TakingAIIM

Now Hear This: When Redundancy is Good

A basic tenet of ECM is to eliminate content redundancy. From increased storage overhead, to potential miscommunication,increased risk and exposure, the potential probelms caused by redundantly storing content are many. A common mantra of mine: “use the power of the e-doc to eliminate redundancy but provide wide spread centralized access.”

As is teh case with many things, however, there are no absolutes. I recognize that sometimes redundancy is good – especially if the content is redundant in every way but medium. This idea goes to the heart of repurposing content, a subject I have blogged about before.

I think about this often – as I have said in the past it is one area that allows for a great deal of creativity in something as “old hat” as content creation and publishing – its the fun side of ECM.   

Why am I blogging about it again? Recently I was listening to a program on NPR that was discussing the burgeoning market for audio books.  For those interested in knowledge management, the art of story telling, and/or content distribution, I encourage you to read and/or listen to the show.  Its short and insightful (I like NPR). 

The show introduces the fact that audio books have their critics, those that say they are bad because  people are not reading anymore. I am not going to tackle whether or not audio books are the demise of reading and whether that is a bad thing.  I want to focus on effective communication and content delivery. If the goal of a "document" is to communicate, then why care if it is a picture, a spoken word or a printed word. The focus should be on effective communication – and that comes down to the three Cs of ECM; Content Community and Context – a subject I address often.  

Historically, content redundancy was rightfully associated with risk and increased overhead. But today, electronic content can morph fairly easy into many forms, and overhead is minimal. So why not have a document created for internal consumption that is repurposed, re-formatted/branded etc. for effective external consumption?  Why not have content formated for one gourp of individuals, be reformatted to more affectively communicate to another group - whether for reading devices, learning styles, contextual needs, etc.? When you look at this value proposition, think in terms of effective media choices as well.  Content formatted for smart phones, iPADS and Kindles, as well as print and desktops. Consider the effectiveness of video and or audio renditions of the content.  I know some companies have bee experimenting with video – its cool.  But don’t use alternative forms of content just because you can. Do it because it increases communication.

The NPR proghram discussed how storytelling in caves was the original “book” and that audio books bring us back to that, and enable people in a new cave – i.e., the minivan, to listen to a story. The NPR program brought to my mind the infamous incident of Orson Wells reading “The War of the Worlds" over the radio.  Audio delivery of your message may be a most powerful approach to effective communication.

It is no longer an absolute truth that contnet reducnancy shoudl be eliminated, or even avoided. Redundancy can be a good thing, as discussed further in this article.

That said however, use content redundancy wisely. Be sure to police redundancy. Be sure that redundant versions are synchronized -  that is where (good) ECM technology comes in. 

Today, you need a publishing strategy as much as you do a document strategy if you will garner the ultimate value out of your content.

That's Why I am Here (The Sequel)

Those who follow me on twitter @carlfrappaolo may have recently thought I developed a split personality. (OK keep the jokes to yourself.) Since I began using Twitter, my activity centered around the issues I have dedicated my career to: knowledge, content, innovation and process management. While I continue to tweet on these issues, I have also begun tweeting on effective philanthropy, corporate social responsibility and social impact.  What gives you ask?

To answer that question, allow me to back track just a bit. I started this blog in June 2007, with a post entitled “That’s Why I am Here.” It introduced the fact that I had given up a career in consulting to join forces with a non-profit – AIIM. It explained my passion for and definition of ECM.

Fast forward 3 years, and I find myself leaving another consultancy (Information Architected – now left in the most able hands and mind of Dan Keldsen), to once again join the non-profit world. But this time the scope of my engagement is much different.  As some may have noticed, a month ago I became the Director or Knowledge Management at FSG – Social Impact Consultants.  Why the move?  Or,  to put it the way some friends have, “What are you doing there?”.

The answer this time is a bit more complex. I’ll start by referencing a recently published article by FSG’s Managing Directors Mark Kramer and John Kania. The article, “Collective Impact”, explores new ways to increase the impact and effectiveness of philanthropy and government programs by taking a new and collaborative approach.  It’s a great piece of work, and obviously worth a read for anyone interested in philanthropy, corporate social responsibility and social impact.  But the article also hold relevance to “my community”, the KMers, Innovation Managers and Enterprise 2.0 practitioners of the world.  If nothing more, the article reinforces many of the basic tenets we have espoused, and demonstrates their impact and value to this noble cause.

Kania and Kramer, under the rubric of a new model for effective social impact, provide many examples of the powers of basic E2.0, innovation management and KM techniques and tenets.  They address the need for a common business strategy to drive collaborative KM (common agenda); the need for trust as a foundation to open knowledge transfer, the need for open communication, the power of inter-disciplinary teams, and the value of establishing a metric of success that is common to all participants and focuses on group or team-based success versus the success of any individual – all topics all too familiar and fundamental to the KMers, E2.0ers and innovation crowd. The article also introduces 5 models for collaboration.  Some of you may recall  the 5 models of collaboration I developed. They are by no means one and the same, but there are some similarities. More importantly – both approaches stress the fact that collaboration is something that is most effective in managed and deliberately aligned to a specific model and purpose. Anothercommon theme in my writings.

FSG is amazing – they are applying the principles of innovation and collaboration to their mission and focus,  social impact and effective philanthropy. This is one reason that “I am here” – because I like their business model and causes, and my background can be leveraged to support these.

The second reason “I am here” is the mirror image of the first. FSG gives me the opportunity to apply the powers and capabilities of KM in a way that will have impact internally to make them “better at what they do”. I can think of no greater mission for knowledge management, enterprise 2.0, web 2.0, process management, innovation management and ECM.

So, that’s why I am here. With FSG I have the opportunity to leverage my background to support a noble organization and thus support some very noble causes.

While I will certainly continue to blog and tweet on ECM, E2.0 and innovation, I will also be periodically intermingling this with issues germane to corporate social responsibility and effective philanthropy. I hope both foci are valuable to both communities.

Stay tuned ...

Knowledge Retention: Stop Complaining & Do Something About it Already

The May 2010 issue of Harvard Business Review (OK, so I am a bit behind in my reading), contains an excellent article entitled, “How to Keep Your StarTalent.“ It focuses and provides advice on how to minimize staff turnover, especially of “your best” people.  It’s full of pithy advice, and I encourage you to read it, but, not only for the insights it provides on nurturing and keeping talented people, but also as it applies to a related KM issue, (and thus my primary interest in the article).  

As I read the article, I could not help but think that the advice offered applies not just to retaining top people, but to retaining, capturing and leveraging the know-how and experience of your community in general.

Quick - what is your organization's greatest asset?

It is highly likely that you just answered, “its people.” (If you didn’t, try again.)

More specifically, its not the people per se, but the know-how, talents and experience they bring and contribute to the organization. So then why do too many organizations, even those that have somewhat embraced collaboration and KM, not directly and strategically address Knowledge Retention?  Sure they may seek to establish repositories of “published” content, and some go so far as to track social networking – but given the value of this asset – is that enough?

Knowledge retention is not a new issue, nor a trivial one. It is critical enough to warrant an individual targeted strategy. It is not uncommon to hear senior managers and KM professionals say they need to preserve their corporate knowledge, but despite this, when introduced to proactive strategies to do just that, objections pop-up faster than crocus in Spring.

I have found that most business leaders only pay lip service to the issue. They all claim to recognize the criticality of the issue, but fail to do anything significant about it. Some think they have it under control by conducting exit interviews and scrubbing departing employees’ disk drives and file cabinets. Such attempts are not without some merit – but are often too little too late.

Knowledge retention should not be viewed as part of an exit strategy, but an ongoing process within the organization. While the HBR article focused on how to ensure employees are engaged and less likely to leave,(as a way to decrease the rate of loosing knowledge from turnover),  inevitably all employees will leave at some point – for any number of reasons. Failing to plan for this can be devastating. The cartoon below is one of my favorites – and provides a comically poignant commentary on the issue.

For those of you who prefer a more serious depiction of tis problem, and would like real-world examples of how corporate know how can become “lost” – and the devastating effect that can have on an organization, I highly recommend the book  “Lost Knowledge.”

Ok, so the problem is real – but what can be done about it – save from trying to keep your top thinkers on board as long as possible.

• Establish the automated capturing of know-how and experience to the nth degree possible as a standard practice within your organization. Social collaboration tools, workflow and document management tools ARE NOT panaceas, but go a huge distance in capturing knowledge – without placing any significant burden on the community and the individuals that comprise it. This is important. In order to maximize compliance and minimize user resistance, build in knowledge capture as a transparent background “sub-routine” to existing “normal” processes. To do so, you need a solid appreciation for how these tools work, and the ability to think creatively. What knowledge can be captured, and of that, what is worth capturing and how might it be captured as “just a part of doing business?”  Objections that this approach does not capture all knowledge are legitimate, but in this case, something is better than nothing, and the something can be significant.

• Establish mentoring positions and methodologies in the enterprise. Newer (hopefully in it for the long haul) employees are nurtuerd and trained by more senior and knowledgeable folk in the organization - and not just when the senior individual is preparing to leave, but as part of an ongoing knowledge exchange. Resistance here is often in the form of reluctance to impose on  "your star performers." Thsi is reflective of an attitude of "The last thing they should be doing is teaching, when they can be making us more successful."  Now that is a perfect example of short-term thinking.  That said, it is important that the mentors not only be knowledgeable, but skilled in teaching and inspiring, in a manner that minimally impacts their own productivity. (Discussion for another day perhaps, but such methodologies do exist.)

• Determine which complex processes (those that require more than simple workflow automation and are ripe with decision points/criteria and benefit from experience and expertise) are fundamental to the operations of the organization. Then capture the experience and decision logic of those people who are best at the process. Yes, this can be done.  A small number of methodologies and technology platforms exist to assist in this. It is something that I refer to as “implicit knowledge” management.  I have personally seen these techniques work across many business applications in varied vertical markets, and be cost justified, but  I’ll be honest – they are time consuming and require specialized skills, so you want to be sure you are applying these to situations that warrant the approach.  If you want to know more,  I suggest you look at the works and ideas of Larry Todd Wilson and Knowledge Harvesting, Kate Pugh and Knowledge Jam, and something known as “Knowledge Life Cycle Modelling”.  Harnessing this type of implicit knowledge can lead to the distinct possibility of knowledge simulation. Imagine being able to ask an avatar that personifies an expert – “What would you do if?” or “What would ‘Joe’ do if he were here right now?”.

• It almost goes without saying – but I have seen the contrary too often to not feel it necessary to say:  Make sure that no matter what approach you take to capturing knowledge that you make it intuitively and proactively findable. Like any form of content, knowledge captured that cannot be located is virtually non-existent.

Each of these approaches comes with its own issues, limitations and challenges. Resistance to taking them on are almost as frequent as the lament of executives who fear brain drain. But this is a case of “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”