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Librarians as Knowledge Managers: The View from the Executive Suite

Dave PollardSLA Annual ConferenceJune 6, 2007

dave.pollard@sympatico.ca

Meeting of Minds

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A Tale of Two Executives

D: “We figured that by providing all this Knowledge Management software to our people, we could get rid of the library, and everyone could do their own research online.”

R: “Information Professionals are specialists like everyone else today. It’s insane to have our managers and staff trying, badly, to do research, when IPs have spent their careers learning to do it very well.”

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Dave’s Cultural Anthropology Story

(1) The View from the Executive Suite

“We don’t know how to use this knowledge stuff. And we don’t need it. We’ve already got what we need.”

“Here’s what’s keeping us awake at night:• Mitigating risk• Reducing costs• Increasing value/person• Strengthening key customer relationships Tell us how KM, IPs and librarians can help us with that.”

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Dave’s Cultural Anthropology Story

(2) The View from the Front Lines

“I can’t find anything on my computer.”

“I can search, but I can’t research.”

“Why didn’t anyone show me this before?”

“My task is to assess what all this data means.”

“I don’t need a perfect answer. But I need oneright now.”

“Half of my calls are to ask me if I know about X,or, if not, who does.”

“The things we’re worst at are collaboration andinnovation. Can you help us with that?”

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Dave’s Cultural Anthropology Story

(3) The View from the Customers

“Why isn’t KM enabling our suppliers to reduce the cost of their services?”

“We don’t choose a supplier based on what they know about our business (and we assume they know their business). We choose based on the quality of the relationship we have with our supplier representative.”

“We expect our suppliers to be leveraging best practices and their communities of practice, to improve their services to us and leverage what they all know. Aren’t they?”

Different from what the Executives view.Different from the Front Line’s view. Which group do you want to please?

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The View from the Executive Suite: Panel Results Part 1

Who Owns KM? What’s the IP’s Role?

– No agreement on what it is or if it’s needed– No agreement on who owns it or what it should do– Not sure whether to centralize, decentralize or

outsource ICM– Type D view: It’s everyone’s job. If people can’t do

it themselves, get rid of them– Type R view: The BUs own the content– If librarians are focused on content, they probably

belong in BUs too. Or maybe in R&D? Or marketing?

– If KM is about infrastructure (technology), then IT owns it (they have the budgets)

– If KM is about learning, HR owns it– Librarians are becoming IPs and they have two

roles: research and cataloguing/metadata– Librarians have to specialize or they’ll be

outsourced; if they specialize they could become SMEs

– IPs are increasingly overskilled and underemployed

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The View from the Executive Suite: Panel Results Part 2

Where Does KM Fit? What’s its Mission?

– Still don’t see the benefits: Few senior champions, and disconnect with perceptions of the front lines

– Obsession with risk & cost: Is knowledge-sharing risky? Can KM increase value-based billings? Reduce headcount?

– Don’t care about customers’ unmet needs or innovation or collaboration

– Customers want knowledge delivered on their site, their way, not on Extranet/Internet

– Information we buy is too raw– Information on Intranet is not very useful– Execs still trying to ‘change the culture’ and

processes and expect KM to help– Intrigued by new tech (Facebook, UTube, blogs,

wikis) but don’t get them– Decentralizing (Type R) organizations see the

value in KM that the front lines see, but they are outnumbered by centralizing (Type D) organizations

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Diagnosing Your Organization’s Knowledge Culture

Type D Organizations

Type R

Organizations

What drives decision-making

Short-term profits, risk

Long-term agility, opportunity

How knowledge flows Top-down from ‘leadership’

P2P through collaboration

What knowledge is most valued

‘Best practices’ Stories, ideas, advice

Where power resides In hierarchies In networks

What motivates people

Promotion, raise Personal satisfaction

What management wants from workers

Efficiency Effectiveness

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How Executives See the Role of Information and Information Professionals

Type D Organizations Type R Organizations

(These charts to be re-done to improve legibility)

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acquire

store

disseminateaddvalue

synthesize

connect canvass

apply

Know-whatCollectionContentJust in case

Know-whoConnectionContextJust in time

Librarians are good at this

But can theydo this?

Type R Organizations: The Challenge

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Type D Organizations: The Waiting Game

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A KM Framework & Why It’s Important

• To guide KM activities and provide context for KM projects• To explain the ‘what’ and ‘why’ of KM (over & over, consistently)• To frame elevator pitches

Value Propositions:• Why are we doing this?• What is expected?

KM Services & Products:• Content acquisition & provision• Research, knowledge transfer• Architecture, tools, spaces• Support & Training• etc.

Design & Development Principles• What guides what we do and how we do it?

Outcomes:• How do we measure success?

Customers:• Who are we doing this for?

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Six KM “Quick Win” Ideas

1. Introduce IM2. Introduce Google Desktop and other

PCM tools3. Introduce Desktop Videoconferencing4. Create a JIT Canvassing system5. Improve “Know-Who” Directories6. Introduce RSS Aggregator Pages

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What You Can Do Now: Type R Organizations

1. Quick Wins

2. Cultural Anthropology (study all 3 groups): • current state use of information &

technology• needs• ‘time & motion’ data (see Davenport’s study)• information behaviours (incl. dysfunctional

ones)

3. Experiments: e.g.• personal productivity improvement• proactive research & adding meaning• collaboration• harvesting• stories• mindmaps• social networking tools• ‘wisdom of crowds’ canvassing• thinking customers ahead

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Davenport’s Study of Knowledge Worker Activity Volumes

Workers spend an average every day of:• 3 ¼ hours processing work-related information• Half of that is e-mail (processing and sending

17 e-mails, receiving and processing 44 e-mails, participating in 16 IMs)

• A quarter of that is phone (making 15 calls, receiving 18 calls and 8 voice messages and participating in 1 teleconference)

• Much of the remainder is looking for information

• Multiple, un-integrated tools, not effectively used, not well supported

• Most have poor search, poorer research skills• Work effectiveness tends to be proportional to

time invested in and size of networks• Pilot experiments lack rigour• No ‘end of process’ – yet!

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Dysfunctional Information Behaviours

• (list of 4 categories, 25 total types of dysfunctional information behaviour e.g. bad news never travels up) – this list explains why it’s so difficult to change ‘culture’ in organizations

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What You Can Do Now: Type D Organizations

1. Quick Wins2. Assess the Cost of Not Knowing

(Christensen, risk assessment)3. Competitive Intelligence pilot:

environmental scanning, strategy canvasses etc.

4. Then: skunkworks, vision, learn more about the business, and/or wait

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Now Let’s Brainstorm

• What’s your biggest KM challenge:– Knowing what’s needed?– Finding good models & success stories?– ‘Selling’ investment in KM to

management?• How have you solved these challenges?• Is your organization ready for the

Connect, Canvass, Synthesize, Apply model of KM? Are you?

• What do you need, to be able to persuade your organization to let you add more value to information? To let you become a personal productivity enabler? Do you even want to do this?

• What else can IPs do in Type R organizations? In Type D organizations?

• Tell us your story.