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KM, CKO, and CKM: Keys to Competitive Advantage

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CIOL Bureau
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Knowledge

Management Saves Lives!

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The

following story appears in Working Knowledge
by Tom

Davenport and Larry Prusak:
In 1996, teams

of leading heart surgeons from
five New

England medical centers observed one
another's

operating-room practices and
exchanged ideas

about their most effective techniques
in a

collaborative learning experiment.
The

result: a 24 percent drop in their overall
mortality

rate for coronary bypass surgery, or 74
fewer

deaths than predicted.

This story

highlights the use of several knowledge
management

concepts: knowledge sharing, trust, and
the use of

best practices to achieve the ultimate return
on

investment-saving lives. In addition, the use of
knowledge

management initiatives increased the surgeons' market share by giving them a

competitive
advantage over surgeons with a higher

mortality rate.






Knowledge management initiatives can bring that
competitive

advantage to your organization.

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What Is Knowledge

Management?

Knowledge

management is a misnomer. A working
definition of

"knowledge" is: understanding gained
from

experience. Most knowledge is tacit, in people's
heads.

Consequently, most knowledge cannot be managed.
What

can be managed are an organization's
knowledge

processes. Knowledge processes are
embedded

throughout the enterprise (e.g., strategic
planning,

decision making, marketing, hiring personnel).

Every person

in an enterprise participates in
knowledge

processes. Knowledge managers help the
organization

improve the effectiveness of their knowledge
processes.

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Several

professionals, under the sponsorship of
Knowledge

Management Consortium International,
developed the

following three-phase Knowledge Ltd.

1. Acquire

information and unverified knowledge.

2. Produce new,

validated knowledge from the

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acquired information

and unverified knowledge.

3. Integrate the new

knowledge into the organizationfor improved effectiveness.

Understanding

and optimizing these
KM processes can give your

organization a competitive advantage regardless

of your market segment.

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Innovation,

which comes from the creation of new
knowledge, is

the most important knowledge process
for achieving

competitive advantage. To gain maximum
benefit from

the new knowledge, it must be integrated
into the

organization. The knowledge life cycle is continuous.Understanding

and optimizing these KM
processes can give

your organization a competitive
advantage

regardless of your market segment.

The Need for

Knowledge Management Now!

As businesses

continue to forge ahead in the twenty-first
century,

knowledge management has materialized
as

the only real differentiator.
. According to Larry


Prusak, the executive director of the IBM Institute for

Knowledge Management," In

the emerging economy, a
firm's only

advantage is its ability to leverage and utilize
its

knowledge."

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To accomplish

the knowledge production and integration
processes,

an organization needs to foster collaboration
among

all individuals and to codify the resulting
insights

in knowledge base repositories for self
-service


access by others. This

will enable knowledge
management to reach

its goal of facilitating the delivery
of the best

knowledge to the right person at just
the right

time. With this knowledge, people are
empowered to

effectively solve problems, make decisions,
respond

to customer queries, and create new
products and

services tailored to the needs of clients.

Many

organizations have named a chief knowledge
officer

(CKO) as the executive responsible to make all
of

this happen.

With this

knowledge, people are empowered to effectively solve


problems, make decisions, respond to customer

queries, and create new
products and services

tailored to the
needs of clients.

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- selling

knowledge management to senior managers
and

creating a shared vision

- getting buy-in

from competing initiatives and
advocates

- mentoring

knowledge management initiative leaders

- managing

multiple projects, vendors, and consultants

- delivering

measurable knowledge management

benefits that

significantly contribute to the success
of

the enterprise

The CKO's primary

activities should span the
"metaprise"

(the enterprise and its entire ecosystem
which

includes customers, prospects, suppliers, other
strategic

alliance partners, stockholders, governing
board

of directors, and competitors). To be most effective,
the

CKO needs to be a member of the senior
management

team and should report directly to the
CEO.

The CKO's direct reports could be structured
through

a matrix or as a dedicated knowledge management
organization.

For proven success, multiple
project

teams report to the CKO and team leaders
need

to be accountable to the CKO for the duration
of

their specific projects.

The CKO has a very

complex mission and needs to be
very

learned in his or her profession.To get the
knowledge

required for mission success, CKOs have
many

options available: They can take university
courses,

read any of the hundreds of knowledge management
books

on the market, or use trial and error.

They can also take

the Certified Knowledge Manager
(CKM)

program which combines the best of the
above

options into a one-week workshop and follow-up
practicum.

The Certified

Knowledge Manager

Knowledge management success

requires a holistic approach, and the most effective leader will possess solid

technical, business, and social skills. The CKO is someone who could lead an

enterprisewide knowledge management program. Included in the CKO's

The certified knowledge manager

program prepares its CKM candidates for knowledge management leadership and

emphasizes the role of the CKO.This program exceeds the competencies identified

by extensive U.S. government-funded research to be the critical standards for

successful knowledge management.

Source: John

M. Leitch, Philip W. Rosen in
Providersedge







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