I've long subscribed to Russ Ackoff's spectrum of learning, which has five levels: data, information, knowledge, understand, and wisdom. That kind of notionally puts knowledge management in the middle of the spectrum; probably not what most of us are after. Like Jon, I find managing ideas far more compelling, though I suspect there's far more to it. Still, I do think it's a step forward in our never-ending quest to work better together.

I'm also intrigued by your pointing out the value of shared power. One of Nancy's three issues for this third era is that of transparency and she specifically mentions the openness of management to saying "I don't know", as well as organizational members neither hiding nor manufacturing information to mislead their leadership into thinking all is well.

I also think there's a level of openness required of knowledge workers that says, "I don't know how what I know might fit in to what others are doing or what we might be able to do, but I want to make my work observable (findable) so that others can discover it and make use of it.

Of course, all of this requires an understanding of systems some people aren't quite capable of mustering. Also, the graphic of what those NASA participants were willing to commit to left me far from impressed. Seriously, when I think of the money and firepower put to bear on these issues, there sure seems to be a large component of what I can only call "Motherhood" statements. It looks like my former company's stated aspirations from nearly 10 years ago.