Knowledge workers - Protect Your Loot
It seems that a disadvantage of moving to a paperless office is that things are…well…paperless. The tangible nature of things encourages people to store them in places where they are less likely to be damaged or stolen - fireproof safes, records storage, etc.
As we forge further into the knowledge economy one thing to keep in mind is that our digital documents are just as valuable as their paper-based ancestors. I’m preaching from a pulpit of experience here - recently I allowed a family member that was a self-proclaimed computer pro to do what we thought were some simple updates to my laptop. Five hours and many expletives later he was finished. I awoke the next morning and and when I fired up the machine all emails, contacts, calendar entries and 1,000s of saved reference sites and documents were sorely missed.
I was able to retrieve the documents through an on-line back-up service I was using and I saved my contacts due to my BlackBerry - my emails and calendar items were gone for good.
This experience forever etched in my brain the delicate nature of the goods with which we work now in a knowledge economy. Not being able to recover these things would be akin to a manufacturing shop losing their tools and machines during the industrial age. When those items are tangible it can be easier to remember to lock them away for safekeeping - when they’re digital sometimes it’s less obvious.
I’ve heard many people say “I’ve been meaning to back this up for a long time.” yet they ensure their cars and homes are locked and jewelry is stowed.
Learn from me and others (and perhaps your own experience) and ensure the goods and tools of your knowledge work is protected just the way you would your gear during the Industrial Age. It can be quite painful otherwise.
October 10th, 2008 No Comments »
Back-to-back for the mighty Gators
I am a proud Alumni of the University of Florida. Monday night the Gators beat Ohio State to win the National Championship in basketball just a few months after they beat Ohio State to win the National Championship in football.
Even better, the Gators won the basketball tournament last year as well. One of the announcers Monday night explained what Billy Donovan (Florida’s head coach) had done in the months leading up to last night’s victory while in the shadow of last year’s win…
He talked to others that had done it too. Bill Bellichick of the New England Patriots was a common confidante along with Rick Pitino - both of which have secured their back-to-back wins.
Stellar coaches are not the only ones that can benefit from this tactic because this is how all people learn. What opportunities are there in your organization to put people in contact with others that have been through what they are going through, that have solved the challenges they are facing or that are utilizing a similar strategy?
This can be in the form of a full-blown community of practice or a simple introduction among peers that may just last through lunch.
Leave it to me to find a parallel between this great acheivement in sports and informal learning but hey…it’s what I do.
April 4th, 2007 No Comments »
What to do with a new manager? March is the time to find out
LCB is at it again this month with another great big question - or is it a great, big question? And…has it been a month already???
The question for March is:
What would you do to support new managers?
Ray Sims was the first to post and proposed utilizing audio self-paced learning, coaching and a community of practice. Ray is targeting two areas that have been proven to speed someone’s integration into a new role:
- Quickly becoming part of a network
- Relevant knowledge is distributed through-out a long period time
There is too much stuff for people to remember; especially when starting a new role. Learning to me is about providing easy access to information at the time people need it. Audio learning, coaching and a thriving community will certainly go a long way in providing muliple access points to the information a new manager will need.
I feel there is also room for another piece here as well. If learning is about access to information, how do you ensure new managers will experience lasting change in skills, mindset or behavior? Just as they develop at anything else…practice.
An integration period is a prime time for new managers to participate in an action learning project. In an ideal world their groups would consist of other managers at various stages of their management career. The initial sessions would immerse the new manager in activities to heighten self-awareness (i.e. a 360 degree assessment conducted in their former position, a Myers-Briggs or DISC report, a natural abilities test, etc.) after which participants list which areas in which they would like to develop. Next, the managers are exposed to some foundational content (my favorites are Appreciative Inquiry and systems thinking) that will be the concepts to which they’ll be held accountable throughout the program.
A relevant, timely business challenge is presented to the participants and they are responsible for all data collection, solution design and execution. All the while a learning coach acts as an embedded reminder to participants of their individual development goals as well as referring them back to concepts from the initial workshops. Over the course of a few months participants present a solution to the business challenge. Throughout the time they have been forced to reflect on their own behavior and new concepts via the action learning coach.
It is only through being made to apply the concepts that participants will be quicker to adopt any new behaviors, mindsets and skills needed to be a manager. Along the way a cross-functional network of managers of varying tenure will be formed and provide a solid foundation for knowledge transfer and knowledge management. This will also serve to support the overall company-wide community that Ray suggested. As the grayer managers move on, relationships have formed and developed the infrastructure for the insights, experience and stories to be passed on to the newer managers.
This combination of learning and development create a killer combo for the rapid on-boarding of managers. It’s not successful because the new-comers are going in to management roles, though. It’s successful because the new-comers are human and that’s the way we learn and develop.
The beauty is that this is a foundation that can be tweaked for positions all throughout the organization - not just managers.
March 15th, 2007 6 Comments »
