Comments on: Valuing Knowledge Networks

By: Mike L.

Mike L. — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 08:16:59 +0000

And there is also the “invisible college” of expertise outside the corporation, which does not appear on the organization chart. For specialists within a corporation this can be the most valuable source of collective information. Specialists tend to have a “don’t ask the boss, don’t tell the boss” perspective on supposed company secrets, because otherwise they cannot obtain the information they need from their “invisible college”.

By: Scott

Scott — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 05:11:41 +0000

Badly

By: Wendy Waters

Wendy Waters — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 04:10:31 +0000

Jarie — thanks for sharing your company’s approach. Seeing managers as the enablers is probably a key breakthrough companies need to make in the knowledge era.

Indeed, its when managers are not “enabling” but constricting that you likely get Troy’s observation of the frustrations that can exist.

By: Troy Camplin, Ph.D.

Troy Camplin, Ph.D. — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 19:16:27 +0000

I”m not surprised it flows in a bottom-up spontaneous order network and that bottlenecks occur near the top. This is what those of us who understand systems have known for a while. Unfortunately, nobody seems to listen to us, and top-down approaches dominate.

By: Jarie Bolander

Jarie Bolander — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 15:50:07 +0000

It starts with an open office environment. No one in my department has an office and no one ever will. We like to be able to see each other and interact uninhibited. This allows the free flow of ideas. There have been countless times where an overheard dialog about a problem solved it quickly because someone else had resolved the same issue.

We also empower our staff to get their job done how they see fit. Management’s sole job is to make the staff successful. Anything we can do to remove barriers, we do. It that kind of environment, no one is afraid to ask a question or mess up. Making mistakes is part of creating innovative products. By making and learning from mistakes, we make better products.

Wiki type infrastructure is also a must. We use Trac to collect our tribal knowledge so that we don’t make the same mistakes twice.