Knowledge Management Essentials, Revisited

In my book on promoting knowledge management best practices within the corporate world, I begin by defining “the essentials”. Why should we spend any time trying to manage knowledge? We are all busy enough as it is without adding the burdens of searching for and contributing knowledge.
If we don’t spend time on knowledge management activities, we run the risk of wasting even more time on unnecessary effort. We might repeat mistakes that others have already made, costing time, money, and even lives. And the results of our work will be less valuable than if they were influenced by the experience and expertise of others.

Promoting knowledge management (KM) within an organization means persuading others to sponsor, endorse, inspect, use, and promote a KM program, including its major components: people, process, and technology.

Getting key stakeholders, champions, and users on board with your program will help it grow, spread, and flourish. Failing to do so will give rise to doubters, skeptics, and naysayers—who can subvert, undermine, and block progress.

Knowledge management is the art of transforming information and intellectual assets into enduring value for an organization’s clients and its people. When most effectively designed, implemented, and marketed, knowledge management:

• fosters the reuse of intellectual capital
• enables better decision making
• creates the conditions for innovation

The above goals are achieved through providing the people, processes, and technology that help knowledge to flow—enabling participants to act more efficiently, effectively, and creatively. KM best practices in action.