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Aligning people process and technology in km arma metro ny presentation
This document provides an agenda and overview for an educational event on aligning people, process, and technology for knowledge management success. The presentation introduces the speaker and their background in knowledge management consulting. It then covers key topics like the relationship between people, process and technology in KM, developing a KM roadmap, selecting appropriate KM technologies, and requirements for successful KM implementations like having a clear strategy, governance structure, change management process, and measuring return on investment. The presentation concludes with case studies of successful and unsuccessful KM projects at various organizations.
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Aligning people process and technology in km arma metro ny presentation
- 1. Educational Event Spring 2013 Aligning People, Process and Technology for Success Stephanie Barnes
- 2. Agenda • Introduction • Approach • Roadmap • Technology • Requirements for success • Case studies © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 2
- 3. Who am I? • Accountant and IT Management by education • KM consultant by desire • Chief Chaos Organizer at Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, Knoco franchisee • 4 yrs KM Program Manager in HP • 9+ yrs as consultant to a variety of companies including BMO, HSFO, Kodak, HP, Zenon Environmental, OSC, CIBC, ENE C • Based in Toronto © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 3
- 4. This Presentation • Basedon a report I wrote for Ark Group, which was published in May 2011 • HOWEVER, you do not need to buy the report, the slides are available 4 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 5. Knowledge Management Definition • Connectingpeople to the knowledge they need to do their jobs whether that knowledge is tacit or explicit 5 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 6. Approach People Technology Process © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 6
- 7. Business-IT Alignment © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 7
- 8. Knowledge Management Roadmap Evolve Use Implement Design/ •Change Mgmt Develop/ Test Select •Processes technology •Metrics Resolve: Analyze: •Policies •Knowledge & Collect: •Human, Socia process flows l, and •Business •Metrics Intellectual Processes Capital Best •Strategic •Information Practices Goals Flows •Governance •Organization Strategy and Plan •IT Strategy and Plan © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 8
- 9. Technology © Missing PuzzlePiece Consulting, 2013 9
- 10. Which technology topick? • What problem are you trying to solve? • What challenge are you trying to overcome? 10 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 11. Categories of KMTechnologies Unstructured Knowledge •Domain Knowledge Wikis •Blogging •Communities of Practice •Collaboration •Document and Content Management •Portal Search Structured Knowledge Semi-structured Knowledge •Configuration Management •Lessons Learned Database Database •Yellow Pages/ Expertise Location © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 11
- 12. Knowledge Management Technology Organization/ Business Intelligence/ Data Warehouse Enterprise eDiscovery Communities of CRM, Contact Centre, Incident Context Practice, Expertis Management/Helpdesk e location Group/team Records Social Management Media ECM Document Capture Component Content Management Portal Collaboration Individual Search Learning Management/eLearning Scan, Capture, Package, Share, Transform, Map Create Store Apply Innovate Adapted from: Knowledge Managements by Despres and Chuvel, Journal of KM, vol 3, no. 2 1999, p119. © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 12
- 13. Enterprise Technologies, Structured and Unstructured Knowledge Business Customer Contact Centre Incident Learning Expertise Location Intelligence and Relationship Management/ Management Data Warehouse Management Helpdesk System/ eLearning Common Better decisions Ensure sales staff Improve Enable IT to quickly Administer and Locate experts business problem making at all have current customer identify and resolve track employee within the solved levels: strategic, information for experience for service outages training records organization and operational, and customer service and enable them to Establish a historical Deliver training and tactical interactions support collaborate record of service test participant Standardize and Improve outages and learning Reduce duplication streamline sales and customer incidents as well as of effort marketing processes loyalty their resolutions for Reduce the threat reuse and analytics Track and analyse Reduce cost of of communication marketing customer Provide single point breakdown campaigns support of contact Reduce time to find Tracks IT efforts Subject Matter and provide Experts (SME’s) visibility into service support © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 13
- 14. Enterprise Technologies, Unstructured Knowledge Records Component Content/ Imaging, Search Portal Workflow eDiscovery Management Content Document Forms, Management Management Document (ECM) Capture Common Compliance Improve Central place to Reduce paper Improve Central place to Improve Improve business Management document go for information go for compliance to security of Reduce storage problem quality, documents retrieval information and processes information Productivity costs of paper solved consistency, and access to enhancement Improve Improve Reduce standardization Standardize systems accessibility efficiency litigation Risk data collection Increase regardless of through costs Management (through forms) productivity in location consistency Reduce risk creating content Streamline and Improve processes standardiz- Streamline document ation document/cont lifecycle ent update management Improve the process ability to Increase reuse execute of documents/ administrative information and compliance processes consistently Reduce process execution © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 14 time
- 15. Social Media andCollaborative Technologies Blogs Micro- Social Collaboration blogging Networking Instant Document Wiki Virtual Community of Messaging Mgmt Meeting Practice Common Communica- Quick, Communica- Quick, Everyone Everyone Facilitating Organizational business tion across status-type tion immediate who should who should global/ virtual learning problem functions, communicati communicat have access have access teams Sharing/ Sharing solved teams, on across ion among to a to the finding Reducing travel expertise depts, functions, colleagues document information expertise costs stakeholder teams, has access has access groups departments Reduces Reduces , stakeholder confusion confusion groups caused by caused by emailing emailing documents documents Sharing Sharing information information Timely Timely creation and creation and updating of updating of information information © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 15
- 16. Knowledge Management Roadmap Evolve Use Implement Design/ •Change Mgmt Develop/ Test Select •Processes technology •Metrics Resolve: Analyze: •Policies •Knowledge & Collect: •Human, process flows Social, and •Business •Metrics Intellectual Processes Capital Best •Strategic •Information Practices Goals Flows •Governance •Organization Strategy and Plan •IT Strategy and Plan © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 16
- 17. Requirements for Success ©Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 17
- 18. Strategy 18 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 19. Roadmap/Plan 19 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 20. Budget 20 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 21. Governance (1/4) 21 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 22. Governance Inputs (2/4) © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 22
- 23. Governance Outputs (3/4) © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 23
- 24. Governance Committee (4/4) Department 1 Department Department 7 2 KM Governance Department Department 6 Chair 3 Department Department 5 4 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 24
- 25. Technology Management © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 25
- 26. Change Management • Organizational impact management • Stakeholder and sponsor management • Communication: planning and management • Training: planning and management 26 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 27. Knowledge Management Culture 27 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 28. Return on Investment 28 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 29. Human Resources 29 © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013
- 30. Case Studies © MissingPuzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 30
- 31. Case Studies Case Study KM Technology KM Implementation Results, if known Environmental Company Document Unsuccessful and Increased number of users using the Management then successful system by 50%, saved their million dollar investment High Technology Company #1 Enterprise Content Successful Significant ROI on technology Management investment, validated by external 3rd party 6500+ employees participating in knowledge sharing Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt Portal Successful User acceptance of the platform because they were involved at each step of the process and a technology was selected that met their requirements. Multinational Fast Moving Communities of Successful In the first five years sales in the small Consumer Goods Company Practice retail sales channel in the 12 emerging markets trebled, while profits have more than doubled. Pharmaceutical Company Portal Unsuccessful Project failed due to alienation of stakeholders and lack of participation of users. © Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 31
- 32. Thank You! © MissingPuzzle Piece Consulting, 2013 32
Editor's Notes
- #7 The key to success with technology is taking a balanced approach, considering people, process, and technology. By understanding people, and processes, the appropriate supporting technology can be selected and implemented.
- #8 Throughout the knowledge management roadmap process, it is important to maintain business IT alignment. Picking the appropriate enabling technology is critical to the success of the KM program. For this reason it is necessary to include both business and IT in the requirements collection phase that happens in the first few steps of the process. It is only in understanding what each group wants or needs to meet their requirements that makes success achievable.
- #9 The process for determining supporting knowledge management technology is outlined in this slide. The steps start with collect and move through analyze resolve selecting the technology designing and developing, and testing the actual implementation then use and finally evolving the technology platform.In the collect phase business processes are collected and analyzed as our information flows. The organization strategy and plan, as well as the IT strategy and plan. It is important to collect this information at the start of the project and involve the various stakeholders from across the organization so that the process of organization buy-in and acceptance is started as soon as possible.In the analyze phase the information collected in the first step is compared against best practices for human, social, and intellectual capital best practices. In this way the gap analysis is determined between the current state versus the to be state. Assuming that the organization is headed towards some best practices state depending on their organizational culture, which is a part of understanding the people in the organization.In the resolve stage policies. Knowledge management processes and flows metrics strategic goals and governance are all addressed and compiled in a strategic plan document for the organization. This plan lays out the knowledge management initiative: what it will do, how it will do it, who will be involved, budgets, metrics, how the organization will know that they’ve been successful. All of these things, including the implementation plan as much is a can be determined at that stage. The implementation plan will have several phases and extend over a 3 to 5 year time horizon. Starting with initial planning and rollout of a pilot and moving through an organization-wide rollout and maturation of the activities and processes.With the completion of the resolve step there is adequate information to go to market and determine what off-the-shelf technology is available. In the case where off-the-shelf technology isn’t available, it will at least be enough information to start the engagement of developers to develop a customized software application. Customized software creation will require additional rounds of requirements analysis in order to get enough detail for the developers to create a platform, which meets user needs and requirements. To select technology, it is important to understand the requirements of the users and involve them in the process of reviewing vendors. This user involvement in the selection process improves user acceptance down the road and ensures that users have identified all their major requirements. Often, users don’t know what they want, so sometimes seeing the selection of vendor applications can help them get a better handle on what would be useful and what isn’t useful, thus making sure the investment in technology is one that the users will actually use.Design, develop and test, is a critical and time-consuming step. It is important that the application be designed, or in the case of off-the-shelf software configured to meet user requirements. Including users in the testing phase, so that the application works as they expected it to work is key. It’s not enough to have the developers test and make sure it works the way that they understood the developers are the ones who will be using it the users have to be involved in user testing with appropriate documentation of use cases and a bug or error feedback mechanism. Testing should also include the more technical load testing to make sure that the system works on the hardware that has been purchased for it. And in the organization’s network information technology environment that will stand up to the load of users using it on a regular basis. Once all this testing is done the stakeholders need to sign off on the move to production.In the implementation, step change management becomes much more important. While there has been communication, training and education happening slowly or at various points along the earlier steps. Once the implementation phase it started there is a big push for communication, training, and education so that users are ready to start using the application. Process documentation should be modified at this step so that users have updated documentation to use. It is also at this point that baseline metrics will be finalized and implemented.During the use, step users are using the application. The governance team is governing the application and its general the business is you usual. There should be a feedback mechanism as part of governance to record user feedback and input for changes are things that aren’t working the way that they wished even with user involvement in the earlier steps. There is often things that have snuck through and made it into production that should not have.This feedback is used to modify and improve future phases of the technology and the KM program generally, it is fed into the evolve step of the knowledge management roadmap process along with other changes that the organization may make to its processes and strategies.
- #12 There are 3 main categories of technologies. There are technologies that deal with Structured Knowledge, such as the kind of knowledge found in a configuration management database; there are technologies that deal with semi-structured knowledge, such as the knowledge in a lessons learned database; and there are technologies that deal with unstructured knowledge, such as document repositories.
- #13 There are many types of technologies as you can see from the above that diagram and a lot of them overlap which makes it difficult sometimes to pick the right one. For this reason, it’s important to understand whether it’s for individual use or group or team use or organization or enterprise use. Once you understand that you can start to narrow down the possibilities. Then you need to understand what types of activities are going to be performed using the technology: is for scanning are mapping i.e. understanding what knowledge exists; is it for capturing or creating; is it for packaging orstoring; sharing and applying; or transforming and innovating? All of these things are criteria that will influence the selection of the technology. Everything from search to social media to business intelligence and data warehouse technology can be determined using the answers to these questions.
- #17 The process for determining supporting knowledge management technology is outlined in this slide. The steps start with collect and move through analyze resolve selecting the technology designing and developing, and testing the actual implementation then use and finally evolving the technology platform.In the collect phase business processes are collected and analyzed as our information flows. The organization strategy and plan, as well as the IT strategy and plan. It is important to collect this information at the start of the project and involve the various stakeholders from across the organization so that the process of organization buy-in and acceptance is started as soon as possible.In the analyze phase the information collected in the first step is compared against best practices for human, social, and intellectual capital best practices. In this way the gap analysis is determined between the current state versus the to be state. Assuming that the organization is headed towards some best practices state depending on their organizational culture, which is a part of understanding the people in the organization.In the resolve stage policies. Knowledge management processes and flows metrics strategic goals and governance are all addressed and compiled in a strategic plan document for the organization. This plan lays out the knowledge management initiative: what it will do, how it will do it, who will be involved, budgets, metrics, how the organization will know that they’ve been successful. All of these things, including the implementation plan as much is a can be determined at that stage. The implementation plan will have several phases and extend over a 3 to 5 year time horizon. Starting with initial planning and rollout of a pilot and moving through an organization-wide rollout and maturation of the activities and processes.With the completion of the resolve step there is adequate information to go to market and determine what off-the-shelf technology is available. In the case where off-the-shelf technology isn’t available, it will at least be enough information to start the engagement of developers to develop a customized software application. Customized software creation will require additional rounds of requirements analysis in order to get enough detail for the developers to create a platform, which meets user needs and requirements. To select technology, it is important to understand the requirements of the users and involve them in the process of reviewing vendors. This user involvement in the selection process improves user acceptance down the road and ensures that users have identified all their major requirements. Often, users don’t know what they want, so sometimes seeing the selection of vendor applications can help them get a better handle on what would be useful and what isn’t useful, thus making sure the investment in technology is one that the users will actually use.Design, develop and test, is a critical and time-consuming step. It is important that the application be designed, or in the case of off-the-shelf software configured to meet user requirements. Including users in the testing phase, so that the application works as they expected it to work is key. It’s not enough to have the developers test and make sure it works the way that they understood the developers are the ones who will be using it the users have to be involved in user testing with appropriate documentation of use cases and a bug or error feedback mechanism. Testing should also include the more technical load testing to make sure that the system works on the hardware that has been purchased for it. And in the organization’s network information technology environment that will stand up to the load of users using it on a regular basis. Once all this testing is done the stakeholders need to sign off on the move to production.In the implementation, step change management becomes much more important. While there has been communication, training and education happening slowly or at various points along the earlier steps. Once the implementation phase it started there is a big push for communication, training, and education so that users are ready to start using the application. Process documentation should be modified at this step so that users have updated documentation to use. It is also at this point that baseline metrics will be finalized and implemented.During the use, step users are using the application. The governance team is governing the application and its general the business is you usual. There should be a feedback mechanism as part of governance to record user feedback and input for changes are things that aren’t working the way that they wished even with user involvement in the earlier steps. There is often things that have snuck through and made it into production that should not have.This feedback is used to modify and improve future phases of the technology and the KM program generally, it is fed into the evolve step of the knowledge management roadmap process along with other changes that the organization may make to its processes and strategies.
- #19 Certainly no one should start out on a Knowledge Management journey without a strategy that sets out the overall direction for a KM initiative. This strategy should address people, process and technology. Knowledge Management also needs to align with the overall organizational strategy. Knowledge Management is meant to enable the organization to meet its goals and objectives in an effective and efficient manner. It can only do this if it is aligned with the organization goals and objectives and supports the business processes rather than impeding them.Many organizations view Knowledge Management as a tactical project jumping into the details of technology or processes too soon and with the idea that it will come to it end because projects come to an end. However, Knowledge Management is an additional business process and as such does not come to an end; it evolves over time and becomes second nature, but it does not end.The OCASI case study illustrates the importance of completing a strategic plan.
- #20 Creating a roadmap is critical as it breaks the strategy down into phases and activities, which makes the implementation of Knowledge Management easier to execute. A roadmap is completed for each phase of the Knowledge Management implementation, as well as for the KM initiative as a whole: the roadmap for the phase aligns with the roadmap for the whole programme.The roadmap provides “the big picture” for the KM initiative; it provides insight into organizational structure and participation required by the programme as well as proposed timelines, and activities. For instance, it helps set-out the steering committee requirements, human resources requirements, cross functional involvement, as well as a support strategy. It also provides opportunities for users to participate in the KM strategy, planning, and implementation process which helps to ensure the final product will meet their needs and requirements as well as aiding with buy-in and support for KM within the organization.Many of the case studies illustrate the need for a KM roadmap, and identify the steps they took to implement KM. In particular the High Technology Company #1, ICICI Bank, and OCASI case studies are examples of organizations with a road map for KM.
- #21 BudgetMany organizations budget only for the technology, e.g., hardware and software licenses, but there are many other costs associated with implementing Knowledge Management that need to be included in the budget. SoftwareDepending on whether the organization has chosen to build or buy its Knowledge Management application, it is important to include design or customization and configuration in the budget. The budget for this item is not only money but also time and people to participate in providing input as well and as to complete the work of designing and configuring. It is important to allow enough time to complete the necessary design and configuration tasks; it will probably take longer than expected.Data migrationAnother task that will probably take longer than expected and is often forgotten in planning Knowledge Management implementations is data migration. This means planning for the moving of documents, forms, images, etc. from the existing technology to the new system. Even if it seems like there is no data to migrate there probably is. Staff will have documents or cheat sheets on their hard drives, there will be Excel spread sheets with data or home-grown databases. Even if the decision is not to migrate the data, the issue still needs to be reviewed and assessed and a decision made. The information captured from the review of existing data needs to be fed into the meta-data and taxonomy activity discussed in Step 5 of the Roadmap Process.TrainingA component which is often overlooked in the budgeting process is training. Questions concerning who will do the training, when will it happen, how long will it take, who will create the materials or will they be purchased, all of these need to be considered, and budgeted. Do not assume that people will learn the application on their own. Certainly there are some people who will be able to intuitively figure it out, but this is not the majority of the staff. Even if the basics are intuitive, there will be more complex features that need to be explained or demonstrated so that staff can take full advantage of the functionality of the application. Training should be completed prior to the rollout of the technology but close enough to the actual rollout date that the training is not forgotten. It is a good idea to make short videos or animations available once the application goes live so that staff may refer to those videos to refresh their memories about application functionality. Each video should deal with one activity, for example, adding a document, or completing a form and not try to address all the functionality at once.Change managementChange management is a significant component of any project the organization executes; however, in KM projects it is even more critical because in Knowledge Management people are being to change their behaviours and ways of working. Change management provides the communication, education, and other activities needed to help ensure buy-in and support from members of the organization. There is more about Change Management in another section where the framework for the Change Management plan are presented.On-going operationsThe final component that is often overlooked in budgeting for the Knowledge Management programme is the cost of on-going operations and support. KM continues, it is not finite and as such there needs to be a budget for on-going activities such as communication, education, technology improvements, and generally expanding and supporting the use of all KM related People, Process, and Technology activities across the organization.
- #22 The next requirement for success is the establishment, implementation, and enforcement of corporate-wide policies and procedures for KM; this is done through the Governance Committee. Governance is necessary to ensure that the Knowledge Management programme represents and continues to represent the needs of the organization and that it addresses all Knowledge Management and related issues, such as records and information management policy, records retention policy, taxonomy and meta-data, document-naming conventions, and legal hold procedures. Records and information management, record retention and legal hold policies are often the domain of a separate non-Knowledge Management department. However, the KM programme should be aligned with those initiatives and in the case where no one in the organization is addressing those issues, the Knowledge Management programme may take responsibility for them in as much as they relate to the knowledge lifecycle.
- #23 To help maintain business IT alignment in the knowledge management program it is important to have a KM governance body. This governance body has four main inputs. Business requirements come from the business reps themselves, and includes both the initial business requirements and ongoing business requirements is they change or evolve over time. The enterprise architecture inputs from the IT group are where the IT strategy and architecture needs figure into the determination of supporting knowledge management technologies that may be used within the organization. The third input is security and compliance. This is from an IT perspective, but also from a records management, privacy, and HR perspective; in addition to any other regulatory requirements that may be a criteria for the organization. Related to the three other factors is the fourth factor of having Business and IT participation. The governance body is not an IT body and is not a business body, both functions need to be at the table to ensure their interests are considered in the organization’s knowledge management activities.
- #24 The governance body has several outputs They provide advice and guidance to the knowledge management program team so that the program team’s activities remain aligned with the organization’s overall objectives as identified and incorporated into the KM strategy through the KM governance body. Another output is the support will platform for KM activities and request prioritization. Request prioritization is key for the governance body. Once the program is rolled out, staff will immediately start to have feedback on what works and doesn’t work and request for extending functionality and processes. It is the governance body’s responsibility to take these requests and prioritize them based on business impact and budget availability. In some organizations they may choose to have chargebacks, that is centralized services like knowledge management and IT are allocated to profit and cost centers across the organization so that those areas understand the costs of centralized services. Not all organizations do this, but if they do, the KM governance body will provide validation of the chargeback charges.
- #25 As mentioned on the governance input side,the governance committee should have cross functional representation. This is shown in slide. The governance chair can be a rotated position with each department getting a turn or it can be a senior manager who has the overall responsibility for knowledge management.
- #26 As has been high-lighted throughout this report it is critical that IT and the business work together to find a solution that meets everyone's needs. There is no "one-size-fits-all" when it comes to technology. It must be selected based on the users' needs and requirements of the organization: what works for one organization may not work for another; due to differences in user profiles, locations, and organizational cultures.As with any service provided, the business needs to be clear about what they need and not let the supplier tell them what they need, this is a recipe for disaster. Even when the supplier is an internal department, this is still true.Technology is a tool to enable the organization to work more effectively and efficiently. It should not be the cause of rework, additional work, or stumbling block to sharing of information.One of the technology activities that users need to have input on and that can be quite complex is the determination of user access controls. This determines who has access to what information. In general, it is a good idea to keep information as open and available as possible; restricting access only to that information that is highly-sensitive and has a sound business reason for its restricted access.
- #27 There are four main areas to consider in change management. The first is organizational impact management, that is understanding how knowledge management, and the supporting technology will impact the organization: how will people’s jobs be changed, what things will people need to do differently, what things will they stop doing, what things will they start doing. Understanding the impact of KM and the supporting technology on the organization is key to developing a good change management program.A key consideration in change management is the management of stakeholders and sponsors: making sure that they are onboard, making sure that they have participated all the way along the processes so that their needs and requirements are being met, and so that they support the full implementation of KM. Frontline people will look to their management and leaders as well as key influencers that they work with to see how they behave and to judge whether they themselves need to change their behaviours.It is important to plan communication: what are the messages that need to be communicated, when should they be communicated how should they be communicated, are there e-mail newsletters, are there posters, are there trinkets and trash, what kinds of communication activities need to be in place to inform people of the changes that are being implemented and why it is necessary for them to participate. The communication plan may need to be revised and updated based on feedback and outcomes from earlier activities.Training planning and management is also necessary. Training is different from education. Education is about informing while training is about making sure that people know how to execute the processes and use the technology that is being giving them. Both are critical to the success of the KM initiative. A big part of the training will be technology training, at least it is when the technology is a significant part of the KM initiative. For instance, if a new collaboration platform is being rolled out, it is important that people understand how they are expected to interact with the platform, as well as how to use it: how to add information, how to delete, how to give permissions to people to see it or not see it, all these kinds of functional requirements so that staff can perform their activities using the supporting technology.
- #28 Building an internal KM culture takes time, and should not be the primary goal/objective of the KM Programme, it will happen, but it is necessary to acknowledge up-front that it takes time. It is important to break down reluctance to share information, by first changing behaviours. Behaviours can be changed through change management activities, changes in metrics and measurements, processes, and performance evaluations. When staff members recognize they are being measured and evaluated in different ways, for different things, their behaviours will change. Once their behaviours change, the culture starts to change, and after a period of time, as many as 5 or 10 years, the culture of the organization has changed.
- #29 Evaluating return on investment is difficult, although there are methodologies that help. The challenge comes from the fact that many of the benefits of Knowledge Management are intangible, thus making them difficult to measure and include in an ROI calculation. Human capital work has made a contribution in this area, as have Thomas Stewart and Nick Bontis, two well-known KM experts.The questions of, ‘how soon can the organization expect the investment to start paying off?’ and ‘how can the ROI be maximised on an on-going basis?’ do need to be answered, regardless of the challenges in measuring them. Knowledge Management can start to show some benefits immediately. For instance, anecdotes will start to circulate about people finding information they did not know existed, or connecting to people within the organisation they were unaware of. However, it will be 12 or more months before dollar values can be attached as answers to these questions and an early ROI determined. Ideally, calculating an ROI at the three and five year marks is more meaningful as benefits have accrued and metrics and measurements have been gathered.The case study on the Multinational Fast Moving Consumer Goods Company provides a good example of ROI calculations.
- #30 Having the right people involved is key,some of the key roles and responsibilities include:Knowledge Management SponsorThis is the key internal person responsible for initiating communications and coordinating the change process. The Programme Sponsor is also responsible for setting the direction for the programme and influencing people to follow in that direction. Knowledge Management ChampionThis is the key person responsible for driving change in their respective business area by building and sustaining strong enthusiasms about the change. This often includes reminding everyone in their areas why the change is occurring, as well as communicating the benefits that will come as a result of the Knowledge Management implementation. Knowledge Management Functional Lead(s)This is the key person who will serve a similar role as the Programme Sponsor and Programme Champion in their respective business areas. This will include initiating change and guiding their own development and productivity as well as that of other individuals, and groups they interact with.