Steve Barth | Reflexions

A Reading List for Personal Knowledge Management

I recently created a reading list of materials on PKM. The idea of a "personal" approach to knowledge management has been a focus of my work for more than 10 years now. Originally there were very few of us writing about this topic (Pollard, Skyrme, Cope, Frand, Dorsey, etc) while the idea had some vocal critics (you know who you are). In the past few years, the subject has become both popular and socially acceptable. Along the way, my own views have evolved considerably.

In general, I'm interested in how the individual fits into increasingly social, collaborative and networked views of knowledge, learning and work. On one hand, I have explored the principles, values, skills and tools necessary for each of us to make our best contributions to collective efforts. On the other hand, I have increasingly focused on the notion of "citizenship"as it relates to cognition, cultures and craft in organizations.

You can filter my blogged posts under the category "self-organization" to see thoughts as they emerge. However I have also published dozens of articles on PKM in books, magazines and journals. Here is a brief list (under construction), along with another list of articles by others that I have found useful.

NOTE: My first pass at this page is basically a drag-drop from my citation manager, Mendeley, so apologies for the appalling format and links. I see that there are also many of my favorite references still missing (filed elsewhere), along with dozens of my own articles. I’ll clean it up as soon as I have more time. The best references are highlighted in bold. All of my “Personal Toolkit” columns are still available from KMWorld. My articles from Knowledge Management magazine and destinationKM are not currently online, which I hope to rectify soon.

Please send your suggestions!

Ambiguity: Friend or Enemy?

Chris Jones has an interesting post "On Semantics: Ambiguity is the Enemy." As someone who has spent 30 years writing professionally, I think he makes some very good points.

Our messages get misunderstood, if not ignored, when we're not careful in choosing our words. It's worse if we fail to consider what filters our audience may use to interpret them.

But speaking as someone who has spent 10 years working with disparate cultures, organizations and stakeholders, I find that, quite often, ambiguity is a reliable friend. No matter how precisely we choose our words, we can never assume they will be heard or interpreted exactly as we intend by every recipient. Instead, I find that being deliberately ambiguous forces project participants to collectively negotiate the meaning that will apply to the context at hand. And for the duration, they will own that meaning and take responsibility for its maintenance.

How to Treat Best Practices

Writing for the New York Times, Bruce Buschel is compiling a list of "100 Things Restaurant Staffers Should Never Do" for his new seafood restaurant:

Veteran waiters, moonlighting actresses, libertarians and baristas will no doubt protest some or most of what follows. They will claim it homogenizes them or stifles their true nature. And yet, if 100 different actors play Hamlet, hitting all the same marks, reciting all the same lines, cannot each one bring something unique to that role?

He makes a great point. Working with organizations that want to document and replicate "best practices" I always struggle to balance the advantages of efficiency with the danger of stifling adaptation or innovation. One way is to focus on "worst practices," not best. This warns people away from behaviors or processes that tend not to work, but also encourages them to think about why while giving them more freedom about how to proceed and letting them take ownership of positive actions.

Geert Wilders’ NY Speech: delete or reply?

Thanks for emailing the New York speech by Geert Wilders. My first reaction was simply to delete for the same reason others were clicking forward. But the email helped me understand something I've been working on about the difference between knowing, learning and the replication of information.

My ancestors in Europe (and America) were themselves ostracized, restricted, blamed, persecuted and evicted because of their middle-eastern origins, adherence to timeless religious and cultural beliefs and dietary preferences. So my instinct was to dismiss Wilders as a demagogue. His rhetoric has been used before, almost word for word, to stir fear about Chinese, Catholics, Jews or other groups.

Judging by the American panic his speech has created, Europeans are somewhat more inoculated to it, having been infected before. Are the Dutch any more inconvenienced by Halal than they are by Kosher consumers? Are France's mega-mosques any more threatening to secular society than California's mega-churches? Are there really more hate crimes committed by extremist Muslims in Europe as there are attacks on minorities by radical skinheads? Is a woman's decision to wear a hijab somehow more offensive than a man covering his head with a yarmulke? Should we be any more concerned that Pew found half of French Muslims may put faith before patriotism than that Pew found 40% of Americans see a conflict between religious teachings and modern society (although US Muslims, Jews, Buddhists and Hindus each only surveyed at about 30%)? And are demands for Islamic holidays more ominous than similar demands to take off on Columbus Day, St. Patrick's Day or Yom Kippur?

Our Little Robot Turns Four

I like to tell people that there is no better knowledge management technology than a good coffee machine. Coffee is an attractor, bringing people into an ideal state for reflection, insight, conversation and collaboration.

In 2005, we bought a super-automatic espresso machine, as a consolation for not remodeling the whole kitchen: Gaggia Synchrony Compact purchased from Whole Latte Love for about $650. It was Achille Gaggia who invented the modern espresso machine in 1938, which uses steam pressure to extract the best flavor and aroma from ground beans, along with the signature crema—the golden brown foam of nitrogen bubbles that smooth out the experience of drinking an espresso.

A super-automatic is essentially a coffee-making robot, Put whole beans in the hopper and fill the water reservoir, and the Synchrony grinds and pumps cups of espresso or crema coffee at the touch of a button at the perfect pressure and temperature. Then the mechanism expels the spent puck and readies itself for the next shot. Our preferred way to enjoy coffee is to express about 2-4oz of coffee and then add an ounce or less of milk or creamer to cut the acidity of the coffee. In Spain and Latin America, this is often called a cortado.

Digitizing or Indigenizing Knowledge?

Comparing "traditional knowledge" (as in indigenous communities) to "traditional science" (as in scientific method) offers a useful metaphor—and perhaps a better model—for the problem of constructing KM solutions, which are typically approached as an extension of "scientific management" even though organizational interventions respond better to anthropological approaches rather than technological ones.

Knowledge in the Wild

The International Council for Science defines traditional knowledge as the accumulated learning, skills, and practices maintained by communities with long experience in their environments. That knowledge informs day-to-day decisions and long-term worldviews on practical and fundamental aspects of a group's practices.

"Traditional knowledge" suggests (wrongly) that this knowledge is rooted in the past without necessarily renewing itself, which it does. "Indigenous knowledge" is a better term, emphasizing the situation of knowledge: its inextricable link to place and context. This situated knowledge is almost always framed by social responsibility and long-term sustainability. Nevertheless, it tends to sound like "common sense" (which it is, literally) about practical advice and everyday reality, albeit based on a long view stretching back generations, centuries or longer. It also balances collective and individual stewardship for the knowledge that is vital if the group is to survive and thrive.

Caldey Gets Broadband

 

The Cistercian Brothers of Caldey Abbey upgraded last summer to 30mps broadband beamed over from the mainland. The first monastics settled on the Welsh island in the 6th century. But lately, Caldey's online perfume business has outgrown dialup. According to the lamentations of the Abbot, Father Daniel, "Patience is one of the characteristics of monastic life, but even the patience of the Brothers was being tested by our slow Internet." (If you ask me, they were an ideal candidate for cloud computing.)

I visited the monastery on a wintry Christmas weekend when I was a travel writer during the 1980s and published a sketch in Islands magazine …

Paradise is a concept invariably associated with islands. Caldey has no barrier reef, no blue lagoon or swaying palms. But there are many different kinds of islands. And many different kinds of paradise.

PS-Probably just a coincidence, but someone nicknamed "Caldey Abbey" is tagging a lot of music on Amazon.com: symphonic metal (114), melodic metal (68), progressive metal (52), power metal (29), death metal (22), gothic metal (21), epic metal (19), black metal (16), opera metal (11), neoclassical metal (10), folk metal (9), doom metal (3), fantasy metal (2)…

Organisms, Organizations and Systems

We are each organisms inside of organizations, simultaneously independent agents and components of larger systems. We co-evolve reacting to each other and together are incremental creators—and creations—of the system.

Sensing our environment is information. Reacting to our environment is learning. Repeating the reaction is called knowledge. Knowledge is more efficient than learning. However, adapting to changes in the environment requires learning.

The simplest organism capable of responding to its environment makes that environment a complex adaptive system. The only difference for humans is an awareness of systems and selves. All organisms operate in systems where many factors are beyond their control. All systems are parts of larger systems, subject to conditions beyond their control.

 

Unfilling the Cup

Learning is harder than knowing. It requires effort both to grasp and to release previously held beliefs…

Nan-in, a Japanese master during the Meiji era, received a university professor who came to inquire about Zen. Nan-in served tea. He poured his visitor's cup full, and then kept on pouring. The professor watched the overflow until he could no longer restrain himself. "It is overfull. No more will go in!"

"Like this cup," Nan-in said, "you are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup?"

Zen Flesh, Zen Bones by Paul Reps and Nyogen Senzaki (Tuttle)

Trust Pays Off in Productivity

Is trust important in the workplace? More than you think. You'll perform better when you trust you managers. But it makes even more of a difference when workers know they are trusted.

"A Closer Look at Trust Between Managers and Subordinates: Understanding the Effects of Both Trusting and Being Trusted on Subordinate Outcomes" by Brower, Lester, Korsgaard and Dineen in the Journal of Management, March 1, 2009

Despite previous calls to examine trust from the perspectives of both the manager and subordinate, most studies have exclusively focused on trust in the manager. The authors propose that trust in the subordinate has unique consequences beyond trust in the manager. Furthermore, they propose joint effects of trust such that subordinate behavior and intentions are most favorable when there is high mutual trust. Findings reveal unique relationships of trust in manager and trust in subordinate on performance, organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), and intentions to quit. Furthermore, the interaction of trust in manager and trust in subordinate predicts individual-directed OCB in the hypothesized direction.