KM: News from the battlefield…
October 20th, 2009
We are at war!
What if KM is not dead but merely mobilizing its troops for battle? And who is this dreaded enemy? The economic downturn? The naysayers of KM? No, the enemy is none other than social media (SM)! Yes, my friends, KM is embroiled in a full-on war, a generational war in which the Boomers battle the Millennials for the future of KM.
What is this war about?
Venkatesh Rao is the perceptive guy who first noticed the war. His full findings can be found in his blog post. Rao believes that we are in the middle of a hidden KM-SM war. The real cause of the war is a generational thing. KM was conceived as a top-down Boomer (b. 1946–1962) management effort, created by this generation just as it was moving into leadership positions. Social media, is a Millennial and Gen Y (b. 1980–) movement. This overall generational and cultural divide has shaped the ongoing corporate cultural war.
Rao goes on to conclude that the war will end when the Boomers retire and the Millenials win by default. KM will quietly die and SM will win the soul of Enterprise 2.0. The new leadership will quietly slip the best of KM ideas into SM without anyone knowing.
What do others think about the war?
David Snowden commented directly to Rao’s blog post noting that Boomers are actually amongst the highest adopters of social computing and that people do not have ideas and attitudes by age group. Andrew McAfee further cautions Rao about ageism in his blog post.
Regardless of whether we believe the so-called “KM-SM war”, it is encouraging to see the significance of the human element in generating a knowledge system that works. Davenport (2005) in his interviews with academics and professionals found that characteristics of a good KM system are ownership of knowledge by users and commitment from the organization to foster knowledge. Technology on its own cannot produce, though it may contribute to, an effective KM system.
While the “KM-SM war” rages on – mind you it seems to be completely undetected by most KM practitioners – there appears to be many organizations which have thankfully found ways to avoid casualties. Lamont (2008) supports the idea that social networking should be added to traditional KM offerings. Moreover, next-generation workers are not only accepting, but demanding increased interactivity. People have a natural tendency to share, but the rigidity of KM systems actually discourages them from doing so. Lamont (2008) goes on to mention several vendors of KM products who have implemented social networking including Vignette, Mzinga and Ektron.
What we can take away
- We are in a battle between KM and SM
- SM is organic and energetic while KM is mechanical and structured
- KM will die a slow death as the Boomers retire and SM will win the war
- Regardless of the war, the human element is becoming an important factor in KM
IMHO, the so-called “KM-SM war” is a great marketing gimmick to bring some much-needed attention to KM. Just as a war typically stimulates the economy and creates jobs, applying the term “war” to KM brings a little excitement to the topic. However, I believe we can combine KM and SM quite effortless and hopefully without any ammunition!
~ Sarah
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Davenport, R. (2005). Why does knowledge management still matter? Training and Development 59(2), 18-25. Retrieved September 26, 2009 from ABI/INFORM Global.
Lamont, J. (2008, June). Social networking: KM and beyond. KM World, 17(6), 12-13. Retrieved September 27, 2009,from Academic Search Complete database.
Rao, V. (20008, September 28). Social media vs. knowledge management: A generational war. Blog post from http://enterprise2blog.com/2008/09/social-media-vs-knowledge-management-a-generational-war/
Replys
The history of KM, brief though it be, is not the practice of KM. The early days starting in 1995 focused on software tools because the advent of sharing information via the Internet was blooming. But most KM practitioners realized very quickly that knowledge sharing was a behaviour not a process (although Davenport and business process people grasp that faint hope) and it is certainly not software. The software quickly failed (hence the death of KM) but not the attention to knowledge sharing behaviour and how to encourage it. Social Media at its worst is intriguing software. At its best, it facilitates conversations. Now where does real good emergent information first appear?
The war analogy is disturbing. I think the divide between KM and SM (not to be confused with sadomasochism) does relate to the generation divide, however that similifies the issues. Rhetoric involved is not simple.
Knowledge Management is an area of study that accredited university programs hire professors to teach to ‘eager’ students, Knowledge Management can and often does entail ‘expert’ research and organization of information packages.
Social Media has opened up the arena so that the dialogue is no longer just one way, however, those involved in Social Media are not and do not claim to be experts – they are often uninformed individuals with opinions. ‘Public Intellectuals’ at best, mis-informed and misguided people at worst.
Citizenship methods of organizing information or professional methods of organizing can be argued using this analogy – we don’t have citizenship dentists or pilots why do we think we can have anyone who is simply interested and has the proper technology be a knowledge management specialist? Who is responsible? Who is accountable?
Interesting topics and I do not claim to have any answers, just lots of questions. However I do fall on the boomers side of the generations so perhaps I am lead astray by my age…..and experience…..and univerisity degrees…..and other groovy stuff!
Hey Neil, I agree — KM quickly figured out that the technology was one small part of the puzzle. What remains unanswered for me is the persistent belief that knowledge can somehow be corralled and manipulated for business purposes — as if it were simply part of business process engineering and could be included in the list of tools alongside computers and networks.
I just don’t see how KM, if it’s not about the technology, isn’t actually more about social networking, communities of practice and complexity theory — which kinda means the trajectory it might have taken has already been taken by other fields and KM is, actually, irrelevant.
Moyra, regarding your comment about “citizen dentists or pilots”, I’m having a tough time drawing a parallel between the management of knowledge and the management of, well, tooth enamel and g-force systems or even on-craft ventilation systems.
This is not meant to be offensive, because I know the idea that a soft skill is anything but a hard skill can be hard to swallow for experts in that soft skill, but knowledge (not encyclopedic facts, maps or reels of film) is inherently social. Created by people. Shared among people. Lives in a people house.
Performing a root canal is not a people thing. It’s not something I could share with you or you or you. It’s not social… hence no citizen dentists… and hence no FindYourHighSchoolRootCanalBuddy.com social site.
…Knowledge itself can be specialized. But the way that knowledge is shared or by whom? Not so. It’s a social thing that dies in isolation. So why can’t the people who have the knowledge share it via social media? To me, social technologies seem like a happy compromise between the people with the knowledge and the CKOs who want to capture it and avoid organizational memory leak. No?
~joanna
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