Beyond knowledge management to better management
Sometimes we just want someone to tell us what needs to be done and how to do it. For those moments, there are hundreds of "how-to" books that purport to tell us how to "do" knowledge management -- beginner's guides, dummies' guides, idiot guides, lazy person's guides, etc. They are in the bookstores and their... Continue Reading →
In a prior post I talked about how to sort out priorities for your knowledge management department by imagining what you would choose to focus on if you were trying to do it all by yourself. Now, here's a tougher thought experiment: What if your law firm believes that in the short term it cannot... Continue Reading →
Do we really have as much control over our KM department priorities as we'd like to think we have? I asked variants of this question during a follow-up conversation based on my prior post, What's Your KM Priority? In the course of this second conversation, we took a look at how our various law firms... Continue Reading →
A friend at another firm e-mailed me today thanking me for my earlier post, What's Your KM Priority? In her e-mail she said, To me KM has to be `strategic' to avoid being depressing. On this gray, rainy day in New York City, I know exactly what she means. The purpose of strategy is to... Continue Reading →
When I was a child we occasionally were allowed to watch a TV game show called "What's My Line?" The object of the game was for the panelists to guess the occupation of the contestant by asking a series of Yes/No questions. Wikipedia's summary of the game includes the following observations: The panel usually adopted... Continue Reading →
The historic battles between Athens and Sparta or between the Hatfields and the McCoys are nothing compared to the battle royal fought daily by parents determined to make their children eat their vegetables. After years of alternating between cajoling and threatening our children, we now learn that the right thing to do is to try... Continue Reading →
Are you ready to walk away from your major line of business? If not, you may be turning away a new, more profitable line of business. Or, you may find you're soon out of business altogether. Not convinced? Well then, spend a little while with Xerox. When you hear the word Xerox, you tend to... Continue Reading →
Apparently almost anything can be downsized, including a traditional New Orleans Mardi Gras parade float. Thanks to "Mardi Gras Floats for Dummies," you can find directions on how to scale down your ambitions from a typical float (which can exceed 50 feet in length) to a Radio Flyer wagon or even a shoebox. The instructions... Continue Reading →
Seth Godin recently wrote about Derek Sivers (founder of CDBaby), who built his company with one thought in mind: "What could I build that would be like a dream come true for independent musicians?" The post ends with the following provocative statements: If your business is a dream come true for customers, you win. Game... Continue Reading →
At a recent gathering of senior law firm knowledge management experts, an attendee asked two provocative questions: If all the knowledge management personnel in your firm were to fall off the face of the earth today, would it result in a decline in firm profits? And, if what we are doing does not have an... Continue Reading →
Above and Beyond KM 