Knowledge Management Maturity Baseline #maturity #institutionalization
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Jonathan Norman
I saw this intriguing piece of research - which was published a year or two ago: Inefficient Knowledge Sharing Costs Businesses $47 Million Annually (panopto.com) and I wondered whether anyone has come across any kind of KM maturity baseline for teams and organizations? Any advice or links gratefully received. Jonathan
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Jonathan, That was such a great study and I've used it in my TEDx talk along with the Gallup report in 2017 for Workplace Productivity. APQC has a great KMMM. Regards, Cindy Dr. Cindy Young, PMP, LSSMBB, CMQ/OE President/CEO 757-343-4601 CJ Young Consulting Twitter: https://twitter.com/DrCynthiaJYoung |
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Chris Collison
Hi Jonathan, Interesting report. I am more persuaded by value created from accelerated onboarding than the piecemeal consolidation of hours (the 5.3 hours don’t all come in a convenient lump!). I think people generally things to do in the ‘waiting time’ – some of which is productive, and some of which is a distraction which is good for wellbeing.
On the maturity model front, my advice would be to gather some examples (Straits Knowledge, APQC, UK Gov, other examples etc) and use them as references/sources in a workshop where your stakeholders build their own. That way they get to contextualise the facets of KM most relevant to their organisation. The ‘what does good really look like?’ conversations which arise from the process pay a huge engagement dividend, and it gets you over the passive resistance response of “oh but that model doesn’t quite fit us…’
Kind regards, Chris
From: <main@SIKM.groups.io> on behalf of Jonathan Norman <jonathan.norman@...>
I saw this intriguing piece of research - which was published a year or two ago: Inefficient Knowledge Sharing Costs Businesses $47 Million Annually (panopto.com) and I wondered whether anyone has come across any kind of KM maturity baseline for teams and organizations? Any advice or links gratefully received. Jonathan |
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Gordon Vala-Webb
I have looked at the report in detail - but the methodology looks pretty suspect to me.
1) Survey size: They surveyed only 1,000 "employees." They don't report on the characteristics of the sample size, the population they are trying to measure (all employees everywhere?), and no mention of reliability / accuracy. So I would argue you can't make use of any of their numbers as representative of anything. 2) Survey structure: Their understanding of KM seems to be lacking - or they have a particular approach in mind that they want to further. For example - they asked if people would "prefer to work for an organization where employees share their unique work knowledge with each other." Maybe that unique knowledge is wrong / outmoded? Maybe that knowledge shouldn't be shared but baked in to the work process? Maybe there is other, better, knowledge to be had - that this 'unique' knowledge is simply the tip of the iceberg. Feeling a bit grumpy (obviously) - so off for another coffee. -- Gordon Vala-Webb Building Smarter Organizations How to lead your zombie organization back to life |
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Coffee is an excellent idea everyday! :-) On Tue, Apr 13, 2021 at 8:40 AM Gordon Vala-Webb <gvalawebb@...> wrote: I have looked at the report in detail - but the methodology looks pretty suspect to me. --
Dr. Cindy Young, PMP, LSSMBB, CMQ/OE President/CEO 757-343-4601 CJ Young Consulting Twitter: https://twitter.com/DrCynthiaJYoung |
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Jonathan Norman
Hahaha, thanks Gordon, you’ve made my day. Hurrah for your grumpiness!
BR
Jonathan
From: main@SIKM.groups.io <main@SIKM.groups.io>
On Behalf Of Gordon Vala-Webb via groups.io
Sent: 13 April 2021 13:40 To: main@SIKM.groups.io Subject: Re: [SIKM] Knowledge Management Maturity Baseline #guidelines #institutionalization #maturity
I have looked at the report in detail - but the methodology looks pretty suspect to me. |
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Gordon Vala-Webb
@Jonathan
Thanks for the encouragement. I must say, the combination of pseudoscience and maturity models plus low caffeine is not a happy one. G -- Gordon Vala-Webb Building Smarter Organizations How to lead your zombie organization back to life |
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Jonathan Norman
Indeed! 😊
From: main@SIKM.groups.io <main@SIKM.groups.io>
On Behalf Of Gordon Vala-Webb via groups.io
Sent: 13 April 2021 13:54 To: main@SIKM.groups.io Subject: Re: [SIKM] Knowledge Management Maturity Baseline #guidelines #institutionalization #maturity
@Jonathan |
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Elizabeth Winter
Hi, Gordon—
Also, this study just published by Spiceworks / Ziff Davis may be of use. It is the one I’ve been looking for, for years: RE4MDJC (microsoft.com) Commissioned by Microsoft (in service of promoting their new SharePoint Syntex and Viva Topics products), it contains this “killer stat” (p. 12) I’ve been using with my organization to promote the strategic importance and business value of Knowledge Management:
Hope this helps! Lizzi
LIZZI WINTER
From: main@SIKM.groups.io <main@SIKM.groups.io> On Behalf Of
Jonathan Norman via groups.io
Sent: Tuesday, April 13, 2021 8:16 AM To: main@SIKM.groups.io Subject: [SIKM] Knowledge Management Maturity Baseline #guidelines #institutionalization #maturity
I saw this intriguing piece of research - which was published a year or two ago: Inefficient Knowledge Sharing Costs Businesses $47 Million Annually (panopto.com) and I wondered whether anyone has come across any kind of KM maturity baseline for teams and organizations? Any advice or links gratefully received. Jonathan This message may contain confidential information, legally privileged information or other information subject to legal restrictions. If you are not a designated recipient of this message, or an agent responsible for delivering it to a designated recipient, please do not read, copy, use or disclose this message or its attachments, and notify the sender by replying to this message and delete or destroy all copies of this message and attachments. Disclaimer The information contained in this communication from the sender is confidential. It is intended solely for use by the recipient and others authorized to receive it. If you are not the recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or taking action in relation of the contents of this information is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful. |
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Elizabeth Winter
Sorry, Jonathan, not Gordon—you were the one who asked the question. Low caffeine here, too. 😊
LIZZI WINTER
From: main@SIKM.groups.io <main@SIKM.groups.io> On Behalf Of
Elizabeth Winter via groups.io
Sent: Tuesday, April 13, 2021 8:58 AM To: main@SIKM.groups.io Subject: Re: [SIKM] Knowledge Management Maturity Baseline #guidelines #institutionalization #maturity
Hi, Gordon—
Also, this study just published by Spiceworks / Ziff Davis may be of use. It is the one I’ve been looking for, for years: RE4MDJC (microsoft.com) Commissioned by Microsoft (in service of promoting their new SharePoint Syntex and Viva Topics products), it contains this “killer stat” (p. 12) I’ve been using with my organization to promote the strategic importance and business value of Knowledge Management:
Hope this helps! Lizzi
LIZZI WINTER
From: main@SIKM.groups.io <main@SIKM.groups.io>
On Behalf Of Jonathan Norman via groups.io
I saw this intriguing piece of research - which was published a year or two ago: Inefficient Knowledge Sharing Costs Businesses $47 Million Annually (panopto.com) and I wondered whether anyone has come across any kind of KM maturity baseline for teams and organizations? Any advice or links gratefully received. Jonathan
Disclaimer The information contained in this communication from the sender is confidential. It is intended solely for use by the recipient and others authorized to receive it. If you are not
the recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or taking action in relation of the contents of this information is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful. This message may contain confidential information, legally privileged information or other information subject to legal restrictions. If you are not a designated recipient of this message, or an agent responsible for delivering it to a designated recipient, please do not read, copy, use or disclose this message or its attachments, and notify the sender by replying to this message and delete or destroy all copies of this message and attachments. |
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Hi Jonathan,
Once I had a hard time with one senior leader who thought there should be specific references and benchmarks and baseline models. He did not, could not (would not?) understand that organizations were different and while benchmarks can give you some ideas, they are not in and of themselves the solution to every organization's issues and needs. Identifying the needs, opportunities and issues within the organization is the best place to start. Having said that I heartily agree that 'factoids' (as one senior leader called them) can be used to illustrate some of the potential advantages of taking an informed, analytical examination of areas of need and opportunity to which KM can be addressed. I've used them myself but with some degree of discernment on how and when to use them. Best Paul |
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Patrick Lambe
I heartily endorse Chris’ advice.
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There is no such thing as a "standard baseline" for KM, nor are there standard maturity markers. How could there be, if KM itself is by nature so context sensitive? There is no one size fits all KM in the real world. There is only KM that fits the challenges, needs and opportunities of your present context. So where a maturity model (I prefer capability framework) works at all, it is about characterising your current position in relation to needs, challenges, opportunities and strategic goals, identifying where you want to get to, and identifying capabilities that need to grow. Maturity model descriptors can be mined from multiple sources, selected and used where relevant, but this needs to be a participatory process from within the organisation. You can use a technique such as the River Diagram technique to assess current capability gaps and capability goals, and then you can build out progress markers. There are other issues with maturity models as well. When applied across a large organisation they tend to “flatten out” (i.e. average out) interesting and useful differences in KM capabilities across the organisation, thus concealing them. Those differences are your opportunities to transfer capabilities internally, so you’re not doing yourselves any favours by concealing them in the process. Maturity models should be handled with great care! More on this at P
Patrick Lambe
Partner Straits Knowledge phone: +65 98528511 web: www.straitsknowledge.com resources: www.greenchameleon.com knowledge mapping: www.aithinsoftware.com 
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Murray Jennex
I found both reports very interesting and am still digesting them. My dissertation back in the 90s looked at the impact of organizational memory (what KM was called at the time) on productivity. I found many of the same problems and actually came up with some similar numbers. My methodology was a longitudinal case study of an engineering organization so I went real deep into a single organization, my findings are solid but there are weaknesses in generalizing the results to all organizations. I followed this up with a detailed study in a different organization on how to measure knowledge loss with departing employees, similar approach, similar weakness. I've since done wider research into how to measure KM success, also with good results but some weakness. I've shared all this with the group before so am not trying to push it. What I did want to say is that I did see things that could be used as measures of maturity. I don't have time now to go into all of them but will say they are in the Jennex Olfman KM Success Model. The item I will go into depth on is the one item I think is the most telling on maturity, and that is the likelihood that an employee will go to the KM system when they have a problem. The measure I used is based off the Perceived Benefit Model of Thompson, Higgins, and Howell (1991) which is based of the Theory of Reasoned Action (Triandis). This model is useful as it recognizes that we are looking at voluntary usage and so if the members of the organization are saying that they will use the system when they have an issue then they are basically saying they trust the KMS and the knowledge retrieved from it. The higher the perceived benefit the more mature the KMS as it shows that the KMS has appropriate knowledge that can be found and retrieved easily. I like this measure as it removes the context specifics of the KM in a specific organization and just focuses on how well the KMS works.
As to factors that could go into KM maturity measures: leadership support and use, impact on business processes, alignment of KM with organizational strategy, constantly evolving KM and knowledge content strategies, search and retrieval functions, knowledge content and its vitality (how often it is added to, reviewed, etc.), automatic knowledge capture, security, etc.
My track at the HICSS conference has a minitrack that focuses on KM value and performance measurements so yes, I agree that maturity ties strongly to value. Mature KM has defined and recognized value, immature KM may not.
Just some thoughts....murray jennex -----Original Message-----
From: Elizabeth Winter <elizabeth.winter@...> To: main@SIKM.groups.io <main@SIKM.groups.io> Sent: Tue, Apr 13, 2021 5:58 am Subject: Re: [SIKM] Knowledge Management Maturity Baseline #guidelines #institutionalization #maturity Hi, Gordon—
And as others have mentioned, APQC is a great source for info. on KM best practices. They offer members a maturity assessment your organization can perform to benchmark and complete once a year to assess your KM maturity. Knowledge Management Capability Assessment Tool | APQC Also, this study just published by Spiceworks / Ziff Davis may be of use. It is the one I’ve been looking for, for years:
RE4MDJC (microsoft.com) Commissioned by Microsoft (in service of promoting their new SharePoint Syntex and Viva Topics products), it contains this “killer stat” (p. 12) I’ve
been using with my organization to promote the strategic importance and business value of Knowledge Management:
 Hope this helps!
Lizzi
LIZZI WINTER
Knowledge Management Program Manager 
3333 Piedmont Road, NE | Suite 1000 | Atlanta, GA 30305 O: +1.404.975.6298 www.northhighland.com | Connect With Us From: main@SIKM.groups.io <main@SIKM.groups.io> On Behalf Of
Jonathan Norman via groups.io
Sent: Tuesday, April 13, 2021 8:16 AM To: main@SIKM.groups.io Subject: [SIKM] Knowledge Management Maturity Baseline #guidelines #institutionalization #maturity I saw this intriguing piece of research - which was published a year or two ago: Inefficient Knowledge Sharing Costs Businesses $47 Million Annually
(panopto.com) and I wondered whether anyone has come across any kind of KM maturity baseline for teams and organizations? Any advice or links gratefully received. Jonathan
This message may contain confidential information, legally privileged information or other information subject to legal restrictions. If you are not a designated recipient of this message, or an agent responsible for delivering it to a designated recipient, please do not read, copy, use or disclose this message or its attachments, and notify the sender by replying to this message and delete or destroy all copies of this message and attachments. Disclaimer
The information contained in this communication from the sender is confidential. It is intended solely for use by the recipient and others authorized to receive it. If you are not the recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or taking action in relation of the contents of this information is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful.
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Murray Jennex
You can't get away from benchmarks and baseline models, it is how senior managers think and talk amongst themselves as none of them want to talk about their specific organization. There are actually 3 levels of benchmarks and most times people only refer to the first level which are numbers and measures. The second level is more useful, this level looks at lessons learned, good practices tied to performance, etc. These are useful for talking to senior leaders. The KM standard, just released, is a kind of benchmark and can be used for this purpose.....murray jennex
-----Original Message-----
From: Paul McDowall via groups.io <paul_mcdowall@...> To: main@SIKM.groups.io Sent: Tue, Apr 13, 2021 11:15 am Subject: Re: [SIKM] Knowledge Management Maturity Baseline #maturity #institutionalization Hi Jonathan,
Once I had a hard time with one senior leader who thought there should be specific references and benchmarks and baseline models. He did not, could not (would not?) understand that organizations were different and while benchmarks can give you some ideas, they are not in and of themselves the solution to every organization's issues and needs. Identifying the needs, opportunities and issues within the organization is the best place to start. Having said that I heartily agree that 'factoids' (as one senior leader called them) can be used to illustrate some of the potential advantages of taking an informed, analytical examination of areas of need and opportunity to which KM can be addressed. I've used them myself but with some degree of discernment on how and when to use them. Best Paul |
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Jonathan Norman
No worries, Lizzi. Thanks for the help.
Jonathan
From: main@SIKM.groups.io <main@SIKM.groups.io>
On Behalf Of Elizabeth Winter via groups.io
Sent: 13 April 2021 13:59 To: main@SIKM.groups.io Subject: Re: [SIKM] Knowledge Management Maturity Baseline #guidelines #institutionalization #maturity
Sorry, Jonathan, not Gordon—you were the one who asked the question. Low caffeine here, too. 😊
LIZZI WINTER
From:
main@SIKM.groups.io <main@SIKM.groups.io>
On Behalf Of Elizabeth Winter via groups.io
Hi, Gordon—
Also, this study just published by Spiceworks / Ziff Davis may be of use. It is the one I’ve been looking for, for years: RE4MDJC (microsoft.com) Commissioned by Microsoft (in service of promoting their new SharePoint Syntex and Viva Topics products), it contains this “killer stat” (p. 12) I’ve been using with my organization to promote the strategic importance and business value of Knowledge Management:
Hope this helps! Lizzi
LIZZI WINTER
From:
main@SIKM.groups.io <main@SIKM.groups.io>
On Behalf Of Jonathan Norman via groups.io
I saw this intriguing piece of research - which was published a year or two ago: Inefficient Knowledge Sharing Costs Businesses $47 Million Annually (panopto.com) and I wondered whether anyone has come across any kind of KM maturity baseline for teams and organizations? Any advice or links gratefully received. Jonathan
Disclaimer The information contained in this communication from the sender is confidential. It is intended solely for use by the recipient and others authorized to receive it.
If you are not the recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or taking action in relation of the contents of this information is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful.
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