So what would you do if you wanted to sabotage a KM initiative?  It seems to me that it is really easy to do this:

• -Don’t have a clear idea what you want to achieve
• -Don’t tell anyone about it
• -If you do have to tell people about it, make sure you use KM jargon that they don’t understand.  This will make you feel superior and of course means you will succeed because you understand it so much better than anyone else
• -Focus on senior management buy-in.  You can’t possibly do anything at all unless you get this.  If you have it, it means that the initiative will automatically succeed because senior management say so.
• -Tell people they have to do it, whether they want to or not
• -Don’t listen to anyone else’s ideas
• -Don’t ask for anyone else’s ideas in the first place – so you don’t have to pretend to listen to them
• -Have a plan that you will follow, no matter what

What does a KM toxic organisation look like/sound like/feel like?  I did a bit of a personal brain dump, and came up with the following:

Doesn’t really seem a great place to work.  Of course, for some people, this sort of environment is safe and means they don’t have to take risks with demonstrating what they can or cannot do.  When it comes down to it, however, if they are doing something excellent, it can’t do them any harm to share it and if they aren’t – should they be working in that job in the first place?  A bit harsh maybe, but I think KM is a lot about realising the potential of people.  Not everyone is an ‘expert’ but I would suggest that everyone has a contribution to make – they just need to work in an environment that encourages and recognises that contribution.

So what might a KM enabled organisation be like?

I know where I would rather work….

The third module of the NLP practitioner’s course was around using language to effect change.   Of course it was mostly used in relation to personal change in a coaching environment, but the ideas behind re-framing, and what Robert Dilts called ‘Sleight of Mouth’ could equally be used to alter opinions of groups.  He used a couple of clips from the film ‘Elizabeth’ which were particularly interesting.  In the first we saw Elizabeth rehearsing for particularly difficult situation she was going into.  She didn’t rehearse the words so much as the feelings behind them, trying them out until they felt strong to her.  Then we saw her in the situation itself as she got into a ‘state’ of preparedness and gradually became more and more confident – using the feelings she had rehearsed to telling effect.  Apart from teaching us some useful lessons about the use of feelings/congruence and language – it also made me realise how skilled an actress Cate Blanchett is (and how well the script writer and director understood what great communicators do!).  In this case, Elizabeth was seen to sway an intransigent audience by some very interesting re-framings (‘heresy’ reframed to ‘common sense’ was a significant example).   I think I will make it my homework to identify some change challenges and see what re-frames are possible!

By chance, I’ve come across a couple of sites that have a different approach to patterns.  This one Optimice is about business networks and has an interesting paper that looks at Verna Allee’s value networks in relationship to systems development methodologies.  It also has some very interesting industry maps. The second one is Wikipatterns and looks at tools that can help grow wikis.  On a brief look this has some really useful advice if you are thinking of using wikis to help make the most effective use of them.  Well worth a look.

Tough NLP course this time round because it really made you conscious of how much you didn’t know.  I wasn’t alone in feeling out of my depth, but somehow that didn’t make it much easier.  Anyway, the final major activity was a 50 minute session using nearly all of the tools we have learnt over the 10 days we have been doing NLP – to help someone with a problem/issue.  There was a feeling of mixed awe and horror in the room as the enormity of that sunk in.  However, we were given a written list of steps which outlined the process so that we could simply follow that and use the questions without having to worry too much ourselves.  For me, the results were astonishing.  What it meant was that you didn’t have to worry about the process and somehow, unconsciously (through so many participative exercises) some of the rapport and listening skills had sunk in.  I found myself naturally asking other questions and using techniques at what seemed to be appropriate points and getting someone to improve a situation through realisations that I had guided them towards. The word ‘guided’ is very important, because they did the work themselves.  My partner did a really good job for me too and made me realise a few really key things that I don’t think I would have come to of my own accord. 

The large part of this course has been exercises but putting it all together was a key point and amazed nearly everyone in the room with what happened.    There is nothing wrong with a written checklist, as long as it is supplemented by understanding and skills to make it real.  A lesson to other training and in how to transfer knowledge to others.  We use checklists to help people pass on what they know when they leave, but we also supplement it with interviews so it is not just a mechanical exercise.  Maybe I should adapt some of the key questions I have learnt to help get more depth to the responses.  Several ‘How do you knows?’ at key points might be useful as well as some ‘what if..’ to reframe a situation to get more information.  I was hoping that NLP might be able to help with the whole tacit knowledge issue, and it might just be in the successful use of the right questions and being really present for the answers…

Back on on another part of the NLP course today – quite apprehensive. I’ve realised that a lot of this is to do with fear of failure.  Ironic really, when one of the things that we KMers advocate is that you should not allow fear of failing stop you trying out innovative things and that you can learn a lot from failure.  Yet again, I realise that we speak a lot of words without perhaps taking real account of the emotions behind them.  We can tell people it is alright to fail, but most have to know it in their gut before they will take a chance.  It has to be evidenced in a concrete way to make it real.

A lot about personal change today – we did an exercise where we physically compared dragging someone, leading someone who just passively followed and the putting someone into the position of flowing with you.  The passive follower was a horrible person to lead and it made me think that this is perhaps what happens in a change initiative – you work hard on those against it and welcome those who come with you, but those who don’t care either way are often just left to get on with it because it is perhaps harder to get them to join you.  Not sure how you would do this, it may depend on the change involved, but still a useful reminder.

I wonder whether it is ever possible to truly understand a job unless you actually do it?  I realised something really obvious today – that it’s all very well being a knowledge manager, but do I really know what knowledge it is that people (apart from other knowledge managers) need or am I just making assumptions that may or may not be right?  I am becoming more and more convinced that that the job of KM professionals is mostly about making connections and managing change and that ‘managing knowledge’ is making an arrogant assumption about our capabilities.

A few months ago, a colleague sent me a clipping from a newspaper about a Dutch library that ‘lent’ people out to borrowers to talk about their experiences.  They could go for a coffee with the lent out person and find out more about them.  I think this is a great idea and have decided to give it a go within the organisation.  I have started stocking the shelves with people who are willing to be lent out – either to individuals, or to groups – to talk about their projects or areas of expertise.  This could be a useful way of breaking down barriers between departments as it encourages people to share what they know, but also makes it easy for others to find them.

The monthly technology forum was standing room only today – which was great.  Even better, the project being presented was one that had such obvious benefits and such a pragmatic approach, that it made me hopeful for a real win for all involved.  The best thing of all was not only the use of km type phrases (collaborating, sharing, lessons learned, not re-inventing the wheel, re-use) by someone who has nothing to do with km as a discipline, but the fact that there were tangible examples of these phrases actually meaning something (80% code re-use was a stunning example).  As always the proof of the pudding will be in the eating, but it is a great start and really encouraging to see.