. Gurunet is another new internet business endeavor that wishes to
be the next "killer app." If you were around in the time of Phillipe Kahn and the original DOS utility Sidekick, you might remember that it was the type of utility that could be called up with a special keystroke. It was resident
all of the time, so the information it provided was always available. Phillipe Kahn's Borland sold quite a few copies of this product. To me, the Gurunet product is somewhat reminiscent of Sidekick. It is loaded and remains
resident and is activated with an ALT-click keystroke. This is where the similarity ends. The information behind the Gurunet product is the web. Right now content is limited, but the Gurunet people have plans to extend their
content. One key difference of this product is that when you activate the Gurunet product, wherever it is activated is what is "looked up" on the web. Information at your finger tips. A knowledge management tool?
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The Web as One Huge Knowledge Management Effort
When you think about it, sitting right under our noses is one of the
largest and best examples of a knowledge work effort--the web. What's more, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to say that this effort was anything but successful. In thinking about the world wide web and its concomitant
internet technology, what learnings are there for us in structuring our own knowledge work effort?
The Whole Model
A couple of issues ago I described a model for personal knowledge effectiveness – the
"CUEOD" (pronounced Q-ODD) model. The letters of the acronym stand for CAPTURE, UNDERSTAND, EVALUATE, ORGANIZE, and DEPLOY. Although my description of this model was primarily in the context of the individual, it also applies to
groups and organizations, and in the largest sense it applies to the web.
The web is the ultimate example of the CUEOD process. It provides mechanisms to CAPTURE information and knowledge. It seems to do this almost organically
as if its life were dependent on this.
In the context of the web, UNDERSTANDING can be interpreted to mean activities such as making the decision about where to place new information based on an understanding of the relationship
of the new information to information already present on the web.
EVALUATION is a very interesting phenomenon when considering the world wide web. Given the number of tools and measurement devices that can be put to use, it is
easy to know what people are looking at. This provides an implicit value proposition for the information on the web. People will access sites if they are valuable to them, and will not access sites if they are not valuable.
Portal sites like YAHOO are extremely valuable as access points to the vast amount of information on the web.
In terms of ORGANIZATION, portal sites and search engines provide an organizational infrastructure for the web. The
various indices provide numerous views into the vast number of web resources. Organization comes in three flavors on the web- –manual, governed, and automatic. Manual organization is seen in those portals that allow knowledge
owners to add links themselves. Governed organization is seen in sites like YAHOO that have an infrastructure in place to make decisions about knowledge additions. Lastly, automatic organization is accomplished through search
engine spiders.
Finally, the web has revolutionized DEPLOYMENT through an interface that runs on almost any platform and a standard way of presenting and distributing information.
Although one might consider the
world wide web in the context of technology alone, I would offer the idea that this is a highly limited view of the web and one must also look at it as a huge information ecology that is "powered" by people who add content and
depleted by people who use or do not use content. The idea of depletion might seem somewhat odd in the context of information and knowledge. By depletion I mean that as time goes along and people use information and knowledge it
ages. It may always be used, but new information and knowledge will subsume old. One or more individuals who are using some current piece of knowledge might accomplish the replacement of aged knowledge.
How The Web Was Won
When you look at the history of the web you can identify many factors that lead to its present state, although it is highly unlikely that anyone would have been able to predict the web's explosive
growth. I would like to offer a contrarian viewpoint about successful knowledge work based on the web as a model. This viewpoint is contrary to the present (so called second generation) state of knowledge management that advocates
a much more people oriented approach. In the same way that process work evolved to include the role that people play in process, second generation knowledge management (SGKM) has evolved to include a similar emphasis on people. I
believe the web model of knowledge work is contrary to this people oriented view.
The web model of knowledge work proposes the following:
1)Give people a place to put their knowledge and information.
2)Make the publish and access tools easy to use-–intuitive and non-inhibitive.
3)Provide access to a potential audience.
4)Establish some sort of benefits for participation.
It is senseless to deny the importance of the web's access and publish tools. In the web setting, technology is a driving factor. The web meets the ultimately important goal for a knowledge work project--that its
products become ubiquitous resources.
From this viewpoint, the idea of 'if you build it they will come' seems to be a good way to begin a knowledge work project. The web may represent the best case, but even in the
worst case, the result will be new knowledge about what works and what does not work--information that can be used to evolve your knowledge management capability over time.
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