Tuesday 29 December 2015

Top 10 blog posts of 2015

Thank you for your support for this blog in 2015 - here is a review of the year, and our Top 10 posts


Support for this blog has been steady and slightly rising in 2015, despite a couple of periods when I was away with a client, with no Internet access.

 The most popular posts from 2015 are listed below. If you missed any of them, then why not have a look now!

 1. The 5 basic principles of Knowledge Management
Each organisation must find its own solution for Knowledge Management - there is no template, not universal solution that all companies can adopt. However there is a universal set of Knowledge Management principles that every successful Knowledge Management application adopts, and which form the foundation for a successful KM framework. These are discussed and explained in the blog post.

 2. Why you need Knowledge Management governance
There are may examples of organisations with what look like very good Knowledge Management systems which are not being used. What is commonly missing are the elements of governance. If these governance elements are in place, the behaviours will follow, and the culture will develop.

3. How to sustain Knowledge Management
Many Knowledge Management initiatives fail to get going. Others succeed initially, yet fail once the KM implementation team is removed. And yet some are sustained for the long term, with KM becoming "part of the way we work". What do these organisations do differently?

4. The innovation spectrum
Innovating and Knowledge Re-using form part of a spectrum. Each behaviour has it's place. Either behaviour is counter-productive in the wrong context.

5. How is Knowledge Management defined?
During a spare few hours in Glasgow Airport I went through several hundred KM definitions looking for keywords. The results and analysis are discussed in this blog post. .

6. Should KM change the culture, or work with the culture?
If the culture of your organisation makes Knowledge Management difficult, what do you do? Seek to change the culture? Or work within the different existing cultural elements?

7. Knowledge transfer - the wrong metaphor? 
Knowledge transfer, when illustrated graphically, is often shown as knowledge leaving one head and entering another. This model is wrong - Knowledge is more often co-created than it is transferred in a one-way direction.

8. The cost of lost knowledge
One the enduring challenges in Knowledge Management is defining effective metrics to measure its value. A promising metric which may fill the gap is the Lost Knowledge Frequency (LKF) and it's partner the Cost of Lost Knowledge.

9. Knowledge mismanagement
There is a school of thought that every organisation does knowledge management, usually without realising it. This is not correct - many organisations practice knowledge mismanagement.

10. Who are the knowledge workers?
They are the decision makers. These are people who need to use knowledge and judgement in order to do their work. The better the knowledge we can supply them with, the better the judgements they will make.

 In addition - 

The most visited post this year was an old post from 2009 entitled "What is a Lesson learned", which has had nearly 34,000 pageviews to date.

The 2015 post with the most "+1"s was one on the topic of No-blame processes in KM

The 2015 post which received the most comments, was the post mentioned above on Knowledge mismanagement

3 comments:

Lisandro Gaertner said...

Nick,

I would like to thank you for your blog. In a very rough year in Brazil, when we lost almost 90% of our KM team due to the economic crisis, you have been a great interlocutor and a reminder why we must persevere in our KM mission. As C.S. Lewis said:"We read to know we are not alone".

Thank you very much for the company!

A happy and better 2016 to us all!

Hendri Ma'ruf said...

Two thumbs up for you, Nick Milton, and your KM blog posts. I agree with Rose Atkinson (FIC) on LinkedIn that they're a great resource. The posts are down to earth, yet not missing the system approach.

Nick Milton said...

Pleased to be of service!

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