Management & Technology
KM2.0 – Myth or Legend?
0 yt o ege d
Matthew H d
M tth Hodgson
ACT Regional-lead, Web and Information Management
SMS Management & Technology
October 2008, ACTKM08

Podcasts and Slideshare
Podcasts and Slideshare
www.slideshare.net/magia3e

A little audience participation . . .

Fact or myth?
Fact or myth?

Logical or mythological?
Logical or mythological?

Objective or subjective?
Objective or subjective?

A short history of myth
A short history of myth

As we evolved …
As we evolved …

Blaming Aristotle
Blaming Aristotle
Knowledge = Definition

Blaming Aristotle
Blaming Aristotle
Is: Is not:
• Round • Square
• Cake • Beer
• Sweet • Salty

Repositories for expertly defined knowledge
Repositories for expertly defined knowledge

Modern repositories
Modern repositories
After years of harboring his secret desires
Ned finally hits on the senior librarian

More recently …
More recently …

… and in our own organisations
and in our own organisations

People
p
Rewards
Document management
g
Keyword AAA Explicit
Tacit
Workflow Hoarding
Workflow Expert review
Approvals
Retrieval
R ti l Classification
…the knowledge world we live in
g
Knowledge capture Guard
Content management
Data
aa
Storytelling
DIRKS
Metadata Knowledge-base
Database
Business
B siness classification scheme
Processes Information management
Performance

The world of knowledge is changing
The world of knowledge is changing

Web2.0: the new world
Web2.0: the new world
Embraces :
• Subjective opinion – even Homer Simpson’s view of the world
• Personal stories
• Thinking ‘out-loud’, not refined, edited, controlled communication
• Interaction and trust between people (not documents or repositories)
• Identity, membership and community building
y p y g
• Instant gratification, low-barrier adoption & light-weight processes
Empowers:
• I di id l – me as an expert without interference f
Individuals t ith t i t f from ‘‘so-called’
ll d’
experts or gatekeepers
• C
Communities – it’s easy to be involved at any level

Knowledge as a product?
Knowledge as a product?
Constantly busy
Produce
Get busy! Work in isolation Expert review something Expert classification
and
St
Store

Web 2.0 knowledge processes
Web 2.0 knowledge processes
Refine
‘Burst’ of
thinking Tag and share Communicate/
Collaborate

Web 2.0 knowledge roles
Web 2.0 knowledge roles
33%
19%
13%
19%
15%
Source: Forrester Research, 2008 52%

Web 2.0 behaviour
Web 2.0 behaviour
Creator:
Creator
• Create, work “in the cloud”, comment, messaging
Critic:
• Comment trackback, messaging
Comment, trackback
Collector:
• Cl if and tag
Classify d t
Joiner:
• Message, create personal profiles
Spectator:
• Message, email, passive consumption of material

Web 2.0 knowledge tools
Web 2.0 knowledge tools
Creator – making new knowledge:
• Blog, Wikis, comment fields, instant messaging (eg. Twitter)
.
Critic – refining existing knowledge:
• Blog comment fields Twitter
Blog, fields,
.
Collector – sharing and classification:
• Delicious, Magnolia, Tagging
.
Joiner – contributing to the social cohesion:
• Twitter, personal profiles, friends’ profiles, community
profiles
.
Spectator – just watching from the sidelines:
• Twitter, email,

Why do they do this?
Why do they do this?
Creativity, problem solving, spontaneity
Self-esteem, confidence, achievement, respect of other b others
S lf t fid hi t t f th by th
Family, friendship, community, intimacy
Shelter, security
Food, water, air, sleep
Source: Wikipedia (Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, 1943)

It s also about choice
It’s also about choice
Source: M Hodgson, 2007

It’s a model that works!
It s a model that works!
Some stats:
• 6.5 billion people on the planet
• O 1 billion people use th I t
Over billi l the Internet [1]
t
• 0.5 billion use websites that facilitate social interaction,
networking, and knowledge sharing [2]
• Blogs – 77.7 million unique visitors in the USA alone [3]
• Facebook – 41.0 million
• M S
MySpace – 75 1 million
75.1 illi
• Wikipedia – 100 million hours of evolving knowledge,
2.5 illi
2 5 million iin English articles, 167 million revisions, 5.5 million
E li h ti l illi i i 5 5 illi
registered ‘authors’

How can we leverage this for KM?
How can we leverage this for KM?
It doesn t just happen – you need good strategy
doesn’t
People:
P l
• Understand people – how they think and behave
• K
Know about organisationall culture – esp. it li it ti
b t i ti lt its limitations
Objectives:
• What behaviour do we want to reinforce and why
• What do we want to achieve – the ROI to aim for
Technology:
• Supporting behaviour with appropriate tools
pp g pp p
• Know any technology constraints Source: Based on Forrester’s POST model , 2007

Social computing building blocks
Social computing building blocks
Source: G Smith, 2007

Case study: KM & social computing tools
Case study: KM & social computing tools

The problem
The problem

Standard solution
Standard solution

Team s available brain space
Team’s available brain space

Conceptual solution
Conceptual solution

Delicious – sharing
Delicious
HAS
PARENT TERM OF
TERM
EQUIVALENT TO Wiki
HAS HAS
TERM TERM
PARENT TERM OF

Twitter conversations & community
Twitter – conversations & community

Delicious sharing bookmarks
Delicious – sharing bookmarks

Blogs – sharing, conversations, and
community

Benefits of using social computing tools
Benefits of using social computing tools
Managing the team s knowledge:
team’s
• People – enabled Web 2.0 role diversity (creators, collectors, etc)
• Objectives – share ‘what we knew , as we knew it as it evolved
what knew’ it,
• Technology – store context, who (selves!) knew what about which
terms,
terms enabled networking within and without the project
For the project:
• Quick to set-up and easy to use
p y
• Accessible – web front-end so available off-site
• Saved time – central location de centralised control
location, de-centralised
• Repository for single source publishing – terms into multiple
physical documents for multiple uses

Results
The good:
• Supported team’s work behaviour, not prescribed it
• Vi ibilit of new knowledge practices
Visibility f k l d ti
• Affected other people’s behaviour - other project teams
j
from other divisions took notice, joined in, and used
these tools
The bad:
• We had broken traditional editorial approval process
• The wiki was closed down …. why?

Culture affects the way we work
Culture affects the way we work
There are national and
regional cultural
groupings that affect the
behaviour of societies
and organisations, and
that are very persistent
across time.

Cultural Dimensions
Cultural Dimensions
High Power-Distance organisations:
Power Distance
• Value power according to rank
• V l hi
Value hierarchy over fl t organisationall structures
h flat i ti t t
• Love chain-of-command
• Demand respect and formal deference for higher status
people
• Lots of formal processes and policies
Low Power-Distance organisations:
• Flat structures
• Informal processes and policies

Power‐Distance
Power Distance
Small organisations
Team-based work
Many government
organisations
Source: Hodgson, M (2008) The Relationship Economy

High Power‐Distance can kill!
High Power Distance can kill!
Reinforces:
• Empowers gatekeeper mentality
• Position power
• Control
• Knowledge as a linear, edited, and defined product
Almost impossible to:
• Change – it’s the organisation’s personality we’re talking about
• Introduce low-hierarchical activities encompassed by
‘social computing’
social computing

How to get around Power‐Distance
How to get around Power Distance
When l i
Wh planning and d li i strategy …
d delivering t t
Deploy it:
• At a team-levell or project llevell
t l j t
Plan:
• Security measures to keep it inside the team
• LLeverage profiles and llogins
fil d i
Communicate:
• From the bottom-up
• Sell victories & story-tell lessons learned (blog about it?)

Conclusions
KM might be about:
• Storytelling
• Environments to support knowledge transfer
The reality – it’s Aristotle s world of knowledge:
it s Aristotle’s
• 2000 years of expert knowledge as process
• Objecti e factual, scientific and ph sical
Objective, fact al physical
• Expertly defined
• Expertly crafted and classified
• Reinforces position-power
p p
• High Power-Distance
• Coming to an end

Conclusions
Web 2.0 enables and values:
• Subjective – individuals, thoughts, expression, ideas
• Personal opinion – whether fact or myth
• Self and community rather than ‘experts’
• Different knowledge worker roles – collectors creators
collectors, creators,
critics, joiners, spectators
• Simple light-weight tools knowledge workers can use at
Simple,
home
Web 2.0 is legendary stuff:
• S i l revolution online
Social l ti li
• Heralds a paradigm shift in Western thinking

Fin
Welcome to KM 2.0

KM2.0
KM2 0
Myth or Legend?

Matthew Hodgson
ACT Regional-lead, Web and Information Management
SMS Management & Technology
Blog: magia3e.wordpress.com
Twitter: magia3e
Slideshare: www.slideshare.net/magia3e
Email: mhodgson@smsmt.com
g @
Mobile: 0404 006695