The Knowledge ManagementInfrastructure

Prof.E.Vandijck

“ If we only knew what we know at TI “

Jerry Junkins

Former chairman ,

President and CEO of TI

Knowledge

Knowledge is a broader and more difficult to define concept than information.

We obtain knowledge when the information is also interpreted and therefore made usable. We get knowledge by creating associations and by earning insight.

The Pyramid

Data

Information

Knowledge

Wisdom

Types of Knowledge

We can distinguish between two major types of knowledge

Tacit Knowledge

Explicit Knowledge

Tacit Knowledge

Tacit knowledge: resides in someone´s head, it does not exist in explicit form and is not easily transferred to others.UndocumentedIn people´s headsA source of explicit knowledge

The highest-value knowledge is that held by employeesExperienceInsightexpertise

Explicit Knowledge Explicit knowledge is stored in digitized form so that it can

be viewed, read, used and applied.

StructuredBooks, reportsDatabasesDrawingsMethodologiesTrend analysis

Unstructured IllustrationsArticlesE-mails, news

More directly usable

Forms of Knowledge Conversion

Tacit knowledge Explicit knowledge

TacitKnowledge

ExplicitKnowledge

Socialization Externalization

Internalization Combination

Externalization of Tacit Knowledge

Best for:

Advantage:

Limits:

Examples:

Capture and Codify Knowledge

Multiple,

Repeatable solutions

Sharable by many

Major conversion and maintenance

Supply chain mngt

SAP install

Provide guide to experts

Innovative

Unique solutions

Low KM solution cost

Demand on availability of experts

Investment banking

Strategic consulting

Source: Gartner group

Benefits of Explicit Knowledge

Payoff:

Internal

Sources:

External

Sources:

New Intelligence

Discover trends

Anticipate

Improve strategic action

Employees, product, service and customer analysis

E-commerce feedback

New feeds

Internet research

Asset Management

Reuse elements

Protect from loss

Key employees

Critical databases

Critical business processes

Market analysis

Internet research

Source: Gartner group

Benefits of Tacit Plus Explicit Knowledge

Solution supportApplying pragmatic experience to replicate decision

making for complex problems

ExamplesComplex contracts or decisionsDiagnosis and treatment in healtcareBuilding direct-marketing campaigns

PayoffImprove process and service performanceBest practices databases

Knowledge Management

What is Knowledge Management ?

Knowledge management is notThe implementation of a technology

Knowledge management isa multidisciplinary approach that integrates

• Business strategy

• Cultural values

• Work processes

Good technological support is crucial, but is not enough to create a good knowledge environment.

Knowledge Management

The broad process of identifying, capturing, organizing, transferring and using knowledge .

Knowledge management promotes collaborative approach and group work.

Framework:

LeadershipOrganizational

Knowledge

AdaptApply

Create

Identify

CollectOrganize

Share

Leadership

Measurement Culture

Technology

Process

Enablers

Source: American Productivity & Quality Center - Carla O’Dell, C.Jackson Grayson

Facts

Enterprise invested in KM-relevant technologyIntranetsGroupwareData warehousesData mining

Enterprises forgot the non-technical workAligning knowledge to business goalsMapping knowledge contentCreating networks of knowledge usersChanging culture and defining KM role

Business Benefits of KM

KM generates economic and business benifits by:

Providing broad and easy access to enterprise knowledge

Leveraging knowledge trough improved collaboration processes and technologies

Integrating KM into work tasks and processes of employees

Stimulating innovation and the creation of new knowledge

Gartner group study showed that 60% of knowledge management programs resulted in success

Aspects of Knowledge Management

Knowledge discoveryGenerating knowledge from data

Knowledge representationHuman-readable knowledgeMachine-readable knowledgeOntologies (study of being, general properties)

Knowledge filtering Knowledge searching

Search engines Intelligent agentsVisualization models

Within the Company

Companies try to manage and use this knowledge in a more systematic way.

Required actions.

define which knowledge is required in order to define and execute the strategic business plan;

organizations must implement a system that assures a continuous flow from the members of the organization, the knowledge workers, towards the infrastructure that supports the knowledge management;

there has to be an integration of the strategy, the processes, the cultural and technical aspects of knowledge management .

Setup of an Enterprise Knowledge Architecture.

 .

KM Success Is Focused on the Business

Do firstDetermine role of knowledge in achieving company goalsSelect mission-critical business areas for high KM impactKnowledge-enable key processes and decision makingTry to make the link between improved knowledge and

business resultsStart small projects within the business culture

Do thenEncyclopedia of R&D or operations knowledgeKnow-how of departing expertsCapture tacit knowledge in explicit form

Business Architecture

Knowledge Architecture

Information Architecture

Data Architecture

IT Architecture

EnterpriseArchitecture

The Enterprise Architecture

The IT architecture: basis for the other components.Hardware.Network and communication environment.The system management tools.The middleware and the basic software.

The data architecture.How data will be collected, stored and distributed.Those data are raw data in an updateable form,

needed for later interpretation and usage.Important aspects here are reliability, integrity and

security.

The Enterprise Architecture

In the information architecture: basis and the guideline for the ICT-management.The ICT-strategy of the enterprise is captured. It is the translation of the enterprise business strategy into

high-level information needs.A set of applications that are build to fulfil business needs.

The knowledge architecture.How and where the organization creates and distributes

knowledge in all the forms. The business architecture.

The way the enterprise planned to achieve its business strategy.

This strategy includes goals and objectives, seen in the context of the environment of stakeholders, employees, competitors and other internal and external factors.

KnowledgeArchitecture

KnowledgeManagement Infrastructure

Gathering. Document management. Office systems. Data entry.

Dissemination. Email, voice mail, … Web. Inquiry systems. Data warehouse, data mart.

Networks. Lan, wan, Internet, intranet, extranet.

Storage. Databases, files, ... Meta data, dictionaries, …

Groupware. Collaboration tools. Conferencing tools.

Analysis. Data mining. OLAP. Visualization.

•extract•combine•transform•derive•analyze•present

Data Layer

Metadata- Data Structure - Taxonomy- Data Content - Knowledge maps

- Thesaurus

Data Sources

•Groupware repository

•Document management

• Intranets

• File servers

•WWW

• …

Data Types

• Relational databases

• Text files

• Audio/video

• Web pages

• E-mails

• …

Data Formats

• XML

• HTML

• ASCII

• GIF

• MPEG

• …

Portals

Provide a window into information, systems and processes of an organization

Portals are essential to support KM Enterprise portals

Personal portals

A portal provides a uniform access to Documents (unstructured data)

Databases (structured data)

Applications

…

Based on a knowledge map, repositories and indexes Build-in filtering mechanisme To be combined with  Push Technology

The Knowledge Framework in Practice

The components of a technologic

knowledge architecture

Knowledge repositories and libraries

Knowledge carthography

Communities of knowledge workers

The Knowledge Flow

Knowledge-repositories

andLibraries

Knowledge Carthography

Communitiesof

knowledge-workers

TheKnowledge

Flow

Source:Borghoff 1998

Organizing available Explicit knowledgee.g. case based reasoning

Also tacit knowledge of specific experts

Meta-knowledge.Map of knowledgedomains

Technological applications for exchanging tacitknowledge

Technology that supportsconversion from tacit to explicit knowledge and the other way around

Explicit Knowledge in Document Format

Documents is a traditional method for the codification of knowledge

Better usage of already available documents On-line document databases

Lessons-learned archivesBest practices databases

Document knowledge bases for knowledge domains without unique answers

Development of a knowledge repository

Setup of a Knowledge Repository

What documents are we going to store, and why?

Manuals to support maintenance

Client documentation for marketing

…

Avoid overload

Selection based on predefined criteria

Alternatives

Special task to select documents

Everybody can add documents

Organizing Documents

Values in an index or meta-knowledge Attributes of a knowledge document

Activities

Keywords

Type of document

Product or service

Authority (owner, usability, quality, …) of the knowledge

Time and validity period

The Knowledge Flow

Support the knowledge flow is the basic goal of knowledge management.

It is the central component in the framework, and the the link between the three other components.

It stimulates the interaction between:The tacit knowledge generated and exchanged between the

community of the knowledge workers;The explicit knowledge in the knowledge repositories;The explicit meta-knowledge used as the corporate knowledge

map.

The basis for the technological structure.

are the itelligent agents.

Intelligent Agents

Intelligent agents:perform tasks on behalf of something else like e.g. a person, a

system or a business proces;. it is a small computerprogram that can perform tasks on his

own, including take some decissions;an agent can react on events; it can contain simple rules or it can be based on more complex

techniques like neural networks; they run in background, often without being seen by the users.

Useful in two of the components of the framework: in knowledge repositories; in knowledge carthography.

Intelligent Agents in Knowledge Repositories

Personal agentsTo master information overload;To switch from pull to push mode;Personalized content filtering;User profile, based on a personal thesaurus and

intelligent search algorithms;

Technical agentsAutomatic document indexing;Important in case-based reasoning systems;

Intelligent Agents in Communities of Knowledge Workers

Personal agentsResponsible for activity planning (workflow environments); Interaction with actor agents that define the role of the worker in

the business process;

A workflow agent tries to find a personal agent that can perform a certain task;Asks the personal agent whether this task fits in planning of the

specific knowledge worker;

A deliberation agent will check the requests against the availability of the personal

agents;An instance of the actor, containing the goals and activities of

the task, is added to the personal agents.

Integration of the Components Using Intelligent Agents

Knowledge repositories

• Technical agent (e.g.indexing)

•Personal agents

Explicit Explicit

Knowledge Workers

• Technical agent (e.g.workflow agent)

•Personal agents

Tacit Tacit

Knowledge carthography• Agents / Profiles

Definition•Personal agents•Communities•Processes

1. Add explicit knowledge

2. Inquiry for explicit knowledge

4. Input for profiles of people and communities

6. Input for profiles of people, communities and processes

3. Inquiry for profiles of people and communities

5. Inquiry for profiles of people, communities and processes

Dynamic adaption and creation

Building the Environment

Decision Framework for KM-project

Identify Key Values

Source: Gartner Group

Evaluate EnterpriseStrategy/direction for KM« Values »• Business model• Service goals

• Identify business goals for KM• Select a knowledge recovery strategy• Evaluate potential for Cultural

and business shift• Evaluate potential benefits

• Set performance measures• Determine cost and other

resources for KM• Ensure business unit support

and funding

Analyse Benefits/measures

Define KM strategy

•Explicit knowledge apps.•Tacit knowledge apps.•Combined apps.•Set performance goals

Set KM performance goals

Critical Success Factors

KM strategyMission, goals, vision, alternatives, responsibilities, …

ResourcesBudget for staff, development, …

TechnologyNetwork, user delivery, tools, maintenance, storage

MotivationFor sharing knowledge

Promotion and Training

Cultural Success Factors

Combine value contributed by individual with value of contributions by groups.

Face-to-face meetings are still required to bring contributers together.

Consistent terminology and models are critical.

Communities of practice and experience on processes and knowledge.

Cultural change is required.

Citation Citation

There is nothing more difficult to plan ,

more doubtful of success,

nor more dangerous to manage

than the creation of a new system.

For the initiator has the enmity of all who

would profit by the preservation of the old

system and merely lukewarm defenders in

those who would gain by the new one.

Machiavelli, 1513

Computer Technologies for KM

Groupware: mail, Lotus Notes, Intranet,Chat boxes, …

Multimedia, video, … Documentation systems and XML Expert systems Artificial Intelligence systems Data Warehousing, OLAP, data mining, statistics Search engins, encyclopedia, in-text search Case-based reasoning Agents Computer based training

Mentioned reasons for KM

In decreasing order of importance: Integrate multiple sources of data Marketing and sales Growth and innovation Business process inprovement People orientation Service improvement IT orientation Information Management orientation Cost savings

Source: Gartner group

Think about this !

Knowledge management technologydoes not equal

Knowledge management

for the same reason that

an exercise machinedoes not equal

exercise