One of the most powerful uses for KM is to validate and enhance strategy execution. I’m a big believer in Gary Hamel’s notion that management innovation is the best source of long-lasting competitive advantage (Hamel’s Management 2.0 Blog). These innovations are hard to replicate for a wide variety of reasons (see Hamel’s seminal article).
For example, we’ve found that while formal skills are necessary for PM (and project) success, they aren’t sufficient. Running PM KM processes — especially project debriefs — helped us surface specific project success and failure drivers. Our PMs “knew the good,” but didn’t always “do the good.”
We were able use these insights to change our advanced PM training. It had focused on taking skills like risk management and communications to the next level, they paid little attention to the behaviors, competencies, and temperament that had to be nurtured. We’re now building in more structured role plays with realistic conflict/escalation simulations (e.g., by bringing in a senior manager to play the customer and thereby heightening the stress level).
Filed under: Knowledge Management, SAP, Skills vs. competencies, Strategy Management
[...] rather good approximation to very relevant concepts. Oh, and he does find a link between training, knowledge management, and the ability to innovate. And he shows a practical, pragmatic view of KM which is very healthy. Besides, I’ve heard [...]