Knowledge management = creating environments for learning

One of the recent additions to my feed subscriptions is Confused of Calcutta by JP Rangaswami. Recently, he’s been thinking about Facebook and its potential role in Enterprise settings. Today’s installment has an interesting riff on the nature of knowledge management. It dovetails nicely with some of the things I’ve had to say about visibility and knowledge work.

Facebook and the Enterprise: Part 5: Knowledge Management

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Knowledge management is not really about the content, it is about creating an environment where learning takes place. Maybe we spend too much time trying to create an environment where teaching takes place, rather than focus on the learning.

Since people want to learn by watching others, what we need to do is to improve the toolsets and the environment that allows people to watch others. It could be as simple as: What does my boss do? Whom does she talk to? What are her surfing habits like? Whom does she treat as high priority in terms of communications received? What applications does she use? Which ones does she not use? When she has a particular Ghost to deal with, which particular Ghostbuster does she call?

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