Siemens KMS

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Chapter 11 . Knowledge Management 523

tion at Siemens involved

res tO 20 percent IT and 80 percent change runagement-p of dealing with cultural change and human interfaces.,,

The roots of knowledge management at Siemens goback to 1996, when a number of people in rhecorporation.wtro had an interest in knowledge man-agement (XM) formed a comniunity of interest.They researched the subiect, learned what *,asbeing done by other companies- and determiriedhow KM could benefir Siemens- \Fithout suggesrionof crlcour?€emenl frirm senior executives, midlevelemployeei ih Siemens business units began creatingrepositories, cofilmunities of pracice. and informalknou'ledge-sharing techniques_ Bv 1999, SiemensAG s central board confirmed the imponance of l(.ltlto the entire company by creating an organizationalunit that would be responsible for the tvorldu,idedeplol,ment of knorr.ledge flunagement.

Siemens's filovetr€rlt to*'ard KII has presentdser.eral challenges to the companl-- tlre most notableof nhich are tedrnological and cr-rttural- At the hsartof Siemens's technical solution to knowledgemanagement is a \Feb site called ShareNet, whichcombines eiements of a database repository, a chatroom, and a search engine. Online entry forrns allowemplovees ro srore information they think might beuseful to colleagues. Other Siemens employees are

lble to search the repository or browse by topic and,then contact the authors for more information, usingone of the ar.-ailable communication channels.,Inaddition- rhe s\stern leLs ernplor-ees post alerts whenthev har..e an urgenr quesdon. Although knowledge

;lgarn ho*, Siemens has used a three-pronged effort toii!A,. lts ,convirice employees that it is importalt ro pafiici-;...,:.,,t.t" pate in the

"r.trng. of ideas ;i.*f;;;;;;;to share nhat they know. The challenge is manag-ing the people who manage the knou.ledge. tt hasto be eas-v for them to'3hare, or they q.on,t. Siemenshas assigned 100 internal evangelisrs around theworld to be responsible for training. anssveringquestions, and monitoring the system. Siemens,s topmanagement has sho$,n its ftill support for the KMproiects. and the compan-v is pror'.iding incentives toovercome employees' resistance to change. \{rhenemplol'ees post documenG to the sl'stem or use thekno*'ledge, Siemens rewards rhem n'ith .shares',(similar to frequent-fl1-er n:iles). An employee'saccumulation of shares can be exchanged for thingssuch as consumer electronics or dist-ounted trips toother countri,es- Ho*-el'er. the.real inc-entir-e of dres.\-stem is much more basic. Conmissiondrir-ensalespeople have alreadv learned that the knosr.l-edge and expertise of their colleagues ar-ailablethrougCr ShareNet ean be indispensable in rr.inninelucratire contracts. Emplovees in marketing. sen-ice-research and development- and other departments \are also willing to parricipare and contribute w.hentlrcy realize that the svsrem pror.ides them q-ithuseful information in a convenient \r-a\,.tt"' "', ShaieNet "has' undergone tre nlc nclou s gro\\th.which has resulted in ser-eral challenges for

:'Siemens.: The company srives to maintain abalance.he,tryeen,global and local knos,ledge initia-tlves as Well as between KM effort.s thar support theefltire:-aoinpany r.aad those that help indir iclualtiusiness units-;.Furtirermore. Siemens n-orks ro pre-.vent ,shareNetr fr6m.becoming so or.erloaded n-ith

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