Tuesday, May 31, 2005

Practical Advice from Jack Welch

Want to Win? Here's Some Practical Advice from Jack Welch

Jack Welch, former chairman and chief executive of General Electric, loves to be heard. After retiring from GE four years ago and publishing an autobiography, he has now written a book on his management philosophy, titled Winning, which he is promoting through frequent speeches and media interviews. But, unlike most prodigious talkers, Welch is hardly boring. He advocates candor and practices it, strenuously.

Last month Welch visited Wharton to speak to students about his book, co-authored with his wife Suzy. In a packed auditorium, he participated in a fireside chat with Knowledge@Wharton, followed by questions from the students. Here are a few samples of the 'Welchisms' heard during the session:

· Distinctions between leadership and managing are "academic hogwash."

· "Don't take a job because your mother wants you to. Don't be a victim. You own your decision."

· "In the end, winning companies are the only thing that sustains societies like ours. Governments create nothing."

Complete article at: Wharton's website

Some HR readings click here

Monday, May 30, 2005

The Top 5 Reasons you Need KM — Today

by Tom Tobin of Knova Software (formerly ServiceWare)

There are undoubtedly many projects on your corporate wish list, all tagged as “high priority.” Many of the projects sound good, some seem interesting and they all promise incredibly fast ROI. So how do you prioritize your opportunities and select the project that will deliver the most value?

While all of the projects you are considering offer varying levels of incremental returns, the difference with a knowledge management initiative is that it can offer exponential returns, due to its very strategic nature. Here are some compelling reasons to put it at the top of your list:

Complete article at : KM World

HR Readings click here

Saturday, May 28, 2005

KM: Four Obstacles to Overcome

There are four pitfalls to avoid in implementing a successful knowledge management program at your company. This article from the Harvard Management Update reveals what they are.

Knowledge management (KM) continues to be trendy and appealing — a recent conference in San Antonio, Tex., drew some 250 people from 109 companies — but so far it's a concept with a checkered career. A handful of organizations, such as the World Bank and Xerox Corp., have developed robust programs for sharing knowledge that are by now well integrated into everyday operations. But many others have launched initiatives that start with a bang and end with a whimper. According to Houston-based American Productivity & Quality Center (APQC), which has conducted several studies of KM, most programs are in danger of getting stuck in the pilot phase.

Complete article at HBR

Articles on HR click here

Friday, May 27, 2005

Mentoring—Using the Voice of Experience

Companies crave experienced executives—so why don't they do more to make sure that wisdom is captured in the corporate DNA? Harvard Business Professor Dorothy Leonard discusses the differences between mentoring and coaching; why it can be difficult for "masters" to reach "novices" and who should be responsible for managing a corporate mentoring program.

Sometimes executive education has little to do with what happens in a classroom. Mentoring and coaching are the time-tested ways for wisdom and knowledge to be passed through an organization. Harvard Business School professor Dorothy Leonard and Tufts University professor Walter C. Swap, along with HBS research associate Brian DeLacey, are studying the processes of mentoring and coaching in entrepreneurial environments. Leonard and DeLacey discuss their findings with HBS Working Knowledge editor Sean Silverthorne.

Silverthorne: In the context of executive education, talk a little about your research.

Dorothy Leonard: There are two streams of research that are coming together here. One stream is the research that Brian and I started a couple of years ago: the use of technology in aiding learning processes both face-to-face and when people are in diverse locations.

The other stream of research, started in the year 2000, was aimed at understanding how an innovative team working together in a creative act managed the process of knowledge transfer between the more experienced and less experienced members of that team. The context was entrepreneurs learning from coaches who were either professionals in venture capital firms or who were cashed-out entrepreneurs acting as angels for small start ups. Both sets of people had certain expertise that they were trying to transmit to highly inexperienced entrepreneurs. (Sometimes the coaches were inexperienced and the entrepreneurs were experienced.)

Complete article at HBR


Thursday, May 26, 2005

The Re-routing Routine

Routines Evolve Into Dynamic Capabilities

Maurizio Zollo , Sidney Winter



How do companies learn to learn? Maurizio Zollo, Associate Professor of Strategy and Management at INSEAD, and Sidney G. Winter, Professor at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, investigate this topic in their working paper. “This research aims to improve our understanding of how companies develop their competencies,” says Professor Zollo.


From run-of-the-mill routines to definite dynamism – how do organizations find the right route? The authors identify three consistent catalysts building and reshaping organizational routines: how an organisation builds experience, how it articulates knowledge and how it codes that knowledge into task-specific tools. The combination of the three mechanisms result in the development of expertise specific to the manipulation and improvement of routines, what scholars call "dynamic capabilities."

The relative effectiveness of the three catalysts, however, can vary depending on several factors, such as the characteristics of the process considered (e.g. its frequency, diversity and complexity), of the organization itself (its attitude towards knowledge exploration, its organizational structure, etc.), and of its environment (e.g. fast paced high-tech industries, or slow-moving commodity businesses). This paper identifies limitations to the functioning of these three mechanisms and produces relevant guidelines for managers interested in developing their organization’s learning capability.

"The ‘grand finale’ in my Mergers and Acquisitions course is dedicated to the problem of developing an organisational capability specific to the management of acquisition processes," Professor Zollo says. "The notions and the arguments used in this paper are theoretical in nature, but highly applicable to several key managerial challenges."

Source: INSEAD

some reads on HR Click here

Wednesday, May 25, 2005

Getting to Know You

It’s time to trim down and cut costs in your organisation, but where?

Some say you should tighten the belt around projects that don’t show immediate profitability. In professional services, that’s likely to be Knowledge Management (KM). True, investment in KM may be the key to long-term success, but in the short-term, perhaps the high salaries of the specialised KM executives are too tough to manage.

But others argue that when it’s slow-going externally, it’s time to turn to internal strengthening. In that respect, KM is more of a preventative measure, because it will pay off later by preventing another slump.

What could explain this KM dichotomy? Elie Ofek (Assistant Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School) and Miklos Savary (Associate Professor of Marketing, INSEAD) say it may stem from the two conceptual categories of KM: Knowledge Exchange and Knowledge Creation. These two branches have scale economies of different types with varying implications for competitive dynamics.

KM processes may facilitate Knowledge Exchange in the firm, leading to more efficient operations and lower costs, i.e. supply-side scale economies. They can lower the firm’s marginal costs and increase efficiency, making it easier for professionals to access and adapt previously-generated solutions. Many firms do this in a centralized (through electronic documents of client and project information) or decentralized way (through communication, directories, and general sharing of information among colleagues).

Complete article at Knowldge. Insead

Articles on HR click here

Tuesday, May 24, 2005

How Business Schools Lost Their Way

Too focused on “scientific” research, business schools are hiring professors with limited real-world experience and graduating students who are ill equipped to wrangle with complex, unquantifiable issues—in other words, the stuff of management.


Business schools are on the wrong track. For many years, MBA programs enjoyed rising respectability in academia and growing prestige in the business world. Their admissions were ever more selective, the pay packages of graduates ever more dazzling. Today, however, MBA programs face intense criticism for failing to impart useful skills, failing to prepare leaders, failing to instill norms of ethical behavior—and even failing to lead graduates to good corporate jobs. These criticisms come not just from students, employers, and the media but also from deans of some of America’s most prestigious business schools, including Dipak Jain at Northwestern University’s top-ranked Kellogg School of Management. One outspoken critic, McGill University professor Henry Mintzberg, says that the main culprit is a less-than-relevant MBA curriculum. If the number of reform efforts under way is any indication, many deans seem to agree with this charge. But genuine reform of the MBA curriculum remains elusive. We believe that is because the curriculum is the effect, not the cause, of what ails the modern business school.

Complete article on HBR

More on HR

Monday, May 23, 2005

The House That Reliance Industries Built

Construction of the world's largest petroleum refinery built from the ground up -- along with the rollout of a national telecommunications network -- required Reliance Industries, India's largest private-sector company, to devise new management and technology solutions to develop its mega-projects.

The massive Jamnagar petrochemical refinery complex and the company's information-communications business illustrate a willingness to tackle huge undertakings with big payoffs for the company and India, according to Hital R. Meswani, executive director of Reliance Industries, who spoke to a campus audience earlier this month on the topic: "Ideas That Worked: Creation of World-class Businesses through Management of Technology." Reliance Industries is part of India's largest conglomerate, the Reliance Group.

"Both these businesses have demonstrated to us that value creation is possible through effective management of technology, building competencies around people and placing trust in them," said Meswani, who has degrees from both Wharton and the University of Pennsylvania's engineering school.

Meswani, the top manager of both projects, is the great-nephew of Dhirubhai Ambani, a former gas station attendant who founded Reliance in 1968. He died in 2002 and his two sons, Mukesh and Anil, now control the firm, although recent media reports have highlighted differences between the Ambani brothers over the running of the company. With sales of $23 billion, Reliance's businesses include textiles, synthetic fibers, petrochemicals, petroleum refining and marketing, oil and gas, power, and information and communications services.

Complete article at Knowledge Wharton

For latest on HR click here

Saturday, May 21, 2005

KPO: Whats Cooking Up There

A growing number of Indian companies believe that the next big opportunity waiting to be tapped is knowledge services (KS) - also known as knowledge process outsourcing (KPO). Knowledge services involve the efficient use of IT tools and techniques to create, collect, and synthesize data and information to improve decision-making.

Over the years, BPO has proved that standard process-oriented work can be outsourced to destinations like India, Philippines, Brazil, Russia and China. Knowledge services will enable organizations to move from BPO to KPO, where a highly skilled pool of knowledge workers can deliver results that require decision-making and perspective analysis.

The knowledge services market is expected to hit US $17 billion (Source: Industry) by 2010, and should offer new opportunities to professionals like MBAs, CFAs, PhDs, lawyers, doctors, statisticians, economists and other knowledge professionals. However, as the industry matures and new services are defined, this market projection could be revised upward to the region of $50 billion. It is estimated that Indian KPO providers could provide direct employment to 300,000 people by the end of 2010.

Read Complete Article here

Some latest articles on HR available here

Friday, May 20, 2005

The Knowledge Coach

I have been hawking the HBS webiste in the past 2-3 days, here comes another intresting read from HBS.

Many times in our lives—both professional and personal—we need either to transfer knowledge we have built up over years of experience from our heads to someone else's (our children, a junior colleague, a peer) or we have the reverse need: to somehow access those bits of wisdom accumulated in someone else's cranium. Every time we take over a new job or leave an old one, there is an immense waste of knowledge. Not that a newcomer wants to use everything that was in her predecessor's head—some of it was mere flotsam and jetsam, and some was obsolete. But the good stuff? Her mental Rolodex would be handy—whom to call when something breaks down or needs expediting. And how about her uncanny ability to decode behavioral cues—subtle signs of disagreement or even hostility among subordinates in meetings? How does she do that? That storehouse of unwritten process details—the way that certain software or hardware does or doesn't work—maybe that know-how could save some time. The real story not contained in the files on those customers? Definitely neither flotsam nor jetsam. These are her deep smarts—the knowledge that is vital to preserve.

Full article on HBS

Some useful stuff updated on The HR Blog

Thursday, May 19, 2005

The Zen of Management Maintenance

How can leadership be so rich in information yet so poor in knowledge? Hundreds of books and "models" purport to advise on the best way to become a leader. Yet many people, asked to name a leader they admire, struggle to identify more than a few individuals.

According to Jagdish Parikh (HBS MBA '54), the gap between what everyone learns about leadership and what they actually experience exposes a fundamental flaw in leadership models today. The qualities that genuine leaders possess—and what makes inspiring leaders so rare—are not innate characteristics. Rather, he believes, they are skills that aspiring leaders can and should actually teach themselves, such as self-knowledge and self-mastery. Self-knowledge and self-mastery can be developed through conscientious practice.

"Unless one knows how to lead oneself, it would be presumptuous to lead others," Parikh said.

Complete article at: HBS

Also, read some intresting stuff on HR at The HR Blog



Wednesday, May 18, 2005

IP LICENSING IS A TWO-WAY STREET

Says: McKinsey Quarterly

Many companies have ambitious goals for increasing their revenues from
licensing intellectual property, but few actually achieve those goals. The
companies that derive the greatest benefit from the licensing of IP understand
the value to be gained not only by licensing it to other companies but also by
licensing it from them to spur innovation and improve products. For more on how
some companies make the most of IP--their own and others'--read this month's
Chart Focus: "IP licensing is a two-way street."

Saturday, May 14, 2005

The relation between knowledge sharing and distance


Just came across this intresting article:
Joy London at excited utterances repeats some interesting reader comments about human behavior and knowledge management. Keep Your Knowledge to Yourself?

One of the principal impediments to participation is the time and effort necessary to compose, edit and refine a contribution for internal "publication" so that it can be clear to all potential readers. If you post a note about your specialty (e.g. your practice) for your own use, it can be short and cryptic. If you know that only trusted senior members of your practice group will see it, you may be a little more thorough, but you still have confidence that others of equal experience will understand it.

Friday, May 13, 2005

What KM and Legal Outsourcing Have in Common

My loyal correspondent Rob Hyndman pointed out a feature article in Legal Affairs, "Are Your Lawyers in New York or New Delhi?," which takes on the pregnant issue of outsourcing with, to my mind (and Rob's), fairly underwhelming levels of insight. In fact, if you only read one of the two cited pieces, read Rob's. Aside from some truly bone-headed mis-statements in the Legal Affairs piece ("The market for outsourced legal work is expected to reach $163 billion by next year...," for example, which is a figure higher than the total revenue of all U.S. law firms last time we looked), it amounts to a compendium of anecdotes, vignettes, and conspicuously self-serving quotes from vendors side-by-side with double-talk from presumed, or should we say accused, outsourcing clients, such as this blather from Microsoft: "[as] a global company, we are constantly working to improve our ability to serve our customers worldwide in the most cost effective, efficient manner." I mean, who writes this stuff? Are they on drugs?

Thursday, May 12, 2005

Social Networks Are Smarter Than Org Charts

In a recent study at Hewlett Packard (HP), we have additional proof that bottom-up, self-selected groups may be the powerhouses of modern corporations: where actual work gets done. Org charts and formal reporting hierarchies may be completely irrelevant.

Wednesday, May 11, 2005

Knowledge management comes to philanthropy

Foundations are endowed with intellectual as well as financial capital. Now is the time to use it. says Mckinsey Quarterly...


Philanthropic foundations are knowledge-intensive bodies. Almost everything they do, from identifying innovative nonprofit organizations to evaluating grants and publishing policy-shaping reports, depends on the use of human and intellectual capital. But many philanthropies, fearing that a dollar spent internally is a dollar wasted, have neither the organization nor the systems to manage their knowledge properly. What they fail to understand is that knowledge is a cornerstone of effective philanthropy

Tuesday, May 10, 2005

The Independent on Consultancies

The Independent recently carried this intresting piece on Management Consultancies.

McKinsey management consultants are we
We take all our clients' money
We can earn many a million
Because our clients have no vision
From a song reportedly sung at a McKinsey party

Indian Students win in US

I came across this site :http://www.effortsunited.com

A website built by a team of students from Gurgaon in Haryana, is one of two winning sites of the US Department of State's 2005 Doors to Diplomacy Award.

The site explores international security by considering global realities and threats while celebrating the mutual cooperation and celebration that support diplomacy.

The awards recognise the websites that best teach about the importance of international affairs and diplomacy.

Monday, May 09, 2005

KPO in India

India is all set to become the new knowledge process outsourcing (KPO)
hub, according to a press release by the Confederation of Indian
Industry (CII) based on its paper "India In The New Knowledge
Economy." The paper has revealed that "KPO would grow at 46% to
reach a staggering US$ 17 billion by 2010. Besides, the study points
that the growth of services sector would be 8%+ and its contribution
to India's GDP would be 51%+, affirming that India's
transition from being a BPO destination to a KPO destination is
imminent." Check the press release at

http://www.ciionline.org/news/newsMain.asp?

Defining Knowledge as Competence

Defining Knowledge as Competence

Recently on the Act-KM egroup there was a passionate discussion on "What is knowledge?"

And I chose to define it on the basis of Competence.

It's the fourth level of competence building, when "unconscious competence"
takes place, and it is possible when one passes throughthe stages of unconcious
incompetence (no data , no information) , to conscious incompetence (I now know
what I don't know) to conscious competence (learning in a social context, with a
coach or mentor) from which it moves to unconcious competence (my body &
mind both "know" now)


Check here for more.

This is because I have been profoundly influenced by Peter Senge's thoughts on learning:

For Peter Senge, real learning gets to the heart of what it is to be human.
We become able to re-create ourselves. This applies to both individuals and
organizations. Thus, for a ‘learning organization it is not enough to survive.
‘”Survival learning” or what is more often termed “adaptive learning” is important – indeed it is necessary. But for a learning organization, “adaptive learning” must be joined by “generative learning”, learning that enhances our capacity to create’ (Senge 1990:14).

And also Nonaka's thoughts on Knowledge Creation

"The creation of knowledge is not simply a compilation of facts but a
uniquely human process that cannot be reduced or easily replicated."

Friday, May 06, 2005

KM Concepts

What we should know to be considered a proficient KM adviser and knowledge worker

  • codification vs. personalization - the trade-off between capture and storage of explicit information and making connections to people that know.
  • exploration vs. exploitation - should you focus on gathering external information and buying (recruiting) expertise or capture internal best practices and grow local competencies?
  • practice vs. process - the balance between informal learning and strictly defined repeatable activties.
  • after action reviews (AARs) - learning by gathering participants after completion of a significant project, exploring, reflecting, recording advances and mistakes.
  • peer reviews - inviting colleagues who have experience of similar projects to share their tips, tricks and lessons learned before starting out.
  • knowledge mapping & audits - discovering opportunities, knowledge gaps and charting flows. A survey to understand where current knowledge is created and who needs it.
  • lessons learned (learning histories) - a systematic review of failures and successes conducted by a neutral party.
  • 'Ba' - a physical or virtual collaborative space, where participants feel safe and exchange insights.
  • induction (aka data mining) - searching for patterns, rules and interesting insights from collected (business) data.
  • source documents - collaborative scripts that set forth the intention and vision of the firm or group.
  • web standards & protocols - HTML, XML, XTM, RSS

Thursday, May 05, 2005

More on Knowldege...

It's the fourth level of competence building, when "unconscious competence"
takes place, and it is possible when one passes through the stages of
unconcious incompetence (no data , no information) , to conscious
incompetence (I now know what I don't know) to conscious competence
(learning in a social context, with a coach or mentor) from which it moves
to unconcious competence (my body & mind both "know" now)

Symbolism of Colors

How about the symbolism of colors? In Germany, green is the color of hope,
in the U.S. one is "green with envy."

In some cultures, black symbolizes mourning while in other cultures white is
the color of mourning.

Let me summarize the German color meanings/perceptions:

White - pure, good
Black - bad, death, mourning
Red - love
Green - hope
Yellow - Jealousy
Blue as in "blau machen" = "make blue" is to cut class or not go to work
Beige is not considered a neutral color - it belongs to the brown tones

Wednesday, May 04, 2005

Shared Meanings!!

Most of us are familiar with the various meaning of symbols and words in different cultures when they've resulted in a marketing/economic disaster.

For example, Nova as the name for a car model when 'no va' means 'no go'.

Or the baby pictured on baby food that is interpreted in cultures that display the product on a label that there is a cooked baby inside.

However, we don't usually hear of mis-interpreted symbols that are deadly.

Manufacturers of poisonous products often put a skull on the label and assume this is a universally understood warning symbol for danger and death

However, in many indigenous religions the skull is tied to the concept of spiritual blessings.

So I suppose the closest translation of a skull on a liquid insecticide/pesticide would be that this is 'holy water'.

So we shouldn't be surprised at the high levels of poisonings and cancer in areas where illiterate indigenous peoples are laboring at low wages in commercial fields and using/exposed to pesticides.

This is another example of 'talking past each other' via symbols that we should be sharing in our work and not just the 'nova' story.

I'd love to hear of other symbols that do not have a shared meaning across cultures, especially those that might prove dangerous to the 'reader'.

Tuesday, May 03, 2005

What Does Your Birthdate Mean...








Your Birthdate: July 21

Being born on the 21st day of the month (3 energy) is likely to add a good bit of vitality to your life.

The energy of 3 allows you bounce back rapidly from setbacks, physical or mental.

There is a restlessness in your nature, but you seem to be able to portray an easygoing, "couldn't care less" attitude.



You have a natural ability to express yourself in public, and you always make a very good impression.

Good with words, you excel in writing, speaking, and possibly singing.

You are energetic and always a good conversationalist.



You have a keen imagination, but you tend to scatter your energies and become involved with too may superficial matters.

Your mind is practical and rational despite this tendency to jump about.

You are affectionate and loving, but very sensitive.

You are subject to rapid ups and downs.


Monday, May 02, 2005

K M Thoughts.....by Nimmy

Methinks - Knowledge Management can be a complete success only when each and every employee puts the organization before himself or herself. Come to think of it, KM isn’t really an effort to overcome dependency on human beings. (That can never ever happen.) But it is to mitigate the risks of depending totally on the people. KM is, in fact, about realizing that each person has unique knowledge that needs to be leveraged upon. Some part of the explicit knowledge can be documented and converted into a procedure or a process, but that's about it. Who will improve it? Who will help the system evolve and adapt to change?It has to be understood.

KM folks are in an unenviable spot. For... for KM to be a hit, the basics (Employee satisfaction has to be on a high) have to be in place. And the basics cannot be controlled completely by the KM folks. The basics are established by the founders, managers and leaders in the organization. If an employee has to put the organization before himself or herself, not only does he/she have to be highly kicked about the organization's goals but also he/she should not be taken undue advantage of by people around him/her. There has to be a feeling of oneness with the entire orgainzation and its people. This is probably asking for the sun. Looks like I am getting to be a little pragmatic and not dream of an ideal 'only-in-the-dreams' world. But what this boils down to, perhaps, is that the CEO should own KM.

What is Knowledge Managment

Knowledge Management has its roots in a variety of disciplines and domains such as organization theories, management theories, computer technology and cognitive science. To some extent its point of departure is within the resource-based view of the company, which focuses on the development of competencies and the knowledge based theory of the firm that suggests that knowledge is the organizational asset that enables sustainable competitive advantage in today's hypercompetitive environment

What is Knowledge

“It is not the smartest or the strongest species that prevails,
but that which is most adaptive”, I have a one word definition for
knowledge -- ACUMEN.

And if you wanted “acumen” expanded it is : honing one’s sense-making
apparatus [1] that energises [2] one to take the most effective actions [3]
of a rainbow [4] of possible actions, in a diverse environment [5]

To me knowledge has to be default actionable knowledge – acumen is a
better word. I seek knowledge to sharpen my acumen to deal with my self and
the world around me.

So, in summary the following associations can reasonably be made:

  • Information relates to description, definition, or perspective (what, who, when, where).
  • Knowledge comprises strategy, practice, method, or approach (how).
  • Wisdom embodies principle, insight, moral, or archetype (why).

Sunday, May 01, 2005

My Personality type..








Your #1 Match: INFJ




The Protector

You live your life with integrity, originality, vision, and creativity.
Independent and stubborn, you rarely stray from your vision - no matter what it is.
You are an excellent listener, with almost infinite patience.
You have complex, deep feelings, and you take great care to express them.

You would make a great photographer, alternative medicine guru, or teacher.


Your #2 Match: INTJ




The Scientist

You have a head for ideas - and you are good at improving systems.
Logical and strategic, you prefer for everything in your life to be organized.
You tend to be a bit skeptical. You're both critical of yourself and of others.
Independent and stubborn, you tend to only befriend those who are a lot like you.

You would make an excellent scientist, engineer, or programmer.