"You Know Your KM"

[Neil Olonoff]

Hi, All

 

A friend recounted that he was talking to a long-time friend and a acquaintance who is CEO of a contracting firm. They were discussing the qualifications needed for a particular high ranking KM position. He was asking if my friend was interested in the opportunity, and in the conversation, the CEO remarked, by way of acknowledging my friend's qualifications, "You know your KM."

 

I found it such an interesting remark, given the wide range of skill sets and approaches we lately have been discussing.  If somewhat says, "she knows her KM," what exactly does she know? I guess this goes to the certification and skills debate. 

 

But I throw it out there as an interesting question for discussion.  

 

Regards,

 

Neil

Neil Olonoff   olo...@gmail.com
Lead, Federal Knowledge Management Initiative,
Federal KM Working Group hosted at  http://KM.gov
Office:  703.614.5058 (US Army HQDA, G-4/Contracted by Innolog)
Mobile: 703.283.4157 (Disabled during working hours)
Personal profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/olonoff
Blogging at http://FedKM.org

[nic...@att.net]

Neil Olonoff asks, "If someone says, 'She knows her KM,' what exactly does she know?"

I'll hazard a few guesses...

First, she can discuss various aspects of KM in ways that convey having a grasp of the subject matter - and she can do so with a wide range of audiences.

Second, she can suggest or propose applications of KM in relation to specific situations that make sense to her clients or to her own company's management and to other competent KM practitioners as well.

Third, she can successfully plan and carry out relevant, value-adding KM efforts.

Fourth, she has written and published some highly regarded papers/articles about KM.

There are four possibilities for starters...

--
Regards,

Fred Nickols
Managing Partner
Distance Consulting, LLC
nic...@att.net
www.nickols.us

"Assistance at A Distance"

-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: Neil Olonoff <olo...@gmail.com>
>
> Hi, All

[mike7...@aol.com]

I would agree with the first three of Fred's criteria.

But I find the fourth smacks of the type of intellectual/academic elitism that could give our discipline a bad name.  There are plenty of people who "know their KM" but for whatever reason have not "written and published some highly regarded papers/articles about KM."  Many of them are in this group.

Retirement is good.  Fishing is good.  See you in November.

---

A Good Credit Score is 700 or Above. See yours in just 2 easy steps!

[David Bray]

Two cents:

* a resume that indicates you're tried to do KM at a large-team or
small division level, learned that it's never as easy to implement as
the textbooks make it sound, earned your stripes by showing you have
the human abilities, to include the ability to adapt and adjust to
unforeseen obstacles, while trying to encourage a KM-related activity
in an organization

* equally, some course work to indicate you have some formal schooling
and not just a peddler of vaporware or "rah, rah, KM" without
sufficient understanding of where the literature, research, practices,
and theory -- particularly the latest social science, business, and
sociotechnical literature on KM subjects, balanced with enough time
out of school to test, adapt, and refine your learned knowledge with
real implementation experiences

* ideally reviews/references from a 360' perspective, indicating you
not only managed and met expectations of senior management with your
efforts, but also your peers and your reports (all too often these two
categories are forgotten, yet I'd suggest their perceptions and
expectations management are crucial to a good KM leader)

________________________________________
From: Neil Olonoff <olo...@gmail.com>
To: ActKM Discussion List <ac...@actkm.org>; kmgov
<km...@list.jpl.nasa.gov>; fedkm <fe...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Tue Jul 07 09:36:46 2009
Subject: [kmgov] "You Know Your KM"

[Weidner, Douglas]

Dear Fred, Neil

 

Fred. as to your four quals:

 

1.    Ability to discuss - yes. I have found that few can do this. Want a test? Can she define knowledge and KM in a suitable way to that audience – “elevator speech.” This also proves ability to effectively communicate, an essential to success.

 

2.    Applications - yes. But, I'd add, does she understand and can relate on overall KM Methodology that she might follow. Success is more than an appropriate app, but includes much else such as strategic planning and change mgmt which is typically overlooked. US DoD spent much $ on a KM Methodology in 1994 - 1998, why don’t we follow it?

 

3.    Plan/execute – yes. Ties back to both a robust methodology and her own management skills

 

4.    Publish. Publish or perish? I’d question that. Most successful practitioners don’t publish much. Some speak or facilitate discussions at local chapter meetings such as the KM Institute events, but I don’t think that is what you mean by publish.

 

I’d add at least a fifth—recruit a KM team of educated (in KM), multidiscipline (other mgmt skills beside KM such as project and change mgmt, metrics, etc.) passionate KMers.

 

Also, the US gov spent much on skills and competencies for CKO in 2000-2001 era. Many of us local KM Consultants were involved. Why don’t we use it? It includes: Leadership & Management, Communications, Strategic Thinking, Tools & Tech, Personal Behaviors and Personal K and Cognitive Capability.

 

 

Douglas Weidner, eCKM Mentor™

Chairman, International Knowledge Management Institute

Best in KM Training & Certification

Home of the KM Body of Knowledge (KMBOK)™

www.kminstitute.org

703-757-1395

 

 

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: fe...@googlegroups.com [mailto:fe...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of nic...@att.net
Sent: Tuesday, July 07, 2009 11:09 AM
To: fe...@googlegroups.com
Subject: [FedKM:489] Re: "You Know Your KM"

 

 

Neil Olonoff asks, "If someone says, 'She knows her KM,' what exactly does she know?"

[Karen Danis]

Doug,

 

I’m not familiar with the KM methodology to which you refer—that which DoD developed in 1994-1998.  Could you kindly elaborate?

 

                Karen

 

Karen T. Danis, CKM®/CKEE™

Specialist in Collaboration and Human Capital Planning
Danis Consulting
Bremerton, WA

 

(360) 377-2226

[Karen Danis]

Doug,

 

I’m familiar with the CKO competencies defined in the 2000-2001 timeframe, if you’re talking about the 13 or 14 competencies that the KMWG wanted to see supported in CKO certification programs.  And I think that they have been used, to some extent, for that purpose.  Neil has asked us to avoid discussion of cert programs in this forum, so I’ll leave it at that. 

 

Were you thinking of an application external to cert pgms?

 

                Karen

 

Karen T. Danis, CKM®/CKEE™

Specialist in Collaboration and Human Capital Planning
Danis Consulting
Bremerton, WA

 

(360) 377-2226

 

[nic...@att.net]

Mike takes issue with my fourth criterion - publishing - which he asserts smacks of intellectual/academic elitism.

I agree with Mike that there are plenty of people who know their KM who have not and perhaps will not publish. The reverse does not follow; namely, that those who do publish don't know their KM. Moreover, a central tenet/aim of KM is knowledge sharing and one way of doing that is through publishing. Most of what I've published I consider a form of sharing lessons learned with colleagues. I have a grand total of one published paper in a peer-reviewed academic journal (and it had nothing whatsoever to do with KM per se).

So, I'll stick by my fourth criterion, as one indicator of knowing KM and I'll accede to the notion that it is not a pass/fail criterion (i.e., you can indeed know your KM without having published).

--
Regards,

Fred Nickols
Managing Partner
Distance Consulting, LLC
nic...@att.net
www.nickols.us

"Assistance at A Distance"

-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: mike7...@aol.com
>
> I would agree with the first three of Fred's criteria.
>
> But I find the fourth smacks of the type of intellectual/academic elitism that

> could give our discipline a bad name.? There are plenty of people who "know

> their KM" but for whatever reason have not "written and published some highly

> regarded papers/articles about KM."? Many of them are in this group.

[Weidner, Douglas]

Karen,

 

I specifically didn’t mention certification programs, J but the skills and competencies tie into robust quals, whether gotten from education, training or elsewhere.

 

Even the 14 CKO Learning objectives (actually 39 if parsed) weren’t specific to certification, though they might have been interpreted as such, and were indeed the basis for the original design of my certification program in 2000-2001.

[Weidner, Douglas]

Karen,

 

OSD started project in 1994 with focus on BPR Methodology, when BPR was failing.

I, at a DoD Think Tank (IDA) and about 30 local BPR consultants from largest firms and Gov execs participated – 3 weeks using Ventana.

 

Later, as a consultant with Litton/PRC, which became part of Northrop Grumman, I had contracts with DISA and DLA to convert to KM Methodology, circa 1995 – 1998.

 

 

Douglas Weidner, eCKM Mentor™

Chairman, International Knowledge Management Institute

Best in KM Training & Certification

Home of the KM Body of Knowledge (KMBOK)™

www.kminstitute.org

703-757-1395

 

 

 

 

 

From: fe...@googlegroups.com [mailto:fe...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Karen Danis

Sent: Tuesday, July 07, 2009 12:43 PM
To: fe...@googlegroups.com

[Snowden Dave]

That is interesting if a bit depressing.  Knowledge Management operates from a completely different paradigm from BPR.  The latter makes assumptions about causality and control which are appropriate for manufacturing control, cheque processing and the like.  A human system and the nature of human acts of knowing is radically different and aside from small overlaps you cannot apply the same principles.

Dave Snowden

Founder & Chief Scientific Officer

Cognitive Edge Pte Ltd

Now blogging at www.cognitive-edge.com

[Karen Danis]

Doug,

 

Ah, yes….I do recall the BPR methodology—seems to me it was accompanied by a cert pgm J…?? 

 

I know that DoD hired a company to provide KM training to DoD clients, but I’m thinking of a later date—2000-2001.  I’m thinking that was the company that had been engaged in the BPR methodology and training. 

 

And there was a special project to harvest the knowledge of acquisition experts—also in the 2000-2001 timeframe.

 

We in the Dept of Navy developed a “Knowledge-Centric Organization Toolkit”—1999-2001 timeframe.

 

 

How would we get more info on the DoD KM Methodology?  If it’s in the public domain, it could very well be available to us, at least in some form.

 

                Karen

[Weidner, Douglas]

Dave,

 

I agree with what you said about different paradigms, etc.

 

I’m focusing on the methodology to implement KM, which must include strategic planning – a vision for the Knowledge Age, etc., change management – how to get folks to become aligned, etc., and other activities that are essential to KM success.

[Snowden Dave]

Well just to be difficult,  getting people aligned behind a common vision is very much a part of the process/learning paradigm that dominated from the 80s until recently.   There is a strong argument for focusing on emergence rather than planning and diversity of perspective (to increase scanning and weak signal detection)

Dave Snowden

Founder & Chief Scientific Officer

Cognitive Edge Pte Ltd

Now blogging at www.cognitive-edge.com

[Weidner, Douglas]

Karen,

 

It wasn’t exactly a Cert program as we use it at the KM Institute, but one version was the Cadre100 – 100 trained experts, which was in mid-90s.

Most BPR fell well off by 2000. Heyday was 1991-1995.

 

Yes, Navy did much under Alex Bennet.

 

As to DoD KM Methodology, the public domain version would be in the archives at DISA/DLA. Good luck.

The updated KM Institute version is provided to students.

 

But, maybe we should take this offline.

[Joe Firestone]

Exactly. Thanks for saving me the trouble.

[nic...@att.net]

Neil:

I and others responded to this earlier. Did you repost it for a reason?

--
Regards,

Fred Nickols
Managing Partner
Distance Consulting, LLC
nic...@att.net
www.nickols.us

"Assistance at A Distance"

-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: Neil Olonoff <olo...@gmail.com>
>