Jan 05
Out, Out, Damned Spot
It seems to be standard operating procedure that when people want to escape indictment, they destroy incriminating evidential records. The Nazis did it. The Stasi did it. Enron and its accounting firm Arthur Andersen both did it. Now, it appears that the Bush administration is alleged to be doing it too, before the imminent handover to the next administration (read this New York Times article). What is there to do when attempts at erasing history are being made, especially by those at a very high level?
Jan 05
Knowledge Power and Responsibility: A Conversation with Nancy Dixon
I had the privilege of a wonderful conversation with Nancy Dixon on the sidelines of KM Asia at the end of November (thanks to Ark Group for facilitating this).
We started off by picking up on one of Nancy’s final points in her keynote the day before, that KM has done a lot of work in figuring out how to facilitate lateral knowledge sharing, but that the issue of knowledge movement up and down hierarchies had been sorely neglected. This evolved into an extremely rich dialogue (for me anyway) on the relationship between knowledge, power and responsibility, and some strategies for overcoming some of the barriers to knowledge transfer presented by power and hierarchy. It’s 50 minutes or so, and I’ve done a rough transcript below. Nancy, by the way has started a blog – well worth following!
To download the original video file (mp4 format) try rightclicking here. The original video page is here. To subscribe to my KM videos in iTunes here’s the feed link. And the RSS feed is here.
TRANSCRIPT (timings approximate)
00:00 Nancy talks about how her interest in dialogue and conversation in KM has been influenced by her personal history
05:25 How hierarchy and power prevent knowledge exchange
06:22 Importance of listening skills for good decision making
07:15 Confirmation bias – how managers tend to readily accept information that confirms their judgment, but place a heavy burden of proof on information that disconfirms their judgment.
08:49 Discussion of the Challenger launch decision
10:30 The temptation to simply hand over responsibility for information and knowledge transfer to decision-makers – the need to be able to challenge our superiors skillfully
16:00 Getting through to managers when there is attention poverty
18:10 The need to drive sensemaking downwards in the organisation
20:30 The task of the leader is not to make all the decisions but to convene the conversation to do sensemaking together
23:30 Working top down and bottom up to examine conversation-blocking behaviours
24:30 The dangers of tentative language between subordinates and superiors
27:40 The importance of checking assumptions about what the other person thinks
28:45 Designing the way we organise and use physical space for sharing
33:39 The challenges of getting adoption for these new practices
35:44 The role of the KM professional is to create opportunities for change through skills, design and process
36:24 Patrick and Nancy disagree as to whether the bad habit of inhibiting knowledge flows vertically is a “natural” human thing
39:35 Nancy believes in the human ability to improve and make change in improving knowledge flows vertically, cites the airline industry as an example
40:40 We have the knowledge and skills to make our organisations better at sharing – do we have the will?
42:50 Use of power to convene the sensemaking conversation rather than simply deciding for people
45:15 The temptation to hand over decision making power in a crisis
47:30 We need to have meaningful conversations about responsibility
47:46 Nancy talks about her new book – current working title “Learning in the Moment”
Jan 02
Rumsfeld on Ignorance
Here’s that famous Rumsfeld ignorance quote, found on Youtube thanks to Art Hutchinson. Is that muffled laughter from the press corps in the background as he strives to make his point?
Dec 20
Of Vistas and Subordination
I have spent a wonderful if exhausting week conducting workshops in Athens for a client. Wonderful in two main respects – one was the joy of working with switched-on, interested, critical and learning-hungry participants, who were also just plain nice people. In parallel with that, my hotel is the mountainside St George Lycabettus hotel, with my room (and the rooftop breakfast room) facing southwest towards the bowl of the city and the Acropolis. The view is stunning.
It has also been a strange week. Athens has to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world, not so much because of its urban detail, but in the singularity of how the Acropolis dominates it (seen from my mountainside perch) as it laps against its mountainous bowl by the sea.
Athens was one of the most influential cradles of European civilisation. That ancient past lives on in both civilised and uncivilised ways. Athens still harbours that most ancient form of classical politics, the frenzied mob. Yesterday afternoon during the workshop we contemplated for a while the possibility of having to evacuate our building, when the French Institute just a couple of blocks away was wrecked with sledgehammers and petrol bombed by the anarchists.
The Acropolis itself, the symbol of Athenian grace and memory, also harbours contradictions and ambiguities. You can’t decide when looking at it whether it floats serenely above the city or is locked firmly into its rocky heart, subordinating its surroundings to an anonymous white rash of concrete. My favourite poem from Wallace Stevens comes to mind:
I placed a jar in Tennessee,
And round it was, upon a hill.
It made the slovenly wilderness
Surround that hill.
The wilderness rose up to it,
And sprawled around, no longer wild.
The jar was round upon the ground
And tall and of a port in air.
It took dominion everywhere.
The jar was gray and bare.
It did not give of bird or bush,
Like nothing else in Tennessee.
The Acropolis has held many meanings, from fortified citadel, to religious and political centre, to distant and superior seat of authority and power. In many ways, you might say, the present frustrations in Greece, now finding expression through mob violence, come from a sense of a governmental power that sits aloof and unresponsive above the needs and wants of a stressed populace. Looking out over the city the other day, the silent Acropolis still dominated the cityscape on a beautiful day, the riots that were happening in the city invisible save for the cues given by the waspish, hovering police helicopters.
I find that puzzling and disturbing in many ways, not least because the practice of KM often feels like urban, street-level politics, while its aspirations are lofty, serene and Acropolitan. How do the two levels of activity get resolved into a single identity? For now, however, the temptation of the vista is too strong. It’s a lovely sunny day, I’m going to climb the mountain next to me and see if I can get an even better view.
Dec 19
A Little Information Goes a Long Way
Rayyan Sugangga has reminded me of an incident that took place at the airport in Jakarta a few weeks ago. He and a colleague had arranged to meet me to bring me to my hotel, we had each others’ phone numbers and were coordinating the place to meet by SMS. I got to the designated location and because the signage in the airport is not extremely clear, I checked I was at the right gate with the information desk and at the same time sent an SMS to say I was there.
As I turned around, a man dressed like a porter approached me. “Mr Patrick?” he said. “Yes”, I said. “Follow me” he said, grabbing hold of my case. I was a bit surprised, and asked “Where are my friends? They are meeting me here.” “Stuck in traffic” he said. That made sense, this was Jakarta… so I followed him to a limousine – which I assumed had been booked – but as I did so, sent another SMS to Rayyan to let him know his friend the porter had met me. As I got into the car and gave the man a tip, Rayyan called me. He seemed surprised about the car, and he definitely wasn’t stuck in traffic. He was standing with his colleague very close to where I had been nabbed. So I instructed the driver to drive along the front of the building until we spotted them. As it turned out, neither the porter nor the limousine were part of Rayyan’s plan.
We’d been had – in fact, Rayyan was clearly disturbed that it would have been relatively easy to kidnap me, rob me, or extract money in some other way. All because the porter said my name. How he got my name is anybody’s guess. There is a luggage tag on my case which had my name printed in very small letters, but I defy anyone short of eagle vision to make it out from head height. Perhaps he had overheard Rayyan and his colleague talking about the foreigner they were meeting and did a quick two and two when he saw me nearby. Whatever the case he was extremely entrepreneurial with a little bit of initiative and a very small piece of information, getting a tip from me and probably something from the driver (it was a lot more expensive than a regular taxi) for his pains.
What Rayyan took away from this was the need to be very explicit about the coordination arrangements, and to warn me about the possibility of being deceived. For me, I was more interested in how this fellow had whisked me away from under the noses of the people I was meeting (we knew each other), simply by speaking my name. A little information can go a long way when you are working for yourself in a harsh environment. How come we get so stupid around information when we’re more comfortable and protected?
Dec 18
Looking Beyond Tomorrow
A prescient post from Matt Moore inviting us to look beyond tomorrow’s bad news. That’s challenging, when tomorrow seems to be so bleak, especially for KM. But Matt has words of encouragement:
“The good news: KM really began as a movement after the last major recession (and the BPR-related blood-letting) of the early 90s. Organisations will fire too many people, just as they probably hired too many people in the recent past. They will be awash with ignorance. Fertile territory for those whose job it is reduce the dead weight of ignorance. Hang on.”
I don’t generally consider myself an optimist or a rosy spectacled person when it comes to KM. The urgency of its lack of self esteem is pressing.
But when Matt puts the case like this, I actually think we’re in a better position than we were in the last economic crisis… Yes, trigger happy managers are all too willing to make deep cuts on a mechanistic assumption that organisational life is a matter of scale and numbers, not organic relationships, but this time round there are more leadership teams I think that are wiser to the roles that knowledge, trust, and culture play in being successful. And that might be enough to let those organisations compete/survive visibly better than the autistic amputation enthusiasts. And that might be enough to get KM recognised as a strategic and competitive force. Whether current incarnations of KM deliver to that standard is another question. A tad too many “mights” in that thought for comfort, but it’s worth holding onto.
Dec 15
Called to Account
It is a principle of Open Space Technology meetings that you invite the people you think can make a contribution, in an open and free way, and that “whoever comes is the right people”. Now in most countries, if you invite a VVIP, you’ve got to do it formally, and there’s an elaborate diary-checking pre-dance before you actually issue your formal invitation and get your formal acceptance.
In Iceland, the organisers of a series of citizens’ meetings on their national banking and economic crisis recently issued an open invitation to the entire Icelandic cabinet, something like this:
“Prior to the event, the organizers announced that they would reserve a labelled seat for every member of the cabinet. If they didn’t show up, the seat – with that person’s name in big white letters – would remain glaringly empty. Only one member of the cabinet – Minister for the Environment Þórunn Sveinbjörnsdóttir – confirmed that she would be there. In the end, the PM, the Minister for Foreign Affairs [who is also the leader of the coalition party], the Minister of Education, Science and Culture [who is deputy leader of the Independence Party], the Ministers of Finance, Industry, Communications, Fisheries and Environment were all there, as were several other MPs.” (Get the full report here).
This is clearly pushing the spirit of Open Space, and Iceland is a small country where everyone knows everyone, but it’s an interesting example of public accountability! For a more sanitised version of the event see here. Thanks to Liam for this.
Dec 13
Metascam
I got an email from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon yesterday (he has a by the way). It goes like this:
UNITED NATIONS COMPENSATION UNIT, IN AFFILIATION WITH WORLD BANK.
Attention: Friend,
How are you today? Hope all is well with you and family?, You may not understand why this mail came to you.
We have been having a meeting for the passed 7 months which ended 2 days ago with the then secretary to the UNITED NATIONS. This email is to all the people that have been scammed in any part of the world, the UNITED NATIONS have agreed to compensate them with the sum of US$ 500,000.
This includes every foreign contractors that may have not received their contract sum, and people that have had an unfinished transaction or international businesses that failed due to Government problems etc.
We found your name in our list and that is why we are contacting you, this have been agreed upon and have been signed.
You are advised to contact Dr.S.K Williams of our paying center in Africa, as he is our representative in Nigeria, contact him immediately for your Cheque/ International Bank Draft of USD$500,000. This funds are in a Bank Draft for security purpose ok? so he will send it to you and you can clear it in any bank of your choice.
Therefore, you should send him your full Name and telephone number your correct mailing address where you want him to send the Draft to you. Contact Dr.S.K Williams immediately for your Cheque:
Person to Contact: Dr.S.K Williams
Email:
Phone: +234-8022097627
Thanks and God bless you and your family. Hoping to hear from you as soon as you cash your Bank Draft. Making the world a better place.
Regards,
Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon.
http://www.un.org/sg/
———-
What do you think… should I go for it?
Dec 12
What Can You get a Knowledge Manager for Christmas?
Dec 12
Interesthink 3
I’m speaking at Interesthink 3 tonight, on the topic “Why I work in Knowledge Management” – this is not an easy question to answer sometimes, especially towards the end of the yearly cycle when everyone gets tired and cranky.
It’s a general and very diverse audience, full of idealism (the event models itself after TED). The event itself is now fully subscribed so if you want to get yourself invited to future happenings, you’d better register on the wiki (but videos will be published on the wiki).
According to the programme, I note that I open as first speaker, and the event closes with Tan Puay Hoon of the Public Restroom Association – there is a greater significance to that than you might think (and I’m not being cynical).
