KM Middle East 2012 - Gurteen Seminar

The kind of
conversation I’m
interested in is one in
which you start with a
willingness to emerge a
slightly different
person.

Theodore Zeldin
Conversation
Theodore is an
Oxford Historian

Conversation
Your most powerful KM tool

Outline of the seminar

• Knowledge Cafe Process
• Other Conversational Cafes
• Coffee
• KCafe Applications
• Adapting the KCafe
• Getting buy-in
• Capturing Outcomes
• Coffee
• Tips & Techniques
• Cultural considerations
• Informal Conversation

www.km-me.com 1 info@km-me.com

Gurteen Knowledge Café Process

What is a Gurteen Knowledge Café?

• A Gurteen Knowledge Café brings a group of people
together to have an open, creative conversation on
a topic of mutual interest.

• To surface their collective knowledge,
to share ideas and to gain a deeper understanding
of the issues involved.

• Leading to action in the form of better decision
making & innovation & thus tangible outcomes.

What resources are needed?

• Not a lot!

• A group of 20 – 30 people

• A speaker and a facilitator

• A room or other venue

• Tables & chairs to seat 4 or 5 people per table


What do you need in the room?
• Unthreatening and hospitable environment

• Good ambience, small cosy, good acoustics

• Small round tables and 4 – 5 chairs

• Optional: paper table cloths, felt tip pens, toys

• NO flip charts

• Refreshments

What’s the process?
• Speaker makes a short presentation 5 – 10 mins

• Poses a trigger question

• Small group conversations at tables

• Three rounds 10 – 15 mins

• Whole group conversation in a circle 15 mins

• Share actionable insights 15 mins

• Two hours in total

What subjects are covered?
• Any subject can be addressed

• Explore questions that matter to the participants

• Explore only one theme & question


What’s the role of the facilitator?

• Need not be a specialist

• Should not take a lead in the discussions

• Wander around and listen into the groups

• Resolve any issues

What’s the role of the participants?

• To be prepared to emerge a slightly different person

• To listen more than speak

• To welcome differences

• To withhold judgment

• To avoid position taking

How do things work in small groups?
• No leader or chairperson

• No reporting back

• Everyone is equal

• No group note taker

• Can make own notes


How does the large group sit?
• In a circle

• Takes 2 minutes to
move chairs

• Facilitator & speaker sit
in circle

• Everyone can see &
hear each other & are
equal

How does the circle work?
• Group talks, minimal intervention from facilitator


• Facilitator may need to encourage participation

• Facilitator gently ensures that no one person or group
dominates the discussion

• Connects diverse perspectives

Sharing actionable insights
• Facilitator goes around the circle

• Each person in turn shares something

• A thought, an idea, an insight, something learnt

• Preferably an action

• OK to pass


What are the outcomes?
• Outcomes are what you take away in your head

• Deeper understanding of the issues discussed

• Deeper insight into other people’s perspectives

• Better appreciation of your own point of view

• Position to make more informed decisions

• Improved relationships

Café Principles

• Relaxed, non-threatening, open conversation
• Close to a pub or café conversation
• No manipulation; no hidden agendas
• Everyone equal; no table leaders; no reporting back
• No one forced to do anything – OK to just listen
• Trust people to talk about what is important to them
• OK to go off-topic
• No summarization or attempt to reach consensus
• No capture of outcomes; no flip charts in the room

The Café is NOT about

• Making decisions

• Gaining consensus

• Capturing stuff

• Making plans

• Manipulating people in some way


What is special about the Café ?
• No explicit or hidden agendas

• No command and control

• No desired outcomes

• No push for consensus

• OK to go off topic

• Freedom to speak your mind

Questions and Discussion

Conversational Cafés


Different Types of Café

• Traditional Knowledge Café

• World Café

• Gurteen Knowledge Café

• Other conversational tools


• A conversational café is a simple process for
bringing a group of people together to have
open conversations about a topic of mutual
interest with a specific business purpose in
mind
• Examples
– World Café
– Knowledge Cafés
– Gurteen Knowledge Cafés

• Knowledge Cafés
• Knowledge Jams
• Peer Assists, After Action Reviews, Retrospects
• Anecdote Circles
• Ritual Dissent
• Reverse Brainstorm
• Open Space Technology
• Unconference, unworkshop and Barcamps
• Conversation Dinners and Walks


Traditional Knowledge Cafe

Traditional Knowledge Cafe

• Leaders appointed at tables
• Leaders report back
• Stuff captured
• Facilitator tends to be more controlling
• No sharing circle
• Facilitator tries to summarise
• Attempt to reach consensus

World Cafe


World Café

The World Café is a methodology for hosting
conversations about questions that matter.

These conversations link and build on each
other as people move between groups,
cross-pollinate ideas, and discover new
insights into the questions or issues that are
most important in their life, work, or
community.

How is the Gurteen Knowledge Café
different from the World Café?

• World Café 1995; Knowledge Café 2002
• More business oriented
• Usually shorter
• For smaller numbers of people
• No table leaders
• No capture
• Less preparation required
• Paper & pens on tables optional
• Possibly less controlling

World Café Principles

1. Set the Context

2. Create Hospitable Space

3. Explore Questions that Matter

4. Encourage Everyone's Contribution

5. Connect Diverse Perspectives

6. Listen together for Patterns and Insights

7. Share Collective Discoveries


Resources: World Cafe

• Website
– http://www.theworldcafe.com/
• Community
– http://www.theworldcafecommunity.org/
• Book
– http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1576752585

Open Space Technology

Open Space Technology

Open Space Technology (OST) is an
approach for hosting meetings,
conferences, corporate-style retreats
and community summit events.

They are focused on a specific and
important purpose or task—
but beginning without any formal
agenda, beyond the overall purpose or
theme.


Four Principles

• Whoever comes are the right people

• Whenever it starts is the right time

• Whatever happens is the only thing that
could have

• When it's over, it's over

The Law of two feet

If at any time during your time together you find
yourself in any situation where you are neither
learning nor contributing, use your two feet, go
someplace else.

How is Open Space Technology
different from a Knowledge Café?

• Different Outcomes
• OST Process is more complex
• Used other than to gain mutual understanding
– e.g. problem solving and defining agendas
• Meetings tend to be larger
– often 100s of people compared to dozens for the Café
• Meetings tend to last longer
– often days rather than hours


Resources: OST

• Wikipedia
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Space_Technology

• Open Space Community
– http://www.openspaceworld.org

Unconferences, unworkshops and
barcamps

Unconferences, unworkshops and
barcamps

• Open, participatory workshop-events, whose
content is provided by participants


Resources: Unconferences

• Barcamps
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BarCamp

• Unconferences
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unconference

• My website
– http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen.nsf/id/unconference
– http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen.nsf/id/conference-ideas

Learn before, during and after

Three simple conversational tools for
embedding learning into everyday work

Learn Before, During & After

• Learn Before (peer assist)
– pre start of project meeting to learn from previous projects
• Learn During (AAR)
– continuous AARs, mainly informal
• Learn After (retrospect)
– end of project AAR - formal
– Post project review


What is an After-Action Review?

• Review of an event
– to promote learning
– to reinforce success
– to eliminate deficiencies

What is an event?

• An event has a
– a beginning and an end
– a purpose
– measurable objectives • Project
– entire action or • Project milestone
– smaller part of an action • Internal meeting
• Presentation
• Meeting
or phone conversation
with customer,
supplier, or partner

How to run a After-Action Review

• Questions
– What were the desired outcomes?
– What were the actual outcomes?
– What were the differences?
– What was learnt?


What else do you need to know to
run an After-Action Review?

• Open climate
– practice dialogue
• Observe the event
– if possible
• Do immediately
• Involve everyone
– no hangers on
• Record lessons
– use technology

What different types of After-Action
Review can be held?

• Formal
– at end of project or project milestone
– takes time
– planned, need resources
– need a facilitator
• Informal
– any time! May take just 5 mins
– no resources, no facilitator
• Personal
– on your own, any time

What are the benefits of
After-Action Reviews?

• Learn from experience

• Inexpensive, easy

• Immediate payoff

• Learning at 2 levels:
– Individual learning
– Team learning


Learn Before, During & After

• Learn Before (peer assist)
– pre start of project meeting to learn from previous projects
• Learn During (AAR)
– continuous AARs, mainly informal
• Learn After (retrospect)
– end of project AAR - formal
– Post project review

Resources: After action reviews

• Book: Learning to Fly
– by Chris Collison and Geoff Parcell

• Book: Proactive Reviews
– By Ditte Kolbaek

• Book: Sharing Hidden Know-How
– By Katrina Pugh

Anecdote Circles


Anecdote Circles

• An anecdote circle is a gathering whose
purpose is to generate and collect anecdotes
about some issue or topic
• Usually the anecdotes gathered will be used
later in some sort of sense-making
• They may be placed in a narrative database
for sense-making and as a knowledge
repository

Resources: Anecdote Circles

• Anecdote
– http://www.anecdote.com.au/archives/2006/02/anecdote_circle_1.html

• Guide
– http://www.anecdote.com.au/file.php?fn=Ultimate_Guide_to_ACs_v1.0.pdf

• Cognitive Edge
– http://www.cognitive-edge.com/method.php?mid=41

Reverse Brainstorming


Reverse Brainstorming

• Reverse brainstorming helps you solve
problems by combining brainstorming and
reversal techniques. By combining these, you
can extend your use of brainstorming to draw
out even more creative ideas.

Reverse Brainstorming Process
• Facilitator talks about theme & poses question. He/she explains the process. (10 mins)

• Participants break into groups of five. Each Group has a flip chart. Asked to brainstorm the question and to
write on the flip chart as many things as they can think of that will ensure the destruction of their profession.
The more outrageous and destructive the better. (10 mins)

• Facilitator asks people to wander around the room and look at the flipcharts and see what others have
come up with. (10 mins)

• Facilitator asks each group to identify the top three items on their list. (10 mins)

• Facilitator asks each group to share their items - giving a few more words of explanation behind each. (10
mins)

• Facilitator asks them to think about their three items and come up with three antidotes to them. i.e. 3 things
hat if they did really well would ensure that their profession has a very bright future. (10 mins)

• Facilitator goes around the room and ask each group to share their items - giving a few more words of
explanation behind each. (10 mins)

• Finally, facilitator asks them to sit at their tables and share their experiences and insights from the session
in their group. Then they are brought back together and have a large group conversation about the session
and what they have learnt. (20 mins)

Possible Themes

• How do we ensure our profession has no
future?
• How do we ensure that our KM initiative is a
total failure?
• How do we ensure that our project fails?
• What are the most innovative and creative
strategies to decimate key staff in an
organization?


Resources: Reverse Brainstorming

• My website
– http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen.nsf/id/reverse-cafe

• Mind Tools
– http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newCT_96.htm

Ritual Dissent

Ritual Dissent

• Ritual Dissent is a workshop method
designed to test and enhance proposals,
stories, ideas or whatever by subjecting them
to ritualised dissent (challenge) or assent
(positive alternatives).
• In all cases it is a forced listening technique,
not a dialogue or discourse.


Resources: Ritual Dissent

• Cognitive Edge website
– http://www.cognitive-edge.com/method.php?mid=46

Conversation Dinners and Walks

Conversation Dinner

European Training Foundation, Turin, Nov 2011


Resources

• Theodore Zeldin, Conversation,
Dining And Dancing
– http://muse.prettygetter.tv/dinners

• Conversation Encounters
– http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen.nsf/id/conversation-encounter

Café Style Talks

Café Style Talks

• Turn a conventional talk, workshop or
conference into a mini-knowledge cafe


Resources: Café Style Talks

• Gurteen Knowledge website
– http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen.nsf/id/L003675/


First Coffee
Break


Some Applications of the Café

Trinidad & Tobago Oil and Gas

Dubai Holdings

• On canals in Amsterdam

• At end of week of
workshops & visits

• To help summarise the
week

• Develop plan for action


UK National Audit office

• Day long workshop

• 3 presentations on social tools

• A knowledge Café

• Future leaders in the group

• Future leaders determine action plan

ISN Zurich
The knowledge café has led to a dramatic improvement in
terms of inter-team dialog, collaboration & knowledge
sharing.

Many internal work processes are now being overhauled for
the better as a result of these knowledge cafes & we have
seen an explosion of new ideas & initiatives on the part of
staff at all levels of the organization.

Simply put, the knowledge cafe format has empowered all
our staff to speak up and take the initiative in ensuring the
successful development of the ISN.
Chris Pallaris, Chief Editor
ISN, Zurich

ING Bank Amsterdam


ING Bank, Amsterdam
• Mireille Jansma and Jurgen Egges
• Gather articles and reports about relevant trends in
management, banking, and finance
• Broadcast “Research Alerts”
• When an Alert deserves serious attention, they host a
Knowledge Café
• Targeted at specific groups or open to anyone
• Sometimes the Cafe is triggered by a Video
• Follow through with online discussion groups

ING Bank

These types of initiatives focus on
topics that are highly relevant and in-
the-moment for managers and
workers, and where the sharing of
ideas and exchange of opinions lead
to creativity and innovation.
Is the Traditional Corporate University Dead?
by Karl Moore and Phil Lenir, Forbes Magazine September 2011

Statoil, Norway

• To surface issues as a result of a merger

• Series of Cafés to bring retiring experts together with
younger members to transfer knowledge
– In a community hall on an allotment

• Geophysicists
– Discussion of preferred technologies
– Exchange views on experiences

• Management Training
– But not called a Knowledge Café


Department of Sustainability &
Environment, Melbourne

• Ran a divergent Knowledge Café in the morning
– To explore the topic freely

• Ran a convergent Open Space Session in the
afternoon
– To focus on ideas and plan action

• “What can we do to break down the barriers between
departments and work together more effectively?”

Generic applications of the Café

Generic applications of the Café

• Pure conversational Cafés

• Cafés can be adapted for specific purposes

• Café techniques can be used in other
activities e.g. Café style talks


Where might you use the Café?
• Surface hidden problems & opportunities

• Encourage knowledge sharing & informal learning

• Improve decision making and innovation

• Address disengagement and lack of voice

• Help people make sense of the world

• Help people feel ownership of things

Knowledge Café + Open Space

• Knowledge Café – divergent
– Open, free flowing conversation around a subject
– Surface a small number of topics to explore in
greater depth
– No capture

• Open Space – convergent
– Focused conversation around each of the topics
– Capture key points and ideas

Meetings

• Break meetings into two

• To have a conversation about the issues
– Knowledge Café style
– Divergent

• To make decisions and plans
– Debate and politics allowed!
– Convergent



Getting buy-in for the Café

Don’t try to sell the Café
• Managers may have a problem with the Café
• Don't return, all enthused & say "hey lets run
a knowledge café “
• Don't do knowledge cafés for their own sake
• What you have is a new tool
• When you see problems or opportunities to
adapt the Café and use it effectively then take
them as they arise
• Offer the Café as a solution to a problem
• Do not try to “sell”


An approach

• Start with the purpose not the Café

• Focus on an important issue that is not well
understood

• Adapt the Café to help address the issue

• Don’t assume no buy-in if not a hard outcome

• Find reason to run a Café for the managers!

Capturing Outcomes

Recording outcomes

• Café is about the transfer of tacit knowledge

• Not about making tacit knowledge explicit

• Recording can kill the conversation

• Avoid disrupting the conversation

• No leader to record group notes

• Personal notes OK


Reasons for Recording outcomes
• That’s what we always do
• We need a record
• To share with others not here
• Justify to boss

• For a good “business purpose”

• If nothing will be done with the notes then don’t do it!

Ideas for recording outcomes
• External person takes notes on
laptop

• Capture 1 item from each
person & collate

• Encourage people to blog the
session
Visual capture, Bogota 2009
• Audio capture and transcription

• Visual capture



Second
Coffee Break

Tips and techniques

The theme
• A topic people feel passionate about

• Complex issues

• Only ONE question

• Open ended question

• Action oriented


The conversation

• The question is only a seed

• OK to go off topic

• Conversation as close to a
conversation at the pub or
over dinner

The speaker

• Speaker and facilitator need
not be the same
• Facilitator: involved/not
involved
• Speakers can be controlling
or dominant
– Often run over time
– Need to brief and handle
carefully

The facilitator

• Important to be yourself
• Do not control
• Experiment a little
• Take some risks
• Don’t be afraid of silence
• Timing can be difficult
• Let people talk & leave
them alone & you
cannot go far wrong


The venue

• Need not be a room
• Boat on Thames
• Canal Boat (long boat in Amsterdam)
• Knowledge Walk/BBQ (Greenwich)
• Pub (Stavanger)
• Outside under sunshades (Scottsdale)
• Actual café (London & Barcelona)

The room

• Important

• Small, cosy

• Small round tables

• Good acoustics

• Paper/toys on tables

• NO flip charts in the room!

The tables

People need to
be close
enough to touch
each other


Doodling

Holding in a lecture theatre

• Difficult but not
impossible
• Problem of moving
between groups
• Problem of whole group
conversation
– reporting back
• Need for microphones

Using microphones

• Avoid if possible
• Need if group larger than 40
• People hold on to them
• Kills the flow of conversation
• One for you + 2 roving mikes
• Passing technique 1 (London)
• Passing technique 2 (KM Egypt)
• Avoid fixed mikes (Jakarta)


Small group

• Don’t ask to sit with others they do not know
• Change groups 3 times
• Don’t specify a number or any rules
• People do not like changing groups
• Don’t force them!
• Kuala Lumpur story

Knowledge circles

• Greenwich Story
• KM World
• Not difficult

Circle process

• Keep contributions short
• Focus on action
• Pick someone opposite you
• Go around circle
• Each person to say who
they are
• Ok to pass
• Include yourself
• Thank them
• Use of a talking stick


Circle or whole group

• Where you need facilitation skills
• People will report back out of habit
– Or ask you questions
• In some cultures best to let them
• Even for some groups let them
– Central bank librarians story
• Unless in expert mode do not join in too much
• Tolerate silence – pause and wait

Group dynamics

• Dominant, outspoken people

• Submissive, quiet people

• Don’t directly address the issue

• Make it clear by setting an example

Dynamics of different sized groups

• Very small: 4 or 5 people
• Small: 4 – 12 people
• Medium: 12 – 24 people
• Ideal: 32 people
• Large: 50+ people


Listening in

• If expert mode then join in
• If facilitation mode then try not to
• Wander around and actively listen
• “Eyeball” each person
• Observe for issues
• Watch, think, be prepared to adapt

Wrap up

• Circle is the summarisation

• No need to summarise at length

• Keep it short and simple

• Thank people



Cultural Considerations

Culture
• I have run the Cafes in many different countries
– UK
– Spain
– Norway
– Russia
– USA
– Singapore
– Hong Kong
– Indonesia
– Malaysia
– Thailand
– Australia
– United Arab Emirates
– Colombia
– Brazil
– New Zealand
– South Africa

Cultural stories

• Jakarta • India
– Open Café - mikes
– Talk over each other
– Workshop
• Kuala Lumpur • Bangkok
– Won’t change tables – Flee, video
– Won’t go for coffee


Language issues

• Ideally one common language

• Speak in own language in small groups

• But then can’t listen in!

• Common language (English) in whole group

• Even own language in whole group

• Use of translators - serial or concurrent

Encouraging informal conversation

Informal Conversation

The most widespread and
pervasive learning in your
organization may not be
happening in training rooms,
conference rooms or board rooms
but in the cafeteria, the hallways
and the cafe across the street.

Junita Brown & David Isaacs


Informal Conversation
• Coffee and lunch

• Brown bag lunches

• Project/team meetings

• Department & organizational meetings

• Internal seminars

Conversational Space
• Building design

• Cass Business School, BA, GSK, Canon UK

• Coffee areas

• Reception areas

• Open plan verses cubicles verses offices

Summary


www.gurteen.com

David GURTEEN
Gurteen Knowledge
Fleet, United Kingdom

Tel: +44 7774 178 650
Email: david.gurteen@gurteen.com

Some slides I did not use

Argument

Argument is meant to reveal the truth,
not to create it.

Edward de Bono

Edward de Bono


Applying what we already know

The application of what we know
already will have a bigger impact
on health and disease than any
drug or technology likely to be
introduced in the next decade.

Sir Muir Gray

Types of Conversation

Type Purpose

Chit chat To build a relationship

Argument To destroy a relationship

Debate To defeat your opponent

Negotiation To reach an agreement

Discussion To come to a decision

Brainstorming To generate ideas

Dialogue To understand things

Debate Dialogue
Assuming that many people have pieces of the answer
Assuming that there is a right answer and you have it.
and that together they can craft a solution.

Combative: participants attempt to prove the other side Collaborative: participants work together toward
wrong. common understanding.

About winning. About exploring common ground.

Listening to find flaws and make counterarguments. Listening to understand, find meaning and agreement.

Defending assumptions as truth. Revealing assumptions for re-evaluation.

Critiquing the other side's position. Re-examining all positions.

Admitting that others' thinking can improve on one's
Defending one's own views against those of others.
own.

Searching for flaws and weaknesses in other positions. Searching for strengths and value in others' positions.

Seeking a conclusion or vote that ratifies your position. Discovering new options, not seeking closure.

Excerpted from, Yankelovich, Daniel. The Magic of Dialogue: Transforming Conflict into Cooperation.
New York: Simon & Schuster, 1999.


Stephen Covey

• Habit 5: Seek First to
Understand, Then to be
Understood

• Most people do not
listen with the intent
to understand; they
listen with the intent
to reply.

To be a catalyst is the
ambition most appropriate for
those who see the world as
being in constant change, and
who, without thinking that they
can control it, wish to influence
its direction.

Theodore Zeldin
Conversation

Business is a conversation

Here's a definition of that pesky and
borderline elitist phrase, 'knowledge
worker'.

A knowledge worker is someone whose
job entails having really interesting
conversations at work.

David Weinberger
The Cluetrain Manifesto



The characteristics of conversations map
to the conditions for genuine knowledge
generation and sharing:
they're unpredictable interactions among
people speaking in their own voice about
something they're interested in.

David Weinberger


People implicitly acknowledge that they
don't have all the answers (or else the
conversation is really a lecture) and risk
being wrong in front of someone else.
And conversations overcome the class
structure of business, suspending the
organization chart at least for a little
while.

David Weinberger


If you think about the aim of Knowledge
Management as enabling better
conversations rather than lassoing stray
knowledge doggies,

you end up focusing on breaking down
the physical and class barriers to
conversation.

David Weinberger


Oh, the comfort - the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a
person - having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but
pouring them all right out, just as they are, chaff and grain
together; certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep
what is worth keeping, and then with the breath of kindness blow
the rest away.

Dinah Craik

The kind of conversation I like is one where I
don’t feel the need to censor anything I say!

David Gurteen

We have a deeply held belief that the way to make a difference in the world
is to define problems and needs and then recommend actions to solve those
needs.

We are all problem solvers, action oriented and results minded. It is illegal in
this culture to leave a meeting without a to-do list.

We want measurable outcomes and we want them now.

What is hard to grasp is that it is this very mindset which prevents anything
fundamental from changing.

We cannot problem solve our way into fundamental change, or
transformation.

This is not an argument against problem solving; it is an intention to shift the
context and language within which problem solving takes place.

Authentic transformation is about a shift in context and a shift in language
and conversation. It is about changing our idea of what constitutes action.

Peter Block

Conversation is the way that humans have always thought together. In
conversation we discover shared meaning.

It is the primal human organizing tool.

Even in the corridors of power, very little real action happens in debate,
but rather in the side rooms, the hallways, the lunches, the times away
from the ritual spaces of authority and in the relaxed spaces of being
human.

In all of our design of meetings, engagement, planning or whatever, if you
aren’t building conversation into the process, you will not benefit from the
collective power and wisdom of humans thinking together.

These are not “soft” processes.

This is how wars get started and how wars end.

It’s how money is made, lives started, freedom realized. It is the core
human organizing competency.

Margaret J. Whatley


You rarely see the damage caused by
bad relationships or the positive outcomes
of good ones

STOP doing things to people and
start to work with them

Its OK for people not to talk


Café is divergent
Meeting is convergent

Sharing tacit knowledge

• Tacit knowledge is best shared through face
to face conversation

What is tacit knowledge?

• It is drawn from our experience

• And years of study

• It is not stored as answers or explanations

• It is stored as fragments in our brain

• Tacit knowledge is our ability to draw on those
fragments to construct a response to a problem


The importance of context

• When asked a question we don’t know the asker’s
situation
– So we can only provide a general answer

• To respond to a specific situation we need to learn
more about it
– By having a conversation and assembling the knowledge
that applies to that context

• Tacit knowledge is constructed in response to a
question or to a problem in a specific context and at a
specific moment in time

What happens in a conversation
• You can offer information about the issue
• You can probe deeper about the situation
• You can gain a sense of what the other already
knows and so determine at what level to construct
your answer
• You can ask about the meaning of a term you are not
familiar with
• You can seek the reasoning behind a conclusion if its
not evident
• You can correct false assumptions

Sharing tacit knowledge

• The conversation goes repeatedly back and
forth many times in a short period

• Both parties actively try to understand the
what the other is attempting to convey

• Tacit knowledge is surfaced, constructed and
exchanged through dialogue


Email and phone conversations

• A conversation has two levels of meaning
– Content & relationship
• The relationship conversation is about such things as
– “Can I trust you to give me an honest answer?” or
– “Can I trust you to keep this in confidence.”
• Expressed through intonation, gestures & facial
expression
– little can be conveyed over the phone or by email or eforum
• Both are less effective mediums for transferring tacit
knowledge than face-to-face conversation

Licence

• You may use these slides under the following
Creative Commons Licence

• Attribution-Share Alike 2.0

• http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/uk/


KM Middle East 2012 - Gurteen Seminar

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KM Middle East 2012 - Gurteen Seminar