Leading Issues in Social Knowledge Management by David Gurteen (2012)

Introduction to Leading Issues in Social Knowledge Management

A brief and personal history of Knowledge Management!

In its early days, Knowledge Management (KM) was primarily about capturing all the messy unstructured information in an organization; making it searchable and easily accessible to employees. It’s still what most companies mean when they talk about KM - so much so, that many IT managers think this is all there is to KM.

KM in this techno-centric form grew up with the development of the Internet, organizational intranets and portals and the widespread use of electronic mail, Microsoft Office, corporate search engines and the like. It is fundamentally technology driven; usually by the IT department. It is centrally controlled and top-down in nature.

Techno-centric KM is necessary and useful but is not without its problems. Many early KM systems were designed to capture corporate information by requiring people to enter stuff into databases or to create personal profiles to help people find expertise. But too often employees did not see the value in this and such systems failed.

But meanwhile other organizations were starting to practise a form of KM that relied not on technology but on softer tools that enabled people to share information face to face - tools such as communities of practice, after action reviews, peer assists and knowledge cafes.

This people-centric form of KM evolved in parallel with the techno-centric variety and is more about informal learning, collaboration and inter-personal knowledge sharing. The objective is improved communication, better decision making, greater creativity and innovation where as techno-centric KM is more about efficiency – being able to quickly find the right information when you need it.

Quite separately, while all of this was taking place, social tools were starting to evolve on the web: blogs, wikis; social tagging and the like. These tools are very different to traditional corporate knowledge sharing tools. They were originally not developed by the large software developers such as Microsoft or IBM though that is changing. They are often open source and free or very low cost and they are built around open protocols.

Social tools put knowledge sharing power in the hands of the users themselves – so much so that the term “user” is no longer really appropriate. And it’s this, to a great degree that has accounted for their rapid evolution, uptake and success.

As these new tools took hold, people started to talk about Web 2.0. A new web dominated by social tools and the philosophy that they embedded, turning the web of Web 1.0 from a publishing medium to a two way communication and knowledge sharing medium – the so called “participatory web”.

And now as these tools migrate into organizations people are talking about Enterprise 1.0 and Enterprise 2.0 (E2.0). Enterprise 1.0 is seen as a traditional top down command and control, hierarchical organization built around traditional centralized IT systems while Enterprise 2.0 is a flatter, more fluid networked organization built around social tools.

It wasn’t KM people who drove this development. It wasn’t the traditional KM IT vendors and it wasn’t the KM managers and workers within organizations. It was a bunch of enthusiastic renegades on the web as well as a few corporate renegades who could see where things were heading.

But KM managers, practitioners and others are starting to see the power of social tools within organizations as personal KM tools. And a new view is emerging of KM 2.0 that maps many of the principals of Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0 onto KM.

Clearly though, “2.0” stuff does not replace “1.0” stuff as the suffix might imply: traditional “1.0” thinking and tools run hand in hand with “2.0” stuff. Organizations need both and they are co-evolving.

But the key word in all of this is the word social. Another label for KM 2.0 is “Social KM”. It is an emerging social model of KM. To my mind it is a very powerful model as it clearly places responsibility for knowledge sharing and making knowledge productive in the hands of the individual.

And so in the world of Social KM we have two categories of social tool – soft-tools such as after action reviews and knowledge cafes and techno-tools such as wikis and blogs – an incredibly powerful combination.
1 Making sense of Social Business

In the early days, Social Tools (blogs, wikis and the like) tended to be called Social Networking or Social Computing but as these tools entered the corporate realm, the dominant name became Social Media.

More recently, Social Tools have been adopted widely within organizations and called Enterprise 2.0 to set them apart from their use on the web and the realm of Web 2.0.

Then in 2007, I was one of the first to talk about Social KM – using Social Tools to help manage and share knowledge.

With so many terms, it is all a little confusing: Social Tools, Social Software, Social Computing, Social Networking, Social Media, Social Marketing, Social KM, Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0. To make matters worse, everyone has a different take on what they mean and their meaning is changing over time. To my mind though, this is OK, given the rapid evolution of the tools and their application.

More recently still, people have started to talk about Social Business. So what is Social Business?

Many people think Enterprise 2.0 is only about the technology while others think it is about the technology plus the organizational structures, processes and behaviours that govern their use.

To my mind, Enterprise 2.0 and Social Business are the same though I personally prefer Social Business as a term.

Others, who see Enterprise 2.0 as solely about technology, will probably continue to use both terms to draw a distinction, though I would rather see the E2.0 label dropped and replaced by the term Social Computing or Social Software.

So where does Social KM fit into all of this? Well if Social Business is the umbrella for the use of social tools within an organization then both Social Media and Social KM can be seen as part of Social Business.

In summary taking a simplistic, tools centred view:

• Social Computing or Social Software is the technology.
• Social Tools are both technology tools such as blogs and wikis and soft tools such as after action reviews and knowledge cafes.
• Social Marketing is about using Social Tools for a marketing purpose.
• Social Media is about using Social Tools for a marketing or communication purpose.
• Social Networking is about using Social tools to network.
• Social KM is about using Social Tools for a KM purpose such as knowledge sharing or collaboration.
• Social Business (aka Enterprise 2.0) is all of the above and more. It’s about how social tools are used by a business in its totality.

This is a good start in understanding Social Business but we have to remember that although these have been the drivers, it is not so much about the tools or the technology - it’s about a fundamental shift in how we work. It’s about moving from hierarchies to networks; to a business world where knowledge sharing, collaboration, connectedness and relationships are important and are leveraged towards business objectives. Social Business is more a mindset and an approach to business than it is about technology.

But one final twist.

The term Social Business has an alternative meaning that has been around a little longer than in the Enterprise 2.0 sense.

A Social Business is a non-loss, non-dividend company designed to address a social objective. This use of the term has grown from the work of people: Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank that he founded to provide micro-credit to the poor, would be a prime example of a Social Business. The measure of success of a social business is not profit but the impact that it has on society, on people and on the environment.

We need more social businesses to create a sustainable world. In order to survive, we need to collaborate more, to make better decisions and to be more innovative. This to me is what KM is about and is its future.
We need Social Business in both senses of the term.

The papers selected for this book

In selecting the papers for this book I have chosen ones that in some way research the use of Web 2.0 tools or technologies for knowledge sharing or informal learning within business organizations though one or two are more relevant to educational settings.

I must confess that quite naturally these papers tend to reflect my focus and personal views on Social KM but I hope this helps give some sense of coherence to the subject matter and to the book.

In my brief editorial commentaries I have tried to quite concisely describe the purpose of each paper and to extract one or two key insights that I see as important and to add some personal commentary of my own.

I have enjoyed reading the papers and contributing to the book and would like to congratulate the authors, many of whom I know personally, on some fine work.

Enjoy reading the book and let me leave you with one of my favorite quotes from Plutarch, the Greek historian.

“The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled.”

David Gurteen
Gurteen Knowledge
Fleet, England
May 2012

 
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