Knowledge management objective
Contents
Definition
A specific improvement in an organization that can be achieved with the use of effective knowledge management
Purpose & benefits
Understanding the KM objective for the organization is critical to determining the KM Strategy and KM Framework.
Description
To determine and/or understand the knowledge management objective(s) is is first important to to understand the business objectives. This means understanding the issues that the business is trying to resolve. For example, is the business trying to increase sales, is it trying to improve marketing campaign results, is it trying to improve communication or is there a collaboration problem that needs to be corrected? Just what is the problem that is being addressed and how does it align with the overall organisational strategy? Understanding the objective(s) underpins not only the selection of the right kind of KM activities and technology but the determination of success criteria and performance management metrics for the KM initiative.
There are four main areas where a KM focus can have impact:
- Operational Excellence aims to improve the internal practices and processes of the organization so that it operates better, faster, cheaper, safer, or cleaner. The crucial knowledge is that of the operational processes.
- Customer Knowledge aims to improve the delivery of knowledge to the customer interface—the people who work with the customers on a day-to-day basis—so that customer relationships are maintained, service levels are high, and sales volumes are increased. In a not-for-profit or non-governmental organization, your “customers” are the beneficiaries of your programs.
- Innovation involves the creation of new knowledge in order to create new products and services.
- Growth and Change involves replicating existing success in new markets or with new staff. It is critical to identify lessons learned and successful practices, so that good practices can be duplicated and mistakes learned from, and to transfer existing knowledge to new staff.
Variations
Implementation guide
See Knowledge management strategy
Success factors
See Knowledge management strategy
Common pitfalls
See Knowledge management strategy
Related articles
Knowledge management framework
