Success Factors in Implementing KM:
Lessons from the Development Sector
KM Applications: World Bank and Thailand Experience Sharing
February 15, 2007
Bangkok, Thailand
Erik Johnson
World Bank Institute
ejohnson1@worldbank.org
Outline
► Part
1: Linking Knowledge Economy and
Knowledge Management
► Part 2: The State of KM at the World Bank
► Part 3: KM Critical Success Factors
Part 1:
Linking Knowledge Economy
and Knowledge Management
WBI Mission
WBI’s Mission is to Enable Countries to:
►
Acquire, share, and apply global and local knowledge to
meet development challenges
►
Develop capacity at the individual, organizational, and
institutional levels
WBI at a Glance
►
►
More than 800 learning activities annually
More than 90,000 client participants worldwide
►
►
187 formal partner institutions
120 Global Development Learning
Network (GDLN) affiliates
►
45 Focus Countries
WBI at a Glance… continued
WBI Reaches More than 90,000 Individuals
Types of Participants
Others 13%
Private Sector
16%
Govt. Officials
40%
Client Participants by Region
Worldwide
16%
South Asia
6%
Middle East
& North Africa
5%
NGOs
9%
Educators
22%
Latin America
& Caribbean
20%
Africa
27%
East Asia
& Pacific
20%
Europe
& Central Asia
6%
Developing Capacity
at Three Levels
WBI helps countries prioritize their development objectives, identify capacity constraints,
and design interventions at three levels:
INSTITUTIONAL
ORGANIZATIONAL
INDIVIDUAL
WBI F O C U S E S on
governance, the parliament,
the role of the private sector,
and civil society, while
exploring how policies,
incentives, and norms in
these and other institutions
shape the actions of
individuals.
WBI S U P P O R T S efforts
to strengthen management
systems and business
processes. Overall
organizational capacity is
largely determined by how
task-oriented organizations
interact (or fail to interact) to
achieve results.
WBI W O R K S with
partners, and brokers
programs to develop key skills
and knowledge, as well as the
means for delivering and
assessing learning.
Building Capacity
for the Knowledge Economy
Societal
Knowledge Economy
Organizational
Individual
Knowledge Organizations
Knowledge Workers
Knowledge Economy
The K4D framework includes four pillars that form the foundations of
the knowledge economy:
1.
2.
3.
4.
An economic and institutional regime that provides incentives for
the efficient use of existing and new knowledge and the flourishing of
entrepreneurship.
An educated and skilled population that can create, share, and
use knowledge well.
A dynamic information infrastructure that can facilitate the
effective communication, dissemination, and processing of information.
An efficient innovation system of firms, research centers,
universities, think tanks, consultants, and other organizations that can
tap into the growing stock of global knowledge, assimilate and adapt
itto local needs, and create new technology.
Knowledge Assessment Methodology (KAM)
Organizational Knowledge Assessment (OKA)
►3 basic
elements:
people, process
and system
►14 dimensions
►70 metrics are
used plus
demographic
data
►183 questions
in a survey
questionnaire
OKA Results
OKA Results
Cultural Incentives
30
KM Program
Knowledge Identification and Creation
25
Knowledge Content
Knowledge Sharing
20
23.2
12.9
15
3.010
Knowledge Access and Infrastructure
8.1
14.6
Communities of Practice and K-Teams
5
8.2
0
Technology
4.9
13.0
8.9 7.7
10.5
10.0
Knowledge and Learning
9.1
14.2
Metrics and Monitoring
Alignment
Leadership and Strategy
Knowledge Flows
Operationalization of Knowledge
Part 2: The State of KM at the
World Bank
Have we reached the end?
Are we losing ground?
Independent Evaluation Findings
Three main action recommended:
1.
2.
3.
Management should define clear responsibilities and accountabilities
for integrating knowledge sharing into the Bank’s core
business processes; ensure that incentives are aligned with
responsibilities.
Network and Regional units should tightly link their knowledge sharing
activities to lending and non-lending processes. For this, Networks
should set clear objectives for anchor, thematic group, and
advisory services’ support of operational teams, and
Regional/country units should make explicit the knowledge objectives
and strategies of CASs and projects.
Outcome objectives and supporting performance indicators
should be set and procedures established for monitoring and
evaluating Bank knowledge sharing programs and activities.
Part 3:
KM Critical Success Factors
Six Critical Success Factors
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
KM is for Business Needs Only
Management
Inclusion/Cooperation
Staff Skills
Technology (as an enabler)
Communication
1. KM is for Business Needs Only
Lessons from the American Productivity and
Quality Center KM Benchmarking
“If you build it, they will not necessarily come” –
applies to tools and to KM Strategy
2. “Embed knowledge sharing, capture and re-use
into the work itself”
1.
Bottom line = do not create a KM Strategy to
implement KM --- instead, apply KM to solve real
business needs!!!
Contrasting Ideas
Bad idea: “Let’s develop an expert
database because it is a useful
way of finding out who knows
what.”
Good Idea: “Let’s develop an
expert database so that I can save
time looking for the right technical
expert when a client calls to ask a
question.”
2. Management (what they do)
► Provide
Leadership and encouragement
► Create incentives
► Establish a governance structure and roles
► Allocate or negotiate funding
Good KM Leadership
► Top
executive with a vision as the primary
sponsor
► Relentless
► “Walk
►A
communication (i.e. speeches)
the talk” – set a good example
leadership style which challenges and
encourages learning and sharing
Cultivating management buy-in
► Raise
the organization’s KM profile –
participate in international consortia
► Simplify the benefits of KM into tangible
stories (Denning example)
► Equip your manager with talking points to
tell your story at higher levels or publicly
► Write or contract case studies of your work
for publication or conference presentations
KM Governance Structure
CoP-Focused
Governance Structure
Creating Incentives
► Combine
► Formal
formal and informal incentives
performance evaluation
► Rewards/Awards
► Expos/Fairs,
► Stories
for team work
Innovation Marketplace
underlying desired behavior
On Funding
► Special
budget not necessary – could just
identify discreet activities in work plan
► Begin with staff time, then cover special
activities
► Competitive process can inspire innovation
► Decentralize and integrate!!!
3. Inclusion/Cooperation
► Make
champions out of anyone with the energy
and motivation
► Be sure to include field staff
► Work across professional/grade levels – hierarchy
is a burden
► Work across departments – the bureaucracy does
not have to hold you back
► Use your physical space to facilitate knowledge
sharing
The World Bank Matrix
Task Teams and Thematic Groups
Regions
Sectors
Environment
Africa
East Asian
& Pacific
Central
Asia
Latin America
Middle East
& Caribbean
and North
America
South
Asia
Task Teams
Human
Development
Private Sector &
Infrastructure
Operation Core
Services
Poverty
Reduction
Thematic Groups
Communities as a Core
► CoPs
can be a platform for KM, to deploy several
KM activities within the CoPs
► Allow
► Go
you to work across departments
where the energy is
► Empower
► Use
leaders regardless of seniority
virtual tools to extend the community
4. Staff Skills
► Offer
a diversity of pedagogical techniques
to build KM skills
► Identify KM behaviors and ways to shape
them
► Specify KM roles (perhaps formal titles) and
career tracks for fulfilling them
Islamic Development Bank
KM Foundation Program
1.
2.
3.
4.
Capture techniques
Tools and technologies
Narrative skills (Oral History pilot)
Reportage techniques
Build Staff Skills
► Ability
to challenge the status quo (risk
taking)
► Taking time to develop relationships and
build trust
► Building facilitation skills to enable people to
find their own solutions
► Collaborating, working and learning
together from shared experiences
KM Career Track at WB
► Manager/Director
 Senior KM Officer
►KM
Officer
 KM Analyst
► KM Assistant
5. Technology (as an enabler)
► Demonstrate
clear value to business
objectives in time and money
► Standardize and simplify processes
► Integrate databases when possible
► Have a client orientation to the web – prefer
Internet to Intranet
► Prepare staff for change and give them time
Integrating Databases: People Pages
Using Web Statistics WB Web
Web in Review FY2004
► 1.1 million unique visitors per month
► 25+ million page requests per busy month
► a quarter-billion page requests in FY04
downloading the equivalent of 1.9 million 200page books of content in a busy month
► spending the equivalent of 2,783 working years of
time using the site
► 1600 (!) web sites, over 2 million URLs
Page requests on WB
External Web sites (FY96 – FY04)
80,000,000
70,000,000
Page requests
60,000,000
50,000,000
40,000,000
30,000,000
20,000,000
10,000,000
0
1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
Fiscal year and quarter
2002
2003
2004
Comparators
1.8
1.6
Page Requests
(Millions)
25
20
1.4
1.2
15
1
0.8
10
0.6
0.4
5
0.2
0
0
J F M A M J J A S O N D J F M A M J J A S O
2003
2004
Dev't. Gtwy.
InterAction
CGAP/MFG
IDS
UNU
Bank Totals
Respondent satisfaction
with WB online resources
Research reports
Full-length publications
Data (sets, at-a-glance, analysis tools)
General information about the Bank
Smaller summaries / articles / briefs
Topic site (e.g. Environment, Health, etc.)
Country or region site
Bank new s and activities
Project site (information or documents)
Educational/Training materials
Email new sletters
Access to Bank personnel
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
% Responding* (not including "N/A" responses)
++ [very satisfied]
+
-
-- [not satisfied]
100%
6. Communication
► Tells
stories to staff whenever possible
► Convene highly visible staff events such as a
Knowledge Fair
► Feature KM activities through a series of informal
presentations such as Brown Bag Lunches
► Write stories or provide links to KM activities on
the Internet and Intranet
► Do not stop selling the KM concept (it will always
be seen as a fad by some)
Using the web in WHO
Knowledge Fairs
► Development
Marketplace - WB
► Swiss Development Cooperation – Dare to
Share
► USAID – Knowledge for Development
Storytelling in Organizations
► Steve
Denning’s
guide to
communicating
ideas for
transformational
change
Final Word on Measuring KM Results
► Start
with the organization’s measures of
success – do not create separate KM
measures and outcomes
► With demonstrated results, business units
begin to play a larger role in funding and
staffing KM activities
► Just because knowledge is intangible, does
not mean that the impact is
► Success breeds further investment
Questions and Answers…