Sergio Storch in Brazil offers an intriguing dialogue opportunity in his response to the last post about knowledge thought leaders. So intriguing, in fact, that I want to be sure the question gets thrown out to all our readers, so I’m highlighting it as a separate post.
Here’s his practical question:
In a concrete situation where you have a large organization and want to identify the KM thought leaders, which of these methods would you prefer?
a) formulate the traits of these guys and then ask the managers to tell you who in their teams fits to each of these traits of an ideal profile? Would you use a scale for that?
b) throw a bottle in the sea (in the network) and ask people at all levels to self-rate themselves?
c) the same but ask all people to tell who in their personal networks correspond to those traits?
Which pros and cons you have for each of these methods?
How would you respond to Sergio?
I would not rely on any opinion. There is too much bias and politics in big companies.
I would suggest you run a challenging test.
Choose based on what you perceive as the best result.
Agree that is not easy to come up with a reliable test.
Regards
From Jon Thorne via LinkedIn’s KM Edge Group:
a great article … but I would not use any of the options put forward.
For me the people with the knowledge worth capturing tend to be people who have had an experience … that is relevant to a large enough group to make it worthwhile capturing.
This is based on the assumption that knowledge is captured in a way that it enables others about to experience a similar situation … to make better choices.
hope this adds
cheers jon
GStC: Of course, Jon. And I’m surprised I let the experience “piece” slip by. It’s key to our success with KD/KS, no matter what kind of subject field we happen to be in. I happen to have on a shelf next to my desk a 1999 title, given as a birthday present a few years later. It’s The experience economy – work is theatre and every business a stage: goods and services are no longer enough, by B. Joseph Pine II and James H. Gilmore (Harvard Business School Press). I’ve dipped into this book more times than I can remember, and I always come away with the same thought: it’s experience that makes us valuable to our customers, whether we are external management consultants or internal consultants (e.g., knowledge thought leaders). Thanks for the insightful comment, Jon.
I fully agree with John. You do not ask a thought leader to identify himself or you set YOUR parameters or YARDSTICKS to measure the traits, as CONTEXT is most IMPORTANT in thought leadership. I might be very good THOUGHT LEADER in a SUBJECT in a particular Context, but the moment the context changes, I might not measure up. However, thought leaders have one quality which can be spotted by good leaders/CEOs and COOs in an organisation if they look carefully – they work PROACTIVELY, spot problems when others do not see any, and work to find solutions and at time make sure that the problem is rectified even before it truly arises.