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Course Content
Session One: Course Overview
You will spend the first part getting to know participants and discussing what will take place during the workshop. Students will also have an opportunity to identify their personal learning objectives.
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Pre-Assignment
Course Overview
Session Two: Definitions
Then, participants will learn the definition of knowledge, as well as the differences between tacit and explicit knowledge. The meaning and history of knowledge management will also be covered.
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What is Knowledge?
Assignments
What is Knowledge Management?
History of Knowledge Management
Session Three: The Business Case for Knowledge Management
In this session, participants will learn how knowledge management can reduce costs and grow sales. They will also learn how to build a business case for knowledge management. You will also examine the impact that knowledge management can have on business strategy and profit.
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Reducing Costs and Growing Sales with Knowledge Management
Assignments
Business Case Basics
Sample Knowledge Management Business Case
Assignments
Session Four: The Knowledge Management Mix
Next, participants will learn about three components vital to knowledge management: people, technology, and process. In this session, you will examine the relationship between these three essential knowledge management components.
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People
Assignments
Technology
Process
Assignments
Session Five: The Knowledge Management Framework
The knowledge management framework is comprised of four interdependent elements: needs analysis, resource identification, process analysis, and knowledge handling. In this session, participants will learn about the steps to building their knowledge management framework: needs analysis; resource identification; process analysis, identification, and construction; and accumulating, sharing, and storing knowledge. In this session, you will investigate what the four elements of the knowledge management framework are and how they work together.
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Introduction
Needs Analysis
Resource Identification
Process Analysis, Identification, and Construction
Assignments
Accumulating, Sharing, and Storing Knowledge
Session Six: ITandD’s Conundrum
A pre-assignment is designed to get you thinking about the topic, and to give you some indication of what is coming. In this example, the case study and the carefully crafted questions were intended to have you reflect on the vital role of knowledge within an organization. In this session, you will reflect on the answers you provided in the pre-assignment.
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Introduction
Assignments
Session Seven: Knowledge Management Models
Knowing the theory behind the practice can increase your knowledge and inform what you do. Having a foundational awareness helps you to understand the theory’s evolution and history in the business world and better enable you to see how this system will fit into your organization. In this session, you will investigate four different knowledge management models.
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The KM Process Framework (Bukowitz and Williams)
Knowledge Management Matrix (Gamble and Blackwell)
Assignments
Process Model (Botha)
Assignments
Knowledge Spiral Model (Nonaka and Takeuchi)
Session Eight: The Knowledge Management Toolkit
Cross-functional Teams, mentoring, organizational culture, and IT solutions are all techniques that you can use employ when implementing a knowledge management program in your organization. In this session, you will explore each of these techniques in depth. As you review the information, think about ways that you could use each technique in your workplace.
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Cross-Functional Teams
Assignments
Mentoring
Assignments
Organizational Culture
Assignments
IT Solutions
Which Technologies Would Be Best?
Assignments
Session Nine: Implementing Knowledge Management Initiatives
You see an organizational need for knowledge management. You understand what a knowledge management system is. You have the tools and information you need. Now it’s time to take action: it’s time to begin building the program. In this session, you will identify and investigate the necessary components for implementing a knowledge management program.
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Building Knowledge Networks
Creating a Knowledge Management Body of Knowledge (KMBOK)
Assignments
Creating a Chief Knowledge Officer (CKO) Position
Advertise for Your CKO
Assignments
Creating a Post-Mortem Plan
Assignments
Creating Measures
Assignments
Start With a Pilot
Assignments
Where Do I Put This?
Assignments
Support Your Organization Through the Change
Post-Course Assessment
Draft Lesson
Recommended Reading List
If you are looking for further information on this topic, we have included a recommended reading list below. Bergeron, Bryan. Essentials of Knowledge Management. John Wiley & Sons, 2003. Dixon, Nancy M. Common Knowledge: How Companies Thrive by Sharing What They Know. Harvard Business School Press, 2000. O'Dell, Carla, and Cindy Huebert. The New Edge in Knowledge: How Knowledge Management Is Changing the Way We Do Business. New John Wiley & Sons, 2011. Pasher, Edna, and Tuvya Ronen. The Complete Guide to Knowledge Management: A Strategic Plan to Leverage Your Company's Intellectual Capital. John Wiley & Sons, 2011. Rumizen, Dr. Melissie Clemmons. The Complete Idiot's Guide to Knowledge Management. Alpha Books, 2002.
Knowledge Management
About Lesson

Defining Knowledge Management

Knowledge management can be defined as an organization’s systematic approach concerning the retrieval, storage, creation, and sharing of knowledge. Through a variety of processes and procedures, businesses use knowledge management to bridge organizational gaps by extracting tacit and explicit knowledge from their employees.

Some of these processes include:

  • IT development to help connect people
  • IT development to aid in the storage and retrieval of information, forming communities of practice
  • Creating new roles within the organization to support knowledge transfer

Knowledge management also focuses on how an organization can leverage this knowledge.

Case Studies

The implementation of a great knowledge management program can alleviate many challenges within a business. Let’s use some examples to illustrate.

  • You have an angry client calling about a product that has been sold to them. The client was promised delivery of the product a month ago. However, the only person who can do this job is on sick leave for three weeks!
  • You have three senior employees that have stores of vital knowledge that has not been transferred to the rest of the department. They are all retiring from the company within six months. You know your department and the company will suffer from their departure.
  • You have been given a new, complex project to work on. You spend weeks on this project and generate solutions only to find out that a person in another department had knowledge that could have decreased your work time by half.
  • You have been working on solving an organizational problem and have developed some solutions you think are fantastic. After hours of labor, you find out that a team in another department has solved the problem months ago and their solution is better than the solution you planned to propose.
  • You are managing a department and now have four new employees. You wonder how you can bring them up to speed on their new role within the organization.
  • You know that Peggy in HR has the information you need to complete a task. However, she is out of the office that day and you have no idea who else to ask for this information.
  • You do a search for information on the company website and thousands of results come back. You do not have the time to search through them all and you have no idea which results would give you the information you need.

These workplace scenarios are quite common and they can have drastic effects on our individual productivity and the productivity of the overall company. Knowledge management is a system that advocates sharing or disposing knowledge through a variety of processes in the effort to increase our productivity. It encourages organizations to harness and take full advantage of their intellectual capital. Intellectual capital is an intangible, invaluable asset that includes an organization’s ideas, innovations, and different kinds of knowledge.

Lessons Learned

Many organizations do not have a system in place for handling their knowledge. Many people are unsure how to implement such a program and they may assume that knowledge will be transferred naturally. (In other words, the employees of the organization will figure out a way to connect with each other so they can find out what they need to know.) Additionally, the practice of knowledge management is relatively new to the business world.

 

 

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