Many organizations have begun to understand the value and promise Knowledge Management (KM) can bring to their workforce.
Delivering innovation through collaboration and sharing remains the cornerstones of KM; however, once your organization has established its KM strategy, and/or rolled out it’s initial KM offering (i.e., KM system, KM process, tools, etc.) what happens next?
What happens next is the adoption process.
Whether its a new process, procedure, or system; getting your workforce to leverage and use it in the course of executing activities and delivering on their task will be essential to your KM program’s success. In order to achieve this there must be processes and vehicles in place to allow, encourage, and reward staff members as they work within this new paradigm.
It will not be easy.
As with anything new, it will take some time for adoption to occur. To move this along there must be KM supporters, mentors, and/or evangelist at all levels of the corporate infrastructure to encourage the workforce to “drink the KM Kool-Aid”. In other words buy in and practice KM in all aspects of performing tasks and activities.
Developing an organizational culture of knowledge sharing, collaboration, and lifelong learning should be the goals of any KM program. Organizations such as Fluor Corporation have been successful in infusing KM within their culture. From human resource activities, to leveraging knowledge for strategic purposes to engaging with clients, Fluor remains an example of how KM can be leveraged effectively at an organization.
Drinking the “KM Kool-Aid” is a slow and deliberate activity grounded in a basic KM process of Connect–>Collect–>Catalog–>Reuse–>Learn and Innovate. When practiced effectively this process will be a cornerstone to enabling the adoption of KM throughout your organization.
I am very interested in hearing comments on this subject as well as examples of how your organization has or suggestions or will adopt KM.
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