Knowledge Management primer

Part 2 - how?

In Part 1 of this series of articles on knowledge management we looked at the question, "why do we need to manage knowledge?" We uncovered three answers:

1. the rapid development of cheap electronic networks and universal standards for encoding and displaying information (aka web technology) has created an opportunity to make information readily available on a massive scale
2. an increasing requirement in organisations for 'knowledge workers' (people who need to learn new things constantly in order to keep up with customer demands and adapt to rapidly changing processes and technologies) is putting pressure on organisations to facilitate and support their knowledge development
3. competitive pressures are forcing organisations to continuously improve product and service quality and reduce costs by managing knowledge to improve and automate organisational processes, in effect, by leveraging their process-orientation

The next question then is how to go about managing knowledge if these are the imperatives involved?

Leveraging knowledge - interaction, codification, encapsulation, and automation

Exploiting communications technology, feeding knowledge workers, and leveraging process-orientation are the three imperatives for managing knowledge. Responding to these imperatives involves putting processes in place that:

• utilise electronic networks to distribute information quickly, make it easily accessible, and keep it up-to date
• encourage individuals to share their knowledge, and develop it further through innovation and interaction with others
• transform innovations into formal corporate-wide processes that are clearly documented and widely communicated
• leverage processes by computerising and automating them, and documenting user information
• ensuring that automated processes can be effectively developed by documenting them for maintenance and enhancement

When all these things are done, the organisation is managing its knowledge. These things represent a process of 'leveraging' knowledge through four 'levels':

1. Interaction
2. Codification
3. Encapsulation
4. Automation

Interaction

The first level - interaction - is the process of personal communication. That is, people simply talking to each other and exchanging views, imparting information, tossing around ideas, and so on. This occurs naturally all the time of course but recognising its importance in the transfer and development of knowledge within an organisation encourages the implementation of conscious strategies to support and improve it.

Knowledge Management at this level of the leveraging process means doing things like organising forums and seminars (including things like video conferences), allowing time for team discussions, creating a corporate 'yellow pages', sponsoring 'tech talks' by internal experts, and even designing office layouts that facilitate easy communication.

It also means equipping staff with practical techniques aimed at helping them to collect and analyse data, clarify things, and generally get at the truth. And also to generate ideas and to test them properly before they are implemented.

Codification

Codification - the next stage of leveraging knowledge - is the process of producing a 'knowledge' or 'intellectual' artefact. This is anything that allows knowledge to be communicated independently of its holder. Most commonly the artefact is a document. Writing things down remains the most compact and powerful means of communicating knowledge widely and cheaply. But an intellectual artefact may also be a picture, a sound recording, or a film or video.

The ability to communicate knowledge widely and cheaply gives an organisation enormous leverage. This is a major step up from Interaction, which is limited in broadcast scope to those within hearing. Documents can be distributed widely and cheaply over a Corporate Intranet and they persist over time, which makes them available for reference as and when they are needed by both existing and new staff. They constitute the only real 'corporate memory' of the organisation.

But there are costs and difficulties associated with Codification. To manage knowledge effectively at this level of leveraging, the organisation needs to address a major issue of quality. Quality in this case covers a number of factors:

• accuracy
• readability /understandability
• accessibility
• currency
• authority

If these quality characteristics are not present in the ' intellectual artefact' concerned, be it a document, sound recording, picture, or film recording, then its value as a vehicle for transferring knowledge will be low.

Encapsulation and Automation

Encapsulating knowledge means embedding it in a way that creates a tool for people to use. This may be a physical device (a hammer or a screwdriver is embedded knowledge), or more commonly in business it will take the form of software.

When knowledge is embedded, it is leveraged. Having a tool available invariably means being able to perform a task more quickly and effectively. If you have a hammer, you can abandon tying things together. Not only does this speed up and improve construction, it makes it possible to construct new and more complex things. The same argument applies to, say, a clever new financial software system. It may enable a company not only to operate more efficiently but also to offer new and different services.

Automation is encapsulation taken to the extreme. In this case, knowledge is embedded so effectively in an artefact that it can perform tasks autonomously.

The pivotal role of codification

'Leveraging' knowledge then is all about getting maximum benefit from what people know and learn. The levels of leverage may be summarised as follows:

• knowledge held by a particular person allows that person to be more effective
• if people interact to share their knowledge, everyone involved increases their knowledge and becomes more effective
• if knowledge is codified in a material way (ie written down or otherwise captured), then it can be shared much more widely both in terms of audience and time duration
• if knowledge is encapsulated or automated it is leveraged still further because it creates tools that factor-out the need to apply individual knowledge to a task or range of tasks

But if knowledge is encapsulated or automated by way of an artefact (physical tool or software), then that knowledge must also be codified to enable that artefact to be understood, maintained and improved.

If we take the example of even a very simple tool such as a hammer, there is benefit to be gained from written knowledge about how best to use it and how best to maintain it. If we want to improve it, we will need to refer to knowledge about how it is constructed, the materials it is made from, how it performs and how it is manufactured.

Thus, in the leveraging process, codification plays a pivotal role not only by significantly leveraging knowledge in its own right, but also supporting and enabling the higher levels of encapsulation and automation.

The table below summarises, in broad terms, how knowledge management is a response to the three imperatives driving it.

In Part 3 we will look in more detail at a corporate model for the development of knowledge management, and strategies for practical implementation.

This article may be reproduced only with the permission of HCi (email HCi ). Copyright HCi, 2001.