Practicing Communities of Practice with Ernst & Young

Ernst & Young virtual presentation Sustaining Effective Communities of Practice collaborative research report overview for KM Chicago 9 February 2010 Darrin Brogan Brad Kenney

Presentation to KM Chicago – Agenda
EY global and Center for Business Knowledge (CBK)
Communities of practice (CoPs) at EY
Role in supporting APQC’s CoP report
Key findings

EY global and CBK overview ~170 America ~250 EMEIA ~130 shared service center ~40 China/HK (Asia-Pac) ~25 Japan ~25 Number of CBK and eChannel FTEs
Center for Business Knowledge :
Formal knowledge organization – presence in all EY Areas (EMEIA, Americas, Far East, Oceania and Japan)
Total CBK: ~600 FTEs (60 CBK FTEs with a global role)
Mission:
Connect people to people
Connect people to content
Objectives:
Growth
Operational efficiency
People development
Ernst & Young is a global leader in assurance, tax, transaction and advisory services. People: 144,000 Locations: 5 global Areas and shared service locations

Started in 1995 with strong executive sponsorship
Currently more than 600 knowledge-related employees in ~40 locations globally
Chief Knowledge Officers for each global area
Strong, collaborative relationships with Learning, HR, and Technology teams as well as service line and sector stakeholders
Implementing Future State of Knowledge blueprint for the next generation of KM at Ernst & Young
Center for Business Knowledge (CBK) overview It didn’t happen overnight ’ 95 ’ 10 Customer needs Intranet Customer needs Research & analysis Networks Vendor management Deployment

Communities of practice at EY
EY CoPs have enabled a strong knowledge culture, including the sharing of leading practices, due largely to the following critical success factors:
CoPs are easily accessible (and available enterprise-wide)
CoP strategy is not “one size fits all”
Continuous improvement is essential
Rigorous deployment and governance processes are applied
Must have executive sponsorship
Membership must meet certain thresholds (e.g., all requests go through an approval process)
Must have specific goals/objectives
Measurement is applied to goals
Communities are retired/consolidated as needed

Communities of practice at EY enabled via Community HomeSpaces (CHSes)

Presentation to KM Chicago – Agenda
EY global and Center for Business Knowledge (CBK)
Communities of practice (CoPs) at EY
Role in supporting APQC’s CoP report
Key findings/EY perspective

Study process overview
EY was the research champion for the study, which explored how some of the world’s foremost organizations successfully apply KM techniques and measures to sustain communities of practice
Best practice partners for the study included Conoco Philips, Schlumberger and Flour.
About a dozen other firms also participated (e.g., BP, Deere, ExxonMobil, Pfizer)
Primary areas of focus included:
Strategies and practices for sustaining CoP alignment with business strategies/objectives
Practices for promoting and sustaining CoP activity
Cultural enablers for sustaining CoPs; and
Assessing CoP maturity and business impact
Final report is expected to be available by 15 April 2010

CoP Study Findings Content organized around five chapters
Chapter 1 -- Creating a sustainable community strategy
Emphasis on the need for single enterprise-wide approach, and the importance of clearly articulated goals and objectives
EY perspective – Lots of forces at play regarding CoP strategy, including:
How many is too many?
Influence of social networking
In a professional services environment, there are competing (and often overlapping) community strategies across industry sectors and services
Establishing rigorous governance policies without discouraging collaboration
Retiring content and communities

CoP Study Findings
Chapter 2 – Practices and approaches for sustaining communities
Key best practices in this chapter include: alignment of communities with business needs, using community performance plans and leveraging technology thoughtfully
EY perspective –
Organizations unable to effectively connect people-to-people (e.g., via expertise locators) will not have strong CoPs
Staying aligned with business needs often puts a major strain on KM in organizations that continuously restructure
Technology can support, but will not drive, effective community enablement

CoP Study Findings
Chapter 3 – Tools and resources for community leaders
Clearly articulated roles and responsibilities for community leaders are essential, as is a strong support network for the leaders
EY perspective – CoP leaders need a support team to operate, maintain, and demonstrate the value of the CoP in accomplishing the organization’s strategies and objectives. Some of key roles defined within EY CoP’s are outlined below
CoP Leader Knowledge Advisor Knowledge Manager Knowledge Champion
Set annual objectives for the CoP
Accountable for the acquisition, reuse and creation of knowledge within their realm of
Capture leading practices
Steward a body of knowledge on behalf of the larger organization
Communicate with the community members
Primary liaison between internal and customer groups
Achieve consistency in content architecture, use of technology, training and deployment
Drive change to knowledge-sharing culture and harvest leading practices
Manage CoP templates and support mechanisms for their community
Provide guidance and training on how to use and leverage the CoP
Extensive experience and knowledge of the CoP area
Influencers with senior management and executive sponsors
Identify what the business strategies, goals and user community needs are and how CoPs can assist in knowledge sharing

CoP Study Findings
Chapter 4 – Promote awareness and communicate value
Best practice organizations constantly communicate the value that CoP’s provide to the organization, and they will typically create meaningful recognition and reward opportunities
EY perspective – value of knowledge sharing is grounded in several core principles:
Each new hire must sign a knowledge sharing agreement
Knowledge is integrated into new hire, classroom and web-based training programs
Knowledge competency development is part of employee goals process
Central knowledge team fosters awareness and provides additional support

CoP Study Findings
Chapter 5 – Measures
Measures must align with business processes, with a balanced approach between activity measures and measures of effectiveness
EY perspective –
Developing more “impact” measures that are geared toward executive audiences
Detailed CoP metrics also provided, and offer a combination of usage and effectiveness data
Provide measures that:
Align with organizational goals
Demonstrate improved performance
Assist in managing risks
Justify the business value and ROI

Questions?

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Practicing Communities of Practice with Ernst & Young

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Practicing Communities of Practice with Ernst & Young — Presentation Transcript