Mopsos

I like the idea that Knowledge Management is really about Knowledge Conscious Management, or to put it differently, Managing in the Knowledge Age as Professor Klaus North puts it. Incidentally, this explains why it is so difficult to introduce in 20th century organizations, which do not recognize mastery of knowledge flows as a source of competitive advantage.

The HR department of my company asked me to write a short memo and call it "the ten commandments of knowledge management". I thought it was a good idea -KM is a faith with its manifesto (e.g Cluetrain)-, but couldn't find enough time to reduce everything to ten commandments, and I have eighteen!

Let me know your thoughts...

1. Don't always challenge. Welcome one another's thoughts and opinions.
Rehabiliate casual conversations and information sharing as a normal business practice that should take at least half of your time. Don't expect to learn a lot just by challenging your staff.

2. Experiment constantly. Enlightened trial and error outperforms the planning of flawless intellects
You can, and must, plan ahead to know where you want to go, but then put the plan aside and focus on the first steps. Regularly stop to reflect on the action and repeat the process.

3. Release the need to be right. It's OK to make mistakes as long as you learn from them
If you punish failure, you destroy entrepreneurship, stiffle innovation and in the end you harm the company. If you "forgive and forget" because you want to be nice, that same mistake will be repeated twice or a hundred times. You must accept failure as normal, but demand that lessons be learned and communicated for the entire organization.

4. Know by doing, so that there is no gap between what you know and what you do
The first responsibility of a manager is not to manage people and budgets but to have a hands-on practice of his/her mission. It is all right to give assignments to people who have never done it before, but in that case it is your responsibility as a manager to provide them with a network of expert advisors whom you trust. Legitimacy lies in competence as much as position in the org chart. Position without competence results in disaster. Competence without position results in helplessness.

5. What you know does matters, but who you know and who knows you matter even more.
The Rolodex of a staff manager is his most precious asset. The personal network of a corporate staff manager of our company should be over 500 people in various organizations, with an inner circle of over 50 people of trusted colleagues, coaches, mentors and advisors. He/she should meet at least 10 new people each month. Acknowledge that it takes time, effort and travel money.

6. Don't refer to internal organizations. Talk about specific people.
Referring to other organizations of the company as "them" is laying the ground for future excuses about the lack of results. Organizations cannot be trusted, because they are impersonal, complex, and change every 24 months anyway. People and communities however are far more resilient and trustworthy.

7. Consider internal client-supplier relationships as the worst possible form of internal collaboration
A client-supplier relationship in a monopolistic environment is the epitome of bureaucracy. It damages the social capital of the company and paralyzes its ability to solve problems for the customer.

8. Before deciding on a plan, always ask with whom the plan was discussed.
Reject all proposals and action plans bearing only the signatures of your staff. The value-add of a corporate manager is not to come up with bright ideas, but with ideas shared with other stakeholders.

9. Involve people collectively in your thinking
Using managerial authority to deploy programs and plans from the top-down generates compliance at best, but never commitment. If you want people to adopt your views and act accordingly, you must engage into meaningful conversations with them, and not "cascade down" or "communicate messages". Think about your teenage children if you have any.

10. Management is not so much about delegating to individuals than about organizing and empowering groups.
Effective action ("execution") in a big organization is all about coordination and synchronization. Speed of execution is best achieved by self-synchronization of competent people who understand and trust each other. The first job of a manager is to detect who these people are and make sure they work together in the right setting (working group, project team, community of practice...)
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11. It's not about giving objectives. It's about making sure they understand your intent
If they really understand your goals and if it makes sense to them, they will figure out what to do by themselves. Don't delude yourself however: It is by far more difficult to articulate a clear intent than to give objectives.

12. Never give targets without negotiating them first.
Giving quantitative targets without negotiating them with those responsible for making it happen is bad management.

13. Deliver high quality information and develop shared situation awareness
Don't hoard information from your staff. Let them know what you know, give them access to every document you have, unless it is explicitely confidential and for good reasons. Let them sort out the information overload. There are tools for that. Don't work on a "need to know" basis.

14. Balance planning for the future with learning from the past
Balance market studies, action plans, specifications etc. with case studies, lessons learned, good practices. Spend half of your time reflecting on past experiences. Commitment to the past reaffirms the company’s identity and culture.

15. Don't promote people that sound smart, but those who make sure that smart things happen.
"It is the promotion process, stupid!" Be convinced that the company's promotion process is the primary driver of employees' attitudes.

16. Don't expect dedication from someone who fears for his job
All efforts are stalled by the fear of job loss. If you need to fire people, do it at lightning speed, and make sure it appears to all as an exceptional event. Don't suscribe to the deadly spiral of cost cutting.

17. Never manipulate your staff.
Employees are hypersensitive to inconsistencies and incoherences across organizations. They immediately detect every single sign of manipulation when they hear conflicting messages. Establish trusted relations with your peers first. Trust is the bandwidth of communication

18. Get yourself a technology coach
Communication and collaboration technologies are dramatically changing. E-mail is dying. Those who oversee this will be left aside of the most important knowledge exchanges of the planet.

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