Talking about PKM

KMers.org runs a regular TweetChat on knowledge management (KM) issues and today’s was on Personal Knowledge Management, with the following agenda [dead link]:

  • What effective means have we found to aggregate, filter and share information?
  • Is personal KM a good foundation for corporate KM, or are they competing efforts?
  • What are the corporate benefits of individual KM efforts? Should a company deliberately seek to take advantage of individual KM efforts?
  • How do we build a corporate culture in which individuals take responsibility for personal KM or personal sense-making?

It was difficult to keep up with the flow during this intensive one-hour session, so I’ve gone back and picked out some of the highlights [lightly edited for ease of reading].

@markgould13 For me, PKM is a precursor for social knowledge sharing, so I use Delicious, Twitter and WordPress. Trying enterprise apps.

@mathemagenic blogging! [is an effective means to aggregate, filter & share] however the main problem is the time to be invested now for the future.

@jeffhester @elsua makes a great point about our personal networks being key. Most of the tools mentioned work best when shared.

@dougcornelius I see a distinction between consumption and production. Social Media helps bridge the old gap by combining the two [KM and SM].

@richdurost Although data is stored on the web, going back and finding those knowledge nuggets becomes a huge challenge.

@4KM Just thought of PKM as the narrow point of the hourglass. Reflect, filter, synthesize, organize & go macro again.

@markgould13 I think corporate KM is rapidly losing out to PKM. Good thing too in many sectors.

@VMaryAbraham Perhaps PKM is growing in importance because so few organizational KM methods work for individuals.

@RichardHare Corporate KM still sounds like something done to people, rather than simply the ecology of what exists in an organisation.

@hjarche: [so I asked the obvious question]: can you have enterprise KM without PKM?

@nitinbadjatia Don’t think so

@markgould13 I think we tried that with KM1.0. Not sure it worked.

@lehawes No. I believe that is one reason we saw 70% failure rates in KM projects 10 years ago. Little focus on PKM then.

@JohnReaves You can have KM without PKM but you shouldn’t.

@petertwo Incentive for PKM is PCM (Personal Career Management).

@jaycross CIA: From “need to know” to “need to share” as default behavior says Andy McAfee in Enterprise 2.0.

@pekadad Is attention-management a critical piece of PKM? How do I know what to to spend my (precious?) mental time on.

@jaycross @VMaryAbraham So should our focus be on … our focus? Teach priorities and filtering? Good thought, Mary.

@Quinnovator PKM needs to become PKS (Personal Knowledge Sharing).

@lehawes I think all KM is really about sharing, at heart. Need to have something to share, but the act creates the value.

@rickladd As Russell Ackoff used to say – the best way to learn is to teach. Sharing = giving away = getting back exponentially.

@jeffhester PKM is a process. Knowledge flows to me, then through me (as I share with my network and beyond).

Link to complete Twitter transcript [dead link] at KMers

I am more convinced now of the importance of Personal Knowledge Mastery in getting work done in knowledge-intensive workplaces. It is a foundational skill, of which only the principles can be formally taught, and like any craft it must be practised to gain mastery.

Yes, I do offer workshops on PKM and other topics.

7 Responses to “Talking about PKM”

  1. Atle Iversen

    Nice summary – you “filtered out” the best bits for me 🙂

    I missed the actual TweetChat, but it seems like a nice way to brainstorm a topic. And as your post illustrates nicely, a human “filter” that collects, organizes and cleans up the information is very valuable.

    This discussion inspired me to write an article about PKM, filter failure and information overload:
    http://ppcsoft.com/blog/pkm-filtering-info-overload.asp

    Reply
    • Harold Jarche

      Nice graphics on your post, Atle. I read the copyright notice on your website. Would you be open to letting others use them for presentations, with attribution of course. I tried to ask this question on your blog but I couldn’t find the comment function.

      Reply
  2. Atle Iversen

    Sorry for the delayed response – I missed your comment/question (I trust Google to help me too much).

    Yes, I have no problem letting people use my graphics with attribution – if you find any of them useful, feel free to use them.

    I don’t have any comment function on the blog; I prefer that people write their own blog posts or contact me directly (which I should probably have done as well instead of this comment 🙂 )

    Reply

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