I really didn't intend to write a series on management skills and popular songs but, after yesterday's reference to "Love the One You're With" by Crosby, Stills & Nash, here we are today with staffing issues again and Paul Simon's classic "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover."* The impetus for the journey from one song... Continue Reading →
Love the One You’re With
Two stories this week from senior managers I know made me think again about the responsibilities of managers with respect to their staff. In the first case, the manager was a senior executive in a financial firm. He said he was struggling with what to do with certain members of his staff who "would never... Continue Reading →
Aspiring to KM Geekdom
While I don't have a snowball's chance in any place warm of ever achieving geekdom, I couldn't resist testing my abilities against Gizmodo's The 50 Skills Every Geek Should Have. I flunked -- but I'm not too worried. In fact, I suspect that I'm in pretty good company.That said, I do sometimes wonder what a... Continue Reading →
Creating a Great KM Department of One
In my earlier post, Is Your KM Department Serving Fish, I asked what a great knowledge management department staffed by only one person would look like. This is not a purely academic exercise. To begin with, every member of your staff has to be willing to step up as if they are the only ones... Continue Reading →
Is Your KM Department Serving Fish?
Have you ever heard an administrator say that their department could fulfill its mission without additions to headcount? Yet in this economy, more and more administrators are going to be told that they must meet their institutional obligations with a smaller staff. Before we let panic overtake us, let's spend a moment thinking about the... Continue Reading →
Ask and You Shall Receive via Enterprise Microblogging
A lot of electronic ink has been spilled on the possibility of adapting microblogging technology for use behind the firewall. As with other social media tools, the ability of many to imagine enterprise uses for microblogging (or microsharing or microlearning) has been constrained by their encounters with the microblogging tools some of us have learned... Continue Reading →
Another Reason to Resist Change
In a recent post in the Forrester blog, Tim Walters discusses some of the reasons why IT (and knowledge management) folks cling to their top-down one-size-fits-all approach and resist the drive to enable personalization of their offerings. He clearly finds this frustrating since, in his view, personalization is now a matter of "Thurvival".** Unfortunately, the... Continue Reading →
When People Care…
...they participate. We've seen extraordinary voter turnout in this election. What caused these voters to break through their apathy and actually participate in record numbers? They cared.There's a lesson here for knowledge management. You don't need incentives. (Not even the free coffee one vendor offered to all voters... and then all customers.) You just need... Continue Reading →
The Mysteries of Human Behavior
Let me introduce you to My Little Pony Scootaloo. According to the manufacturer, "SCOOTALOO pony loves to play games and be outside. She’s always on the go to meet and play outdoors with all her pony friends!" The suggested retail price for this toy is US$4.99.To be honest, My Little Pony is not something I've... Continue Reading →
Go Vote
Unless you've been under a rock these last few months, you'll know that today is Election Day in the United States. Go vote as if your life depended on it. Voter apathy diminishes a country that holds itself out as a defender of democracy.Given the importance of this election, I suspect very little but the... Continue Reading →
Above and Beyond KM 