The challenge: appoint twelve "Knowledge Stewards" in an organization of two hundred knowledge workers in three global locations. The project team used the organizational survey tool KNETMAP^TM to identify peer-evaluated experts in four functional domains. The reaction from the Project Team after seeing the results from InFlow^TM: "The ten "hubs" for each category identified additional individuals that we had originally overlooked for the new positions."
"The KNETMAP^TM results greatly expanded our horizon of visibility. Our initial choices were limited to our own relatively closed network."
Result: the project team modified their original short list of twelve and expanded the list to include the newly identified KNETMAP^TM "hubs" and "authorities".

A 60-year global manufacturer of fluid engineered products with 450 employees based in Canada, the US and the UK undertook to implement a sophisticated document management system in the year 2001. The system was envisioned to serve as both a document repository and knowledge management system.

After company-wide training on the system was completed, it became obvious that a new role for champions had to be created within the organization, namely that of knowledge steward, the "agent of value creation". Knowledge stewards were described as "lifelong learners who have the ability to communicate well with colleagues and promote the ideas of peers and subordinates with attribution". A knowledge steward would, in short, champion knowledge-sharing culture and the creation and reuse of knowledge artifacts. The project team made a short list of candidates, but took up the suggestion of one of the team members that the formal choices be confirmed by the new organizational network surveying instrument called KNETMAP^TM.

KNETMAP^TM gathers data through a single question delivered weekly via the corporate email system to all employees. The information gathering process is simple and takes less than a minute to complete. The recipient answers the question by clicking on a hyperlink embedded in the email, which leads to a web page that allows them to quickly answer the question by selecting names. The project team decided to trial KNETMAP^TM to confirm its knowledge steward choices in four key categories: order fulfillment, product development (innovation); supplier relationships, and knowledge artifacts. It was expected that results would confirm the original choices and might even identify key individuals ("hubs") who may have been overlooked in the initial discussions.

The following four questions were posed in December 2001 to 250 employees:

1) From whom would you seek advice or with whom would you brainstorm regarding opportunities to improve our relationships with our suppliers. Please select two or three people you might personally approach.
(Supplier network)

2) From whom would you seek advice or with whom would you brainstorm regarding improvements to the order fulfillment process. Please select two or three people you might personally approach.
(Order fulfillment network)

3) From whom would you seek advice or with whom would you brainstorm regarding a new innovation or an idea of yours for product development. Please select two or three people you might personally approach.
(Innovation network)

4) To whom would you go for advice on where to file your documents, drawings, etc. so that others could easily find them (without having to ask you).
(Knowledge Artifact network)

The results confirmed the implementation team’s initial choices and yielded some surprises, as some prominent "hubs" became evident. Other revelations included disconnected clusters and isolated employees.

When the node data was imported into InFlow^TM, the project team received a list of the "top ten" hubs for each network with the corresponding InFlow^TM metric for "Reach".

Reaction from Participants
Quote from one of the organization's IT suppliers, who participated in the survey: "It is very interesting to know if we are talking to the right people when implementing a solution. So much of what we do is trying to unleash the best ideas. When I saw at an early stage names I have never recognized in the innovation network, I suddenly wondered if we were talking to the right people. We could use this information to identify key resources in the design phase in a lot of our projects. I'm sure it’s something almost all companies should use."

"These invisible networks, finally made visible through the maps generated by Question of the Week^TM, showed us how individuals contribute directly to the conductivity of our organization," said the CEO. "Conductivity has a special meaning for me as an engineer. It means ‘to conduct, to lead'" it also means to convey and transmit... and to serve as a channel. Conduction is also about the transmission of energy from particle to particle. This is very much in line with what a conductive organizational network should be."

Next steps
Approach the KNETMAP^TM identified subject matter experts and invite them to populate the system with knowledge artifacts so that a KNETMAP^TM view of knowledge artifacts can be used as a business indicator. Knowledge artifacts can be tracked for reuse via the KNETMAP^TM system.

The long-term benefits that the firm hopes to see are improved knowledge assets reuse -- a corporate strategic imperative. Such a move will contribute positively towards the firm’s efforts to mitigate knowledge loss.

KNETMAP^TM Identifies key stakeholders (internal & external) in innovation i.e. "Leaders of Innovation", thereby unleashing existing capability and creativity in the development of new competitive products for the financial services industry

The challenge: leverage employee and supplier knowledge of customer and market trends to create highly profitable products that address customer needs and transform the organization into a market leader

Background:

Companies must bring new and profitable services and products to the market more quickly than their competitors in order to survive in the global marketplace. Unfortunately, customer expectations of quality, service and response time have risen exponentially while organization capability increases linearly. Many companies attempt to bridge this gap by increasing capacity through acquisition- often at the expense of shareholder value. The alternative is to be an industry leader by powerfully leveraging employee and supplier knowledge of customer and market trends.

When managed as a strategic capability, corporate knowledge has proven to improve productivity, organizational effectiveness and innovative capacity. All managers in an organization should care about corporate knowledge and embrace a leadership role in its management. All employees in an organization should be cognizant of their role in contributing to corporate knowledge and value creation.

The Opportunity

Traditional approaches to innovation through data-mining are time consuming and yield lag indicators at best. The client chose a Knowledge Management approach to innovation which had the advantage of:

• Speed
• Accessing tacit as well as explicit knowledge within the organization
• Identifying & creating emerging demand rather than extrapolating from historical demand
• Engaging key stakeholders (internal & external) in innovation

The leveraging of tacit knowledge…the undocumented knowledge gained through experience and relationships… was a particular strength of a Knowledge Management approach to innovation. Employees and suppliers engaged in an opportunity to exploit this knowledge brought an energy and commitment to producing results that is seldom evident in traditional innovation strategies.

A Knowledge Management Approach

A knowledge management approach enhanced the enterprise's ability to bring new and profitable services and products to the market more quickly than its competitors.

Outcome: Identification of influence and best practice leaders within the enterprise

• Training of the enterprise's CIO and IT managers in use of KNETMAP^TM and the design of key questions
• Analysis of KNETMAP^TM results
• Selection of the Leaders of Innovation Project Team and Team Leader