Two posts at other blogs have caught my attention, and since our goal here at SMR Int’l is to be provocative, let’s see what they say about this whole idea of moving KM, knowledge services, and the support of the knowledge culture beyond the professional and academic and out into the workplace, as I’ve written about in earlier posts.
A colleague sends along Greg Lambert’s fascinating piece Has “IT” Killed “KM”? and in his comment on another subject, Alex Feng puts forward very clear distinctions between the work of information professionals and that done by knowledge professionals (what I call “knowledge professionals,” generally characterizing these knowledge workers as “knowledge thought leaders” for their employing organizations).
So the question seems to be one of both collaboration with other information- knowledge- and/or learning-related business functions and moving away from concepts and processes that inhibit the successful interaction of knowledge professionals with others in the workplace. If these colleagues require some sort of assistance, conversation, etc. as they seek to create and use knowledge, I’m not sure IT in and of itself can guarantee success. And indeed, if IT has in fact transitioned KM into nothing more than tools and those famous “pipelines,” the battle might be lost.
But I’m not so sure. When I think about the people I know who are successfully performing KM – as a business function – in their organizations, I think the collaborative role kicks in, and it’s those interactions with others that keep KM alive. Think about how we define knowledge services (the whole convergence idea, the convergence of information management, knowledge management, and strategic learning). Isn’t that what keeps this work from becoming only an IT function?
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KM has a harder time than IT justifying itself as a separate function in an organization. I'm not even sure that there is always a need for a KM office – at least not a permanent one. The ultimate goal of a KM office should be to run out of business because it is no longer needed. If KM has indeed reached a level of maturity within an organization where it is performed as a business function, then isn't it fully embedded in business processes. In most cases, I suspect a lot remains to be done to get to that level of maturity. IT cannot do much to get KM embedded in business processes. IT can only play a supportive role.
IT has derailed many KM efforts because for every 50 IT vendors out there you may have one KM person arguing for KM as a business function rather than a suite of IT tools. A lot of energy is spent arguing against an IT approach and failing to articulate how KM can truly be embedded in business functions. Either it's not being articulated well enough or there's just too much IT noise around for anyone to hear the KM as business function argument.