Out of The Box - Week Ending 04/09

It's official, dim sum is dead in Atlanta! For the third time in two months I've attempted to satiate my appetite for the little bites of Chinese culinary goodness (at three different, formerly brilliant) restaurants and the for the third - at last time - I've been disappointed with food that is served cold (off of steaming carts, no less) and fails to please the palate. Thank God for Pho!

Anyway, the last week - when I haven't been obsessed with food - I've been thinking a lot about how the lack of understanding of KM among organizational leadership contributes to the failure of KM initiatives. This week's mix of articles provide some truly out of the box insight into KM branding and re-thinking the role and influence of KM.

• Knowledge in action!The role of social influence in surging autism diagnoses makes me wonder how and what organization's transmit KM knowledge and awareness, externally, from their clients and competitors and, internally, from one another.
• (Not so new) Trend of the Week: Crowdsourcing Popular, neologistic term, for outsourcing tasks to a large, diffuse group, usually without monetary compensation. While companies who attempt to abuse this concept will, inevitably, hit a wall, it's a fantastic way to engage your audience as part of your branding strategy.
• The fascinating Nature.com article, Learning in the wild, points out the relationship between learning and personal interest; basically, people learn and take the time to become informed when a subject is personal. Knowledge managers looking to Brand their strategies and improve strategy adoption should learn from this insight.
• Shout out to mystrategicplan.com for connecting me to Pamela Slim's Escape from Cubicle Nation blog
• Question of the Week: Is it possible to create workspaces and workplaces that influence the creation, flow, and capture of knowledge?
• Guerrilla marketing at its finest, now I just need to figure out how to leverage this from a KM perspective.
• What role does your KM strategy play in providing input into the content and format of your companies annual report.
• Reputation management in the digital space. Well written post from Mark Pollard on Cadbury's foray into social media

Out of The Box - Week Ending 02/19

I've been enjoying a "Lifetime" kinda Sunday which, usually, involves laying in bed, watching whichever string of Valerie Bertinelli, Tori Spelling, or ex-Charlie's Angel made-for-TV movies are on and eating whatever leftovers can be nuked during commercials (at which time you're also making quick runs to go potty). But, today I was a little more mobile, taking advantage of great weather to enjoy a variety of recent cinematic pleasures from Leap Year (whose only redeeming qualities are my current female silver screen crush, Amy Adams, and its Irish setting) to Chris Rock's psuedo-mentary, Good Hair, which tried to be both informative and funny and totally missed the boat on both counts.

Anywho, after an amazing meal of rack of lamb and a side of Olympics (thanks Em!) and a quick nap on Em's Lifetime-Sunday-facilitatin' couch (it's that cozy...and, totally TMI, but if you lay just right it'll even cradle your bladder so you can go for hours without having to get up to pee), I started combing through last weeks latest and greatest blog posts and articles.

• Wirearchist (or is it wirearchitect?), Jon Husband, re-presents his amazing insights into Today's Interconnected Environment and reinforces my vision of the future of KM as a field that creates meaning out of available information and knowledge and feeds it back back to its end-users.
• I'm on the verge of making Nancy White my first KM crush of 2010. Like Nancy, I love things you can touch and play with during collaborative strategy sessions (get your mind out of the gutter) and I totally appreciate this post on card decks used in facilitations.
• I'm not known for putting my faith in B-School programs to improve the world of business, but this Knowledge@Wharton article emphasizing the role of collaborating "across the aisle" as an aid in the cycle of innovation doesn't completely suck, lol.
• A great article supporting personalized strategies (as needed) over (hard-core) formalized strategies. ('Cause, you know, it's all about balance, bay-bay.) In the end it all comes down to "insight, accountability, and culture"...who knew?!?!
• KM Opportunity: Don't just nix the sucky ideas floating around your organization...percolate 'em! Or, rather, incubate 'em; maybe tossing them around a bit will make them less sucky and more brilliant.
• Question of the Week: Is your organization spending tons of money on contractors and outsourcing? Two BusinessWeek articles (here and here) on 'buying local' suggest an interesting approach for KM (most likely in conjunction with HR) to influence development of internal resources.
• Google's interest in buying and selling energy represents yet another interesting development from Google Labs. See what happens when you start leveraging the power of knowledge and information? See?!?!

Out of The Box - Week Ending 02/05

See, this is what happens when tennis is your religion...you neglect your blog, the maintenance of your hair, the search for an inexpensive body butter to replace the exceptional one you used to get for a buck at the Dollar Tree (I have eczema and, yes, it was exceptional)...all so you can stay up day and night to watch the Australian Open. Thankfully, Serena and Fed didn't disappoint in their respective Singles Finals and the Williams sisters had some amazing points in their doubles match againt the frighteningly phenomenal Cara Black and Liezel Huber.

The downside this past week was the announcement of Ugly Betty's impending cancellation (though I've been too busy sucking at Mario Kart and getting hooked on Caprica to do more than worry about where I'll get my weekly dose of Vanessa Williams), but the upside has been an interesting and entertaining mix of articles that have generated some great ideas on KM...well, for me at least, that's why this stuff is out of the box.

• In a nod to avoiding the obvious pathways of strategy success, Pepsi eschews multimillion dollar Super Bowl ads in favor of "two-way dialogue" with customers in order to make brand a movement.
• Davos seemed like the place to be for Knowledge Managers this week, curious to know how many KM professionals were in attendance at the annual World Economic Forum (WEF). Can we get this kind of conversation going at future KM conferences?
• Having been roundly chastized for working like a dog to keep the momentum going on KM efforts (which, as it turns out was was more of a political maneuver to "keep-me-in-my-place"), I can totally appreciate Erica Olsen's tips on maintaining the momentum of strategic planning
• Epiphany of the Week: Forget Goldman Sachs janky bonus practices, after reading about how JPMorgan Chase Chairman and CEO, Jamie Dimon, scored a $16M bonus, I finally understand all of these sketchy fees Chase has been hitting me with over the last month. Remember the days when banks charged fees as a penalty and not a dubious revenue generating practice? I do. Here's wishing you lots of karma Jamie!

• Simple, but great advice (the best usually is) on winning new business (or support) whether you're an independent KM consultant or operating an internal KM function.
• How To of the Week: Some timely advice on managing anxiety in the workplace.
• Fantabulous response to a WSJ article on the loss of favor of strategic plans. This is always a point I try to underscore in my KM engagements.
• Question of the Week: Is "heritage" just a fashion trend or something your KM branding efforts can benefit from?
• KM Opportunity: The problem is not digitizing electronic health records, it's improving the accessbility and functionality of these systems (making them user friendly) and getting healthcare professionals up to speed on how to use them without interfering with their ability to do their primary work of saving lives. Anyone know of a group of professionals equipped to make this happen? Ooh, ooh, I do, I do.

Out of The Box - Week Ending 03/13

So, some of these reads have been on my "to post" list for a hot minute, but I've been busy enjoying the lush life. By the way, happy belated St. Paddy's Day y'all!!!! I celebrated with the usual family tradition of corned beef, cabbage, and boiled potatoes...and Guinness, of course, duh!

It's always nice when there are interesting and thought provoking articles to read and share - even if I don't always have the time to read or share them right away.

• As a Knowledge Manager I feel that a critical part of any successful consultation is holding up a mirror and "breaking it down" for the client before laying out recommendations, but in this article, Professor James Heskett ponders the question "How frank should leaders be?" with the rank-and-file.


• Question of the Week: Is Capitalism Working? Nearly 29 years after Time magazine posed the question on its cover, George M. Taber asks it again (and just when its been on my mind too...)


• Interesting Factoid: The US ranks only 16th in the world in car ownership rates? Really? Really!?!?! Color me surprised.


• Cool Tech of the Week: Gagapost offers easy collaborative blogging.


• Marketing strategist and blogger B.L. Ochman offers up some road rules for folks cruising along the information highway.