It's all about learning, people.

Section from Knowledge Bird's 2019 Knowledge Management Career Survey.

There's a lot of change going on in the way that organisations work.  For many years we have, generally, carried on in the same manner, working in the same way. Whether this is in IT, HR, Finance, Logistics, Retail, or any other part of the organisation, we've pretty much done things the same way for several years. There have, of course, been small changes in the way things have been done, but, at least within the IT world, we seem to be rolling out new ways of thinking and working at a rather busy rate.

In the last few years we have seen a formalisation of SIAM (Service Integration and Management), VeriSM, ITIL4, COBIT 2019, Lean IT, DevOps, Agile ITSM, Cynefin, etc and along with those approaches, we have introduced teams to ways of thinking and working that have been used elsewhere for a while, like visualisation of work, Kanban, Value Stream Mapping, Theory of Constraints, servant leadership, constant organisational change management, agile management.....a growing list.

Don't get me wrong, this is all very good stuff and is needed in many organisations. Some are further down the path of change than others, but that has always been the case and always will be. 

All these "new" (to some) approaches can be overwhelming. The other weekend I felt like I was back in the technical world, which I left because it was all changing too quickly for my little brain to cope, with what felt like a barrage of new approaches to thinking and working.  However, when you take a step back and think about it over a nice cup of tea, it's not too bad.

Many of the approaches I have mentioned are fundamentally saying the same things. In no particular order and in a very simplified view: 

• Understand how work is done from end to end
• Break work down into manageable chunks
• Collaborate - internally between IT teams, with service providers and with the wider organisation
• Understand how you work and identify areas of improvement. Does it add value? If not should we be doing it?
• Keep improving little bits (just enough is good enough)
• Allow others to know and see what you are doing
• If you can and if it's worthwhile, automate it. 
• Always think of the whole thing (system, organisation, flow, etc), not just your silo, and try and make it better for everyone
• Share knowledge and make it available to everyone when and where they need it.
• Allow people to have time to try things and learn.

​ There's nothing in that list that we shouldn't really be doing in our everyday life, is there?

If there is one key point from everything that is going on, it's that last point: Allow people to have time to try things and learn. In DevOps speak, this is part of the Third Way.  Rob England & Dr Cherry Vu also talk about this in their book "The agile Manager"; Em Campbell-Pretty talks about it in her book "Tribal Unity"; Karen Ferris discusses it in her book "Game On! Change is Constant" and I'm sure in countless other places. 

Knowledge Bird recently published the inaugural Knowledge Management Career Survey and one part of the results jumped out at me.

















​This highlights what we are all trying to do, or should be.  Ways of working are telling us to create environments where people and teams can experiment, try things and learn from it.  We are saying that people need to have time to learn, while at work. This goes beyond only learning something new when sent on a 3 day training course, or having to learn at home.

​This survey points out that among many other things, one of the key things people want to create improved knowledge for, is to "extend capabilities within their role". The teams are telling us all that they want to learn more. The approaches to new ways of working are telling us that we need to create cultures where people can experiment and learn. 

What are you doing to make this happen in your workplace? 

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