What an eye-catching title. I found the idea in this book powerful – that there are business pouches within every
organization, including big corporations, that have already figured out how to do something well, while other business
units needing the
knowledge don’t know where that knowledge resides.
If Only We Knew What We Know is about the transfer of internal knowledge and
best practice of a company. It defines the
need to identify and share best practices inside the company, because winning is impossible without it. As described in the book, with knowledge
management, knowledge can be found and transferred to those who need it when they need it. O’Dell and Jackson Grayson, Jr. have created a well researched, perceived and easy to read knowledge book.
From the first chapter where they report the key insight that knowledge is both explicit and tacit, it makes the book immediately informative and useful. The plain language descriptions of the barriers that hinder transfer of
Know-how will strike a proper chord with all levels in an organization.
Foremost, it’s a book about how to improve the performance of an organization. As well, this book is anchored in real-life case studies and therefore not based on theories or speculation. I found the case histories make the process and the benefits come alive. Nuggets of wisdom like why a company should “understand first, measure second” are interspersed throughout. The book presents lessons learned in the important aspects of people, processes, technology and infrastructure. The references to other sources of information and to practices at well known companies make the book itself a best practice in explicit knowledge sharing.
For a large organization, in particular, I think there is a tremendous opportunity for improvement by sharing internally-developed choices, from units to units. Based on the experiences I have seen as a change agent for a global Information Technology service industry, and my related involvement with process improvements for the Chief Information Officer (CIO) office, this book reflects much of the learning that I have observed. What I find somewhat missing from this excellent book is the perspective of adding external benchmarking to lead over what the internal best practices are.
A particular valuable tool is the Knowledge Management Assessment Tool (KMAT), that can assist organizations assess their strengths as well as weaknesses in managing internal knowledge. As an added benefit, the book reminds us to focus on the customer - that best practices are only best if they are important to the customer. Sound familiar? This message is simply yet beautifully stated. To those interested with knowledge management, consulting practitioners and managers too, I highly recommend this book. If Only We Knew What We Know is one of the best books I've come across out of this valuable subject of knowledge management.
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