - tea/coffee and biscuit pack, make some personal calls, 'come in late' pass)

This is a major activity but ensures the right motivation is given to each person.

KM Vision
Provide an environment that promotes, facilitates and motivates staff to undertake:
the creation of knowledge
the storing of knowledge
the sharing of knowledge
the learning of knowledge
Cory Banks

The right motivation needs to be provided for staff to participate in knowledge sharing and learning.

It's not about incentives, it's about motivation.