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0:00
Welcome to the introduction
to knowledge management.
I'm Klaus North, Professor
of Wiesbaden Business
School in Germany.
0:12
We'll talk in the
next half an hour
about why you need
knowledge management.
We'll also address
the question of what
are the benefits of
knowledge management.
What is the knowledge of
an organization, and how
to manage knowledge?
0:32
Let's start by
addressing the question
of why do we need
knowledge management.
Imagine some everyday problems.
Your company has been asked to
tender for a major project,
and collating the
necessary information
becomes a project in itself.
You meet the deadline, but
the tender document is
not as good as it could
be or should have been,
you lose a pitch.
Managing your knowledge well,
having your documents ready,
and having peer advice in
preparing the tender
would be a good idea.
Or you are faced with
a serious but unusual
software problem.
Somebody remembers that
the same situation
arose a couple of years before.
But there is no record of
how the problem was solved.
If you had a lessons
learned process
in your organization,
and if you had a base of experts
to whom to address in such a
case, this would be helpful.
A very common problem is
that a senior expert leaves
the firm, and juniors or
less experienced people
are left behind,
and there are no records
of the know-how.
A good handover process
or a good onboarding
and offboarding process
would be beneficial
for your organization.
Or take this problem.
There are large discrepancies
between the performance of
different units carrying out
essentially the same task.
You're conscious
that best practices
are not captured and shared.
You are frustrated
by the lack of
processes that will
enable such sharing.
Establishing a best practice
process in your organization,
sharing these practices, and
implementing them
is a good idea.
