Hi All, I'm sorry for butting in but I am finding this discussion too interesting to resist. But before I offer my humble opinion, may I just say that Mr.Abdul is extremely erudite in his words and his comments gives space to much contemplation and thinking that is very healthy for the intellectual train of thought. I am particularly interested in Mr.Abdul question in 'who does KM help'. But I digress. I agree whole heartedly that in times of crisis, most organizations opt to cut (first) learning budgets and then headcounts. This in itself handicaps any potential manouvering to manage knowledge, what more to even explore the possibilities of tangible results. But big companies have it easy - for every one that leaves, there is possibly a hundred more is willing to take his/her place and usually with a cheaper remunation package and better work ethics. What about the smaller lesser known organizations that cannot afford the glam and monies of global names? We don't need to be soothsayers to prophecies on their fate. Now this is where I have to say KM can come in. If well implemented, I beleive KM acts more like a grid than mere cables as, a strategic and tactical KM system encompasses every other process that is driven by knowledge and people and in knowledge intensive economies like today that means almost everything. I think the problem we face is that KM is still being seen as a stand alone approach that merits its own people, culture, process and ROI. But in the bottom line driven business world, only dollar and cents count not really how it is accumulated in the first place. Let me illustrate with an experience I recently had. I managed to visit a GE floorshop and listen to some presentations on how its management operates. And in summary GE achieves more with less. They managed to reduce 50% cycle time as compared to previous administration with almost 50% less number of employees. And this year the KPI is earmarked to reduce another 10% in cycle time with (I hope) same number of people. This is an incredible feat (well for me at least) as somehow GE has been able to utilize learnings and knowledge to benefit fewer people to do more things. Sure they do not openly call it KM but rather Six Sigma, Supply Chain Improvement etc but the fact of the matter is none of this can be achieved without effective management of knowledge. There is no automation involved rather the focus is on ensuring the right people attain the right knowledge at the right time to produce (tangible) economic benefits. What more can KM actually be about than this? So my take on who benefits from KM is everybody. Organizations get more with less when knowledge is utilized and individuals specialize in certain knowledge that is crucial in our niche centric world of today. This global downturn is really a boon for KM, because now we have ample opportunity to show that when knowledge is managed more can be done with less and the tangible business results will follow. --- On Wed, 3/25/09, ahalim@... <ahalim@...> wrote:
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