This document summarizes the challenges and lessons learned in implementing a knowledge management (KM) program at a large construction company. It describes the company's pre-KM systems and why KM was needed due to rapid growth. The company developed a KM strategy centered around communities of practice. It established a KM organization and processes to connect people, enable sharing, and monitor contributions. Challenges included remote work and reluctance to share. Recommendations included top management support, dedicated KM roles, selecting effective community leaders, and providing engaging content.

1. Challenges & Lessons Learned in
Implementing KM Program in a
Construction Company
By: Mustafa Abusalah, PhD
April 2012

2. CCC Pre KM
 WAN: Company headquarters, projects, offices and areas are connected
via WAN/VPN.
 Communications: Communication channel is mainly through email, IP
Telephony and TDM.
 Document and Content Management: CCC has an in house developed
Document Management System (VBC) which is the repository for all CCC
content.
 VBC Central: VBC central is the framework where projects, departments,
etc. Can create there own content management portals.
 One Repository: As VBC is the repository for all CCC content, all
applications running at CCC stores and retrieves documents to/from VBC.
This allowed different applications to work on the same content when
needed.

4. Why Knowledge Management (1)
 CCC operating platform for developing people and sharing knowledge
seems to be adequate in sustaining CCC’s operations pre 2002-03.
 Project managers and project teams could transfer knowledge to other projects and / or
develop staff within
 Formal procedures (QMPs) and “Method Statements” were created and informal
networks were effective in exchanging information.
 CCC established a niche in being able to execute difficult projects requiring mobilization
of significant resources.

5. Why Knowledge Management (2)
 Magnitude and Rate of Growth are causing “Cracks”
 Management time is being diverted from addressing strategic issues “to shoring up partners
and client’s concerns due to being behind schedule in up to 80% of our projects”.
 Inconsistencies are appearing within our operations and execution of projects.
 Roles, responsibilities, accountabilities, communications channels were becoming fragmented
across the group.
“Sheer volume of growth means we have less time to communicate”
“We discover mistakes too late in the game”
“We capture and share more lessons learned with partners than with
ourselves”
“Someone in the project needs to be responsible for lessons learned”
“Rework is occurring because people do not know what is available”

6. Why Knowledge Management (3)
Conclusions
Sharing the knowledge: Insights, experiences, contact details,
lessons learned, favourite documents, useful links, supplier
and other work related resources.
Collaboration platform: On bridging knowledge gaps, drafting
Corporate Knowledge
Corporate Knowledge
documents, developing new areas of practices, on bringing
Network
Network
innovation to market, on defining new approaches and
solutions to customer issues
People Directory (profiles): for locating experience, answering
questions, solving problems, make recommendations,
training, manuals, lessons learned

7. Definition of Knowledge Management
Knowledge management is the strategic backbone within CCC
that puts in place a supportive social and technical framework &
structure that encourages staff to contribute, share and innovate
knowledge for the benefit of CCC (employees, operations and
partners), which in exchange provides staff clearer with insights on
how and where they can develop through the application and
sharing of knowledge and improve the efficiency of the operations.
“Obtaining and creating the right knowledge to the right people
at the right time”

8. CCC KM Strategy
Blanket Initiatives: Initiatives that when
implemented cover all CoPs eg. Redesign/
reenergise Lessons Learned
Key:
Elemental Initiatives: Initiatives that are
Example Elemental
Initiatives
CoP D
CoP A
CoP C
“optional” for each CoP. Each of these initiatives
can also be done to varying degrees
CoP B
Knowledge
Process Design
eLearning
content
CoP N
CoPs: Groups of individuals with a common
Experience
database
purpose/ goals, supported by functionality
provided by Elemental Initiatives
Foundation Initiatives: Phase I – necessary to
implement prior to developing the CoPs as they
provide the core KM support structure for all
Elemental Initiatives
Phase II – provide the support KM structure for only
some of the Elemental Initiatives
Knowledge
Audit
Training &
development
• Incentives & Recognition framework
• Induction programme
• KM processes
•
•
•
•
•
KM Organisation
Knowledge Portal
KM Comms Programme
Knowledge Taxonomy
KM Scorecard
(Phase II)
Foundation
Initiatives
(Phase I)

9. KM & CoP Organisations
CCC Leadership
Community of Practice
Community Leader
PT
Head of KM
Knowledge Manager
SMEs
PT
Knowledge Captains
Community Members
PT
Knowledge Automation
Engineer (IS)
Knowledge Controllers
KM Organisation
Executive Assistant
Project Manager PT
PT
PT = Part Time

10. KM Organization Processes
Connecting: People to communities, people to experts,
people to KM tools, people to repositories
Enabling & Facilitating: Conversations, exchanges,
collaboration, questions, answers, contributions,
engagement and adoption
Monitoring & Reporting: On behaviours, contribution,
engagement, organisational dynamics, KM system health,
knowledge flows

11. What is a Community of Practice (CoP)?
 CoPs are either formal or informal groups of people with a
common purpose and common goals. A few characteristics of
CoPs are:
 The “members” share common pursuits and problems
 They share common practices and language – eg. They use the same
methodologies and express themselves in a similar fashion (eg.
technical jargon)
 They share similar interests
 Most people belong to more than one CoP
 Members of a CoP often have the same or similar roles but are not
located in the same location (or same project)
11

12. CoP Processes
Search: for answers, experts, knowledge, experience, lessons
learned, documents, images, perspectives
Collaborate: On bridging knowledge gaps, drafting
documents, developing new areas of practices, on bringing
innovation to market, on defining new approaches and
solutions to customer issues
Share: Insights, experiences, contact details, lessons learned,
favourite documents, useful links, supplier and other work
related resources

13. KM Portal
 Wiki Collaboration and Knowledge Sharing platform:
bridging knowledge gaps, drafting documents, developing new
areas of practices, bringing innovation to market, defining new
approaches and solutions to customer issues. Insights,
experiences, contact details, lessons learned, favourite
documents, useful links, supplier and other work related
resources.
People Directory (profiles): for locating experience, answering
questions, solving problems, make recommendations,
training, manuals, lessons learned.
VBC Repository: Formal Knowledge, KAudit

14. Community of Practice (CoP)
Planning Phase*
 Establish founding members
 Develop business case
 Establish Taxonomy Framework & high level breakdown
 Perform knowledge Audit: Content + People
 Build knowledge maps
*Source: American Productivity & Quality Center (APQC)

15. Community of Practice (CoP)
CoP - Design Phase*
 Design knowledge sharing processes/ workflows
 Identify roles and responsibilities
 Identify required IT capabilities
 Develop Initial learning and development plan and content
 Create measures, indicators, and scorecard
 Establish reward and recognition plans
 Develop change management plan ( Monthly newsletters,
announcements, surveys, Bulletin etc.)
*Source: American Productivity & Quality Center (APQC)

16. Meetings Highlights
 First Year: 6 Meetings were held with each CoP
 Meeting No. 1: Business Case Requirements
 Meeting No. 2: Business Case follow-up & KM Roll out plan
 Meeting No. 3: Founding Members’ CoP Kick-off Meeting
and agree on roles and responsibilities
 Meeting No. 4: Business Case Presentation to Top
Management
 Meeting No. 5: Review KAudit report, agree on launching
content, and membership guides.
 Meeting No. 6: Review new contributions, agree on future
contributions and presentations by invited speakers and
members.
 Then Two yearly follow up meetings are held.

17. “Connect & Collect” Knowledge Portal
“Connect & Collect”
Knowledge Portal?
Connect People
3. Share, Validate &
Harvest Learnings
KnowledgeBase
1. Do we
already know this?
4. Enrich the KBase
2. Who can I ask
for help?

18. CCC Knowledge Portal – Fanous
18

19. 19
Communication & Awareness

20. Recognition of Best Contributors/ Projects
20

21. Members Behavior
 Knowledge Culture: contribute in the definition of the company’s
vision and strategy, contribute to innovative processes consider and
recognize members ideas and skills. Encourage members to play
challenging roles and tasks, which go beyond their current
capabilities. Encourage members to learn, knowing that they will
acquire new skills. And finally understand that the members want to
see the company’s values fit their own.
 Motivation: Recognition for best contributions, elitism could be
strong social motivation factor, providing members with challenging
and constantly changing tasks seems to be critical to increase their
motivation.
 Training & Workshops: Members training, running knowledge
capture session in projects, awards for best contributions per project.

22. Measuring & Monitoring
 Monitoring Investment: Time, money and effort (Department
budget, Meetings cost, Time spent in KM-related activities, etc.)
 Monitoring Adoption: whether or not the activity is being taken up
according to plan (Staff time invested in sharing activities, Frequency
of activity per division, etc.)
 Monitoring Health: KM System, repository, search, etc. (#
Knowledge assets created, Frequency of use of knowledge assets
created, etc.)
 Case studies of knowledge re-use. (Ex:
Guidelines For Fabrication Shop Equipment)
 Excavation simulation program
 Participants’ assessment of CoP value for work effectiveness
and/or knowledge development.

23. Knowledge Creation- Innovative Ideas
Project Mobilization Community
lead the development of a
comprehensive guideline for
camps construction. The
guideline includes several
innovative ideas intended to
reduce power and water
consumption, increase waste
recycling, and carbon emission
reduction. The guideline
emphasized on safety
requirements and residents
welfare.
23

24. Collecting & Connecting– Delivering Value
A project engineer in Kazakhstan inquired about best
practice for selection of compressors and dryers for
pressure testing. He found a guideline in Fanous
developed by an SME on the subject, based in Qatar. He
communicated with the SME on his project requirement.
The SME helped him in specifying the equipment. This
resulted on more than US$ 60,000 saving on direct
equipment cost.
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25. Collecting & Connecting – Delivering Value
A project in Qatar experienced high repair rate of smallbore pipe socket welding. A senior welding engineer
searched Fanous for lessons learned from other projects.
He found several recommendations to use special spacer
rings during fit-up of such piping. The delivery time of
such rings is around 3-4 weeks. However, a project in
Kuwait built a machine to fabricate these spacer rings inhouse saving time and cost. The machine was
transferred to Qatar and was operational in days. Beside
time saving in rings delivery and cost of repairs, the Qatar
project realized at least US$ 180K in direct savings.
25

26. Challenges
 Working in remote locations in tough site conditions and poor
communication
 Variant workforce cultures
 Company business changes, type of projects is variant, Oil
and Gas vs. High quality buildings
 Computer literacy, some of the best knowledge holders lack
computer literacy.
 Reluctance to share knowledge. Need of recognition
 Construction is less based on codes so the context has great
impact on the best practice. (ex. Labor intinsives vs.
Automation)

27. Recommendations
 Support of the top management is instrumental, as senior and
middle management tend to resist
 Dedicated KM Organization.
 The KM organization shall drive the KM philosophy and the IT shall
give support and the implementation.
 Selection of CoP Leader is most critical and determent for the
success of the KM application.
 Importance of regular meetings.
 Attractive and rich content, reminders, change management/
elaborate communication plan.
 Evolving Technology & Content (Web 2 & Web 3).
 Start with 3 to 5 CoPs as some will fail. Plan to introduce new ones
every year.

28. Thank You Q&A

29. Discussion Thoughts
 Taxonomy and Ontology Construction (Experiences and per
community)
 Establish/share some benchmarks
 Good size of a community
 Community benchmarks
 Success measures