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Knowledge, Limits and Reality
(Please contact to ICASIT for slide Presentations)
The World Bank hosted the ninth event in the Capital region's Knowledge Management Roundtable (KM RT) series on May 17, 2001.
Held in conjunction with School of Public Policy's International Center for Applied Studies in Information Technology (ICASIT) at George Mason University and Virginia's Center for Innovative Technology (CIT), the KM RT seeks to broaden the application and advance the effectiveness of KM practice in organizations in the region. CIT seeks to increase the Commonwealth's economic competitiveness and quality of life by advancing the development of Virginia as a technology state and by creating and retaining technology-based jobs and businesses.
As part of its efforts to achieve these results, CIT provided a grant to ICASIT to help initiate a shared KM culture among organizations in Virginia by identifying organizations interested in KM and convening the first KM Roundtable that was held in March 1999 (KM Roundtable, March 1999). Subsequently, a KM RT has been convened nearly every quarter: KM Roundtable, June 1999, KM Roundtable, September 1999, KM Roundtable, February 2000, KM Roundtable, May 2000, KM Roundtable, August 2000, KM Roundtable, November 2000, and KM Roundtable, February 2001. Over the past year the KM RT transitioned to become a regional advocate for KM processes in both private and governmental organizations in Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia, and CIT confirmed its support of KM processes by partially funding KM RT activities.
With this event, nine meetings have been held since initiation of the KM RT two years ago; an average of 48 individuals have participated in each event. The May 17th meeting (Agenda) was attended by 66 participants (Participants), 28 of whom attended for the first time. Based upon attendance at this meeting at the World Bank, some 240 practitioners representing 112 organizations are now involved in the KM RT program. (Organization List).
Ms. Alex Bennet, internationally recognized as an expert in KM and an agent for organizational change, has served for three years as the Department of the Navy's Deputy Chief Information Officer for Enterprise Integration.
Prior to her current position, and in addition to other activities, Ms. Bennet served in a number of executive positions focused on acquisition reform, worked with several DON program offices, led strategic planning and development of the IRS plan for educating its workforce, and served as PR manager for the Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan.
Ms. Bennet earned an MS in Management for Organizational Effectiveness and currently pursues her Ph.D. in Human and Organizational Systems. She has published over 500 articles, primarily on Navy topics. Ms. Bennet is the recipient of the Department of the Navy Superior Public Service Award and the National Performance Review Hammer Award from Vice President Gore, among other awards.
Ms. Bennet, who has made innumerable presentations on KM activities at the DON, introduced her self-described "outside the box" presentation, entitled "Knowledge, Limits and Reality," by acknowledging that for this presentation she would go beyond her normal subject areas. Throughout her PowerPoint presentation, Bennet labeled specific slides as illustrating some aspect of the three the words in her title. Below are comments that provide an overview of Bennet's thought-provoking presentation.
Informed by work on a book entitled "Creating Our Reality" that she is writing with David Bennet, Ms. Bennet elucidated the consequences for KM of the continuous flow of ideas in which we are immersed. When integrated with our intellectual and emotional selves, these ideas change us and the world around us as well as help us make choices and set limits that in turn enable us develop more information and knowledge that will change us as individuals.
Three "simple truths" listed in slide 3 framed her presentation. These guide the majority of our activities and present themselves as pre-conceptual thoughts, almost as instincts in other animals. The second truth, setting limits can facilitate new growth, seems counterintuitive, but, in this context, Bennet asserted that by defining our ideas within a framework, we can conceive of new ideas beyond the framework.
Her slide entitled "path to intelligent behavior" depicts our personal and organizational transition from discriminating thought, which recognizes differences, through several stages to one in which we may possess a broadly focused systematic view of a given topical landscape. She defined knowledge as the "product of learning on the path to intelligence." Cooperation, external sharing, and feedback facilitate this transition and enhance the consciousness of all participants.
A slide presenting DON's IM/IT vision (Knowledge: Example 1) for the future resulted from 6 months of deliberation and discussion by 600 Naval personnel from all levels. An important take-away message from this effort is that an organization cannot be knowledge-centric without first becoming a learning organization.
Although over a year old, the spider diagram addressing enterprise knowledge (Limits: Example 1) depicts the "process for optimizing the effective application of intellectual capital to achieve organizational objectives." In the case of battlespace control, this would result in the right people making the right decisions at the right time.
Four slides address knowledge and KM certification from a US government perspective. The first, Limits: Example 3, presents skill sets appropriate for an individual "certified in KM." From inner to outer rings, the slide depicts the flow of tasks, the collections of people involved, and the tools to do the tasks. Two slides list 14 specific learning objectives.
An extended discussion of multiple perspectives that create a shared reality addressed the various ways we construct reality for ourselves and for our organizations. Even in the left-brain world of a DON populated predominantly by STJs, organizations need to focus on people.
Bennet asks us to better understand how our various perspectives influence "reality." She generously shared excerpts from a discussion of these perspectives (Acrobat Reader required) entitled "Creating Our Reality," from a chapter in her forthcoming book addressing Self as an Agent of Change. We each may identify with one or several of these perspectives, but not with others. No matter which perspective(s) we may use to view and learn from the world, Bennet believes that at some level we also "create the reality" in which we live.
Numerous slides depict DON's view of and approach to KM. Careful perusal of the slides will enhance any viewer's level of understanding. Bennet's last slide presents a fourth "simple truth," one that underlies the concept of KM and of the KM RT: as each of us learns and shares what she learns, we all benefit.
Among other activities at its meeting the week after the May 17 KM RT event, the KM RT Working Group wrote a series of questions to help us determine the State of KM in the Greater Washington DC region. We also thought of a question that we would have liked to ask Ms. Bennet at the meeting at the World Bank. I sent it to here, and she answered it.
Q: In light of all the structural, organizational, and cultural obstacles in organizations such as DON (not even considering gender), why/how are you so successful?
A: First, the need is great. Knowledge is the essence of good decision-making and, inevitably, a determinate of success in warfare. These concepts are fully embedded in our Defense organizations.
Second, the Department of the Navy works in teams and has incredible social capital. When you are out on a ship, that "team" is more of a "community", going even so far as potential life dependency on your other team members. Then, our two and three-year rotations are continuously creating new environments. Where other government, and some industry, organizations may take 20 years to cycle through a new organization, we are recreating our organizations every three years. Social capital is built on relationships, and when men and women are under pressure in any conflict or potential life-threatening situation, they bond quickly and permanently. As our people flow through organizations, whether at sea or on shore, they build large networks of relationships and share personal and professional experiences and thoughts.
Third, the time is ripe. The Internet has changed the world. Everyone has access to everything, and there is an almost exponential increase in the amount of that everything. Add this factor to one and two above, and it is clear that the DON was/is ripe for the kind of change that Knowledge Management represents.
Fourth, leadership. We had an early champion at the highest level of the Fleet organization, PACFLT himself, a four-star Admiral. Simultaneously, other leaders were emerging both in and out of uniform. The importance of leadership can never be underestimated in a military and bureaucratic-based organization.
Fifth, it was not made a mandate, but became important at every level of the organization because it makes sense. So often we take the bureaucratic approach and immediately put money and infrastructure behind it, and, inevitably, try to control it, albeit for good purpose. This approach would never work with KM. Our control is a clear vision, and our connectedness is a connectedness of choices.
Sixth, we have taken a change management distributed implementation approach built on Ross Ashby's concept of requisite variety. That variety includes providing guidance and communicating commitment from the top, providing tools and resources, creating a robust outreach and communications program, a well-supported community of practice, and a rewards and incentives program. This approach reaches across the past and present, and into the future, to tie theory, practice and success.
Please reserve August 16 on your calendars for the next KM RT meeting, which will feature a panel of KM experts addressing the "State of KM."
Special thanks to Lesley Shneier for arranging the meeting at The World Bank,
to Alex Bennet for making her presentation and sharing her writing with us,
and to David Melia for adroitly integrating all the pieces of this report
on ICASIT's website.
Please send comments on this report format, suggestions for improvements to the KM RT, or suggestions for topics, speakers, and venues for future KM RT events to Virgil Frizzell, Senior Consultant for KM for the School of Public Policy's International Center for Applied Studies in Information Technology at George Mason University: vfrizzel@osf1.gmu.edu
Virgil Frizzell, Ph.D., MBA
Senior Consultant for Knowledge Management
International Center for Applied Studies in Information Technology
School of Public Policy, George Mason University
703/883-1821
vfrizzel@osf1.gmu.edu