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KM in contextSense-making and

connectedness

John Tropea

2010

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The art of actioning information”…rather than an object it’s a state of being.”

“Knowledge is actioning information in a usable context, which from this experience you get understanding, which in turn becomes knowledge to you.”Andrew Gent

“Once something informs it allows for action. Knowledge, is the context by which action occurs.”Paula Thornton http://bit.ly/6Gi7LX

“…the creation of sufficient shared knowledge to enable the use of information”Dave Snowden http://bit.ly/6FUTYP

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Knowledge is not a thing

“Whenever we wish to express what we know, we can only do so by uttering messages of one kind or another - oral, written, graphic, gestural or even through ‘body language’. Such messages do not carry ‘knowledge’, they constitute ‘information’, which a knowing mind may assimilate, understand, comprehend and incorporate into its own knowledge structures.” Nancy Dixon http://bit.ly/4qOOZU

“Knowledge is profoundly social…it happens only in social interactions”

Larry Prusak

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Internalisation and re-framing"Explicit knowledge is simply information – lacking the human context necessary to qualify it as knowledge. 

Sharing human knowledge is a misnomer, the most we can do is help others embed inputs as we have done so that they may approach the world as we do based on our experience.  This sharing is done on many levels, in many media, and in contexts as close to the original ones so that the experience can approximate the original.”  John Bordeaux http://bit.ly/IQCI

“the internalisation problem is how the represented knowledge can be re-contextualised so that it makes sense within the recipients own world view”

Patrick Lambe http://bit.ly/6fShb9

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Context is the edge

“The new advantage is context — how internal and external content is interpreted, combined, made sense of, and converted to end product. Creating competitive context requires social capital, the ability to find, utilize and combine the skills, knowledge and experience of others.”

Valdis Krebs http://bit.ly/78sdrN

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Context and understanding

“We can always know more than we can tell, and we will always tell more than we can write down. The nature of knowledge is such that we always know, or are capable of knowing more than we have the physical time or the conceptual ability to say”

“I can speak in five minutes what it will otherwise take me two weeks to get round to spend a couple of hours writing down”

“A genuine request for help is not often refused unless there is literally no time or a previous history of distrust. On the other hand ask people to codify all that they know in advance of a contextual enquiry and it will be refused. Linking and connecting people is more important than storing their artefacts”

“We only know what we know when we need to know it. Human knowledge is deeply contextual and requires stimulus for recall.”

Shared context is assumed in artefacts (codified information)Eg. Map assumes that map users knows about muggers

Dave Snowden

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Say that again…

• What’s in it for me?– Share in context of need, rather than stockpile– Intrinsic motivation, audience, engagement

• Context for recall– We don’t know what we know until we need to know it– Need triggers, we cannot brain dump like computers

• Context and content loss– From head to mouth to paper– The way we know is not the way we report it in hindsight

• Shared Context– Is often assumed– Eg Map maker and Map user assuming shared context that you can get

mugged

Dave Snowden http://bit.ly/NpfDz

Context and intrinsic motivation

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Knowing this…

Why do we insist on codifying “knowledge”, when…

• May never be needed (a just-in-case approach may be a waste of time and resources)

• Loss of content and context

• Is quickly outdated

• We need to re-frame information in our context

• Lacks motivation or incentive to share

• Not engaging

• Not how we naturally share and seek information

• Information object doesn’t have intrinsic meaning

• Knowledge doesn’t exist independent from a person

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Get over it…

"Believing that knowledge is only transferred once it has been made explicit leads to mechanistic, engineering approaches to knowledge management that have not proven their worth.  Crank it out of people’s heads, churn it into a shared taxonomy or tag it somehow, and then – and only then – is it useful to others.  I would like to know the exact date that the apprentice learning model was made obsolete by advanced information technology.“

John Bordeaux http://bit.ly/IQCI

The KM branding issue

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Context is everything

”We learn through fragmented input and internal cognitive patterns, embedding extensive context from our environment at the time of learning.”

“The context within which something is learned cannot be reduced to information metadata – it is an integral part of what is learned.”

“The grandfather above will not conduct after-action reviews regarding his fishing experiences, write a pamphlet about fishing, and upload it to the family intranet.  Rather, he will take the boy fishing – where he will show him to tie lures, cast effectively, breathe in the experience, and hopefully learn to love what he loves“

John Bordeaux http://bit.ly/IQCI

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Bigger Context & Connect

True sharing happens when we cultivate conditions for connections and conversations. A community/network space allows people to get to “know each other” over a series of interactions. It enables people to more easily probe and clarify information they find and re-frame information into their context. These are conditions for optimal communication.

It's important not to let gems roll into the archives. Facilitators must garden content by feeding it back into procedures, or complementary pages/lists that consist of contextual workarounds, tips, etc…

Smaller Content & Collect

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Sense-making KM…

Will I search a database?

Will I ask people (CoPs)?

PEOPLE (Community of Practice - CoP)Quick, Referrals, Re-frame to your context, Peripheral information

MACHINE (database) Not quick, Assumes shared context, May not exist, May be outdated

Into procedures, as common practice, or complementary wiki pages (workarounds, informal practices)

Form

al a

nsw

er in

data

base

Answer is new information

Subscribers learn as it happens

Facilitator to feedback integral new information

Answer exists

in CoP

First ask people in the Community of Practice (CoP)

Person may point: to an existing answer or a useful bit in the database, or within the CoP itself where the raw contextual information lives

An answer to the question may create new information

If worth capturing as a new common practice, then put that information into the database (with links back to the raw CoP content eg forum post, and vice versa)

If it’s new insight into existing information, forum thread is resurrected, and then update common practice

New information can even be fed back into procedures

Perhaps procedures need a complementary wiki to list workarounds for different contexts

Just-in-case vs Just-in-time

* Also applies to social networks

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Sense-making KM…

Member to share information, lessons, experience, tips

Will I share it in the CoP, as it happens?Eg Blog, wiki

Asked to codify what I know into a database!

MACHINE (database) Conscripted (resisted) What’s in it for me, Hoarding knowledge is power, Will it be seen or used, Time intensive, Expensive exercise, Lose context/content, Need triggers for context, Outdates quickly

PEOPLE (CoP)On my own terms (engaged),Recognised, Intrinsic motivation, Sharing is power, Comment feedback (may generate new information), Subscribers learn as it happens, Have impact, Feel ownership and connected, As it happens agility, Adapt to uncertainty, Get to know people, Easy-to-use tools, Audience

Capturing knowledge thatmatters (and creating new knowledge) as it happens; rather than stock piling knowledge just in case

Facilitator to feedback integral new information

Into procedures, as common practice, or complementary wiki pages (workarounds, informal practices)

Promotes collaborative (engaged), rather than competitive workforce

Just-in-case vs Just-in-time

* Also applies to social networks

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From management…

Creating a knowledge sharing cultureA centralised approach of ideal behaviours in conscripting people to share information in databases by setting targets and rewardsREQUIREMENT (batteries context not included)

Creating conditions for relationshipsUser-designed tools, audience, intrinsic motivation, recognition, peer network, innate desire to connect, sense-make, emergence, trust, impact, ownership

(context, clarification, conversation, re-framing, understanding included)

ENGAGEMENT

To facilitation…

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To be cont…

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