Knowledge Management, Meta Data, and the Organization

My last piece on this subject tried to cover the whole topic of knowledge management in a single page. We'll call that the overview, or the introduction, but it's time to explain a few things in a little more detail. KM is a hot topic in some circles, but unfortunately it's a phrase that most people misunderstand instinctively. What does the word "knowledge" mean to you? You probably answered with something like "whatever you know", which is true... and that's the problem. When discussing KM, knowledge changes from "something you know" to "something your organization knows".

The goal of a KM system (KMS) is to make the information gathered/produced by each individual (in the organization) available to any and every other part of the organization that might need it, and only when they need it. For an example we'll again look to our own minds. The human brain is filled with a massive amount of knowledge: the interrelationships of people, places, things, and ideas. All of that knowledge is available to the individual whenever it's needed... or almost so, anyway. Barring damage of some sort, the brain can recall virtually anything, and those things recalled the most often are also recalled quickest. Just as important as knowledge recall, though, is knowledge blocking, or filters. How could we function if all of our knowledge was "at the front of our minds" all the time? If every thought, experience and task reminded us of everything we know, we'd be paralyzed. That's what the filters do: they keep the unrelated stuff out, and let the relevant knowledge through. (Of course, it's not perfect... the stray thought does zoom through occasionally, but then it's hard to say exactly how "perfect filters" would work.)

Now, back to the organization. All of the different parts of the organization are producing information and developing knowledge, all the time. Think of this organization as an individual brain: the knowledge that's developed by one member or department must be available to other parts of the organization when they need it. Those who specialize in KM (those who write software specifically for managing an organization's knowledge) would like nothing more than to develop a "hive mind" at the organization. Literally, if such a thing were possible, each member of the organization would be able to share his knowledge with anyone else who needs it, in real time, exactly like a brain cell. Unfortunately that's not possible, so computers must take the place of the hive mind. When someone in the organization needs to know about something, the computer must be used to translate the request for knowledge from the person's input to something the computer can work with (one or more database queries, usually), gather the information, filter out the irrelevant bits, and present the filtered, contextual knowledge back to the person.

That's the idea, anyway. Try that on the web, and you'll probably be swamped with information. (When's the last time you did a search on the web where most of the results contained what you wanted to find?) Most organizational networks are as useful (useless) as the web, in this regard. There are two reasons: a lack of meta information (information that describes the information), and poorly written searches. The hypothetical "perfect KM system" will do this as efficiently and effectively as the best human mind. Such a system will probably never exist, but what's amazing is the dramatic improvements that can be made to existing systems with very minor changes. (Even more amazing is how very few organizations take advantage of these things.)

Consider the first of the two reasons that most intranets are so useless: lack of meta information. If an organization has an intranet, then it's probably just full of useless bulletins and other information that's carefully filtered through an editorial department. Those few that actually allow (almost) anyone to post their knowledge have the opposite problem: too much is available, and searching through it involves simple word searches. That's the problem with the web: too much information, and no good way to filter it! The solution is to add meta data. Even a tiny bit of meta data can make a huge difference! Want proof? Compare Google's search engine with Web Crawler's. Google is much more likely to show relevant links at the beginning of the list because it gives a lot of weight to two pieces of meta data: the page title, and the number of other pages that link to that page.

The page title is meta data. Really! It's not the content of the page, it's a short bit of text that the author has written to describe the contents of that document. So when you search for your name on the web, which page is more likely to contain information about you: a page that's been titled with your name, or a page that mentions your name somewhere in the text? Obviously, the former. Google figured that out better than anyone else, and uses that (along with lots of other things) to make their search engine better. So to make the information on an intranet useful as knowledge, meta data must be added, indexed, and used. Unfortunately, this is the point where you step out of the theory of KM, and into the hard light of implementation reality: people are lazy.

There are two ways to deal with that fact. First, you can make meta data a required part of the information submission process (remember that in the database it's just info: it's not knowledge until someone uses it) and to do that you must make it very easy to specify meta data. Second, you can let the computer specify the meta data. There's a lot of R&D going into this area right now, everybody with a "high-end" KMS is hoping to use Artificial Intelligence to apply the meta data, freeing the individuals from a task they usually won't (and don't) do if given the choice. This is a frustrating problem, because meta data is usually easier to write than the data itself. For example, a keywords field on this article would probably contain "organization knowledge management km kms meta data meta data artificial intelligence". That only took about 30 seconds, compared with hours to write this article, and typing it into a special "keywords field" is just as easy as typing it into the article itself. Unfortunately making it easy isn't enough: people need to believe it's important, and know that it's required. Buy-in and enforcement. What type of meta data is needed? What's the best KMS (or at least the best type of KMS) for the organization? These and other questions wil have to wait for my next article.

Deepa Singh

Business Developer

Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com

Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com

Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

KMWorld's 100 Companies That Matter in Knowledge Management

“The reports of my death are an exaggeration,” the great Mark Twain famously remarked in 1897 upon hearing accounts of his own passing. I’ve been fascinated by recent posts here on CMSWire assessing the health (or lack thereof) of “knowledge management” and debating whether it is dead, dying or will morph entirely with what most people in the CMS Wire community have come to label and know as “social business.” As some have noted, one of the underlying challenges associated with even having this discussion is that definitions around the terms “knowledge management” and “social business” are broad, fluid and in regular flux. That being said, the ongoing debate has been interesting to read and I wanted to throw my hat in the ring, based on some direct perspectives from the front lines:

Within the enterprise, it is becoming impossible to have one without the other

Regardless of exact definitions, as companies try to find their way and their place in the social space, knowledge management and the need for it is NOT going to die. In fact, I believe the needs will only increase as more employees have access and curiosity develops for more information via the continued growth of social collaboration solutions At a base level, this means enterprise search becomes an even more critical part of both knowledge management and social business — empowering employees at all levels to easily and efficiently find the information they’re looking to get. From there, they can deploy this knowledge toward what they do each day.

The perceived decline in knowledge management has happened because of accessibility and because of poorly designed solutions, pure and simple. Rank-and-file employees and even those who specialize in knowledge management cannot easily find the tools, data and documents they need to share information — or worse yet, to function more productively within the enterprise. So for those of us on the social business side of things, there is considerable opportunity — and even a responsibility — to develop solutions that enable employees to more easily search for and find what they need and collaborate more effectively with, or based on the knowledge at-hand. Not to be a broken record, but user experience really matters and this is yet another example of why.

Social business should be about making knowledge management better, not killing it

Just like Microsoft Office made it easy and efficient to bounce between Word and Excel, there is a critical need to make it easier and more efficient for people in the enterprise to access and use knowledge, regardless of platforms As things stand in early 2012, there remains a fundamental inability and challenge to connect-the-dots with and among all different platforms: Yammer, Jive, SharePoint, and others provide so much promise, but the difficulty in navigating or understanding all of them at once can intimidate the most seasoned knowledge management worker, let alone rank-and-file employees. For example, there are a lot of employees who don’t understand how micro-blogging, activity feeds and communities make them more productive, as many rightly see it as a potential distraction to their work at-hand.

The promise for productivity will lie in being able to pull all of these solutions together in ways that make sense and make knowledge sharing and management more efficient and effective than before. There are some promising areas within SharePoint and elsewhere, so we as an industry should be scoping out these possibilities rather than drafting obituaries. It is difficult to imagine how point solutions will fare in the new world of work if they don’t easily communicate with already installed productivity solutions — ie: Office, SharePoint, Lync and Exchange.

Deepa Singh
Business Developer
Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com
Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com
Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

Knowledge Management: Why and how?

Knowledge Management is not just a new buzzword doing rounds in the corporate circle. The `tech concept' is increasingly becoming a must to share, mobilize and leverage knowledge as a tangible organizational asset

Why manage knowledge?

The need for knowledge management is self-explicit. With increasing competition, knowledge about how to produce and sell a service or a product efficiently has become the key factor distinguishing companies. There has also been an explosion in such knowledge in line with the increase in the complexity of the products and services. At the same time, many organisations have been downsizing in a bid to reduce employee costs. As a result, the number of people privy to organisational knowledge is smaller. High employee turnover--another feature of modern business--therefore increases the threat to this key intellectual asset of the company.  While the importance of knowledge management is widely recognized, the formal methods for preserving and propagating knowledge are few. Most knowledge transfers still happen informally through oral means. The "guru-shivery" tradition of ancient India or the more recent practices of apprentices in the trades, articled clerks in chartered accountant firms, junior lawyers in law firms are a few examples of formal mechanisms adopted for knowledge transfer.

Data-information-knowledge

The difficulty in managing knowledge is in defining knowledge. We are all familiar with data, the basic raw material, which is processed to generate information. We store structured data (employee salary details, for example) in databases. Unstructured data lies in text documents (say, the annual performance appraisal report of the employees). As stated by Peter Drucker when "data is endowed with relevance and purpose" it becomes information. Thus salary data can be analysed to generate information about the region-wise staff costs. So far so good.

However, there is less agreement on the value addition needed to convert information to knowledge--the discussion can quickly get lost into obscure by-lanes of philosophy. Instead of quibbling about the definition we will move on to the concept of "tacit" knowledge, which, according to Michael Polanyi, is based on the experiences, beliefs and values of the expert and is latent in his head. Tacit knowledge is communicated, if imperfectly, by face-to face dialogue with the expert. As against this is the "explicit" knowledge that is capable of being recorded and accessed relatively easily by others.

Approaches to knowledge management

One approach to knowledge management places greater emphasis on the cultural and behavioural aspects of the organisation. This approach believes that organisations are process driven and technology is of little use if the organisation lacks a knowledge-sharing culture. This approach is loosely related to the management disciplines of total quality management, business process re-engineering, benchmarking and best practices. The mechanistic approach to knowledge management is more down to earth. It concentrates on providing efficient tools to capture, organise and access knowledge as well as to facilitate its delivery to the right people at the right time.

Categorization is key

The tools used for knowledge capture include the existing groupware applications like Lotus Notes, which facilitate collaborative working in a group. Document management software that helps index images of paper documents as well as to read them using optical character recognition technology also falls in the same category. Once you have identified the sources of knowledge and converted them into electronic form--whether as document images, databases, word processing files, web pages or email folders--the next challenge for KM tools is to facilitate quick access to meaningful knowledge. This poses great difficulties. The plain vanilla search tools will not do because they will return an unmanageable large list of files and documents, which meet your search criteria. (How will you wade through them to locate the knowledge about analyzing balance sheets of firms belonging to the sugar industry?)

The first step to improve the chances of meaningful knowledge access is to build a comprehensives classified catalogue--called taxonomy in KM jargon--which will define the categories in which you would want to classify the knowledge base of your organisation. This is a manual task, which should be carried out by experienced domain specialists with the assistance of librarians. Obviously the more comprehensive the catalogue the better would be the subsequent retrieval. (A category called "balance sheet" and another one called "sugar industry" will not do since that is still not fine enough for you to locate a shortlist of documents relating to analysis of balance sheet of sugar industry).

Deepa Singh

Business Developer

Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com

Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com

Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

Offshore E-Learning Solutions

Education is the root of the growth of the economy, especially in developing countries like India are still many people are uneducated and will remain as a result of growth and unaware of the possibilities around them. We find that education is expensive, and are committed to higher education is even more expensive to keep so much of the uneducated masses, and many, many students who complete their training on half way. With the rapid growth of Internet and multimedia technology has come closer to the world and under the conditionus many advantages over older technologies and learning methods to maintain student interest and provides extensible, rich self-learning with the integration of physically.

Learning has become easier, distance is no longer an obstacle. Compared to classroom learning, online learning is cheaper, easily available and accessible with rich resources. Those who want to learn, but do not spend enough, you must not worry, many institutions offer online Education. This survey shows that the industrial world of e-learning is worth 38 billion euros. E-learning means learning Electronics is a computer-based learning that allows you to increase the quality of your education by providing more resources online and expand your knowledge. E-learning is basically focusing and targeting 5 major sectors – consulting, content, technology , services and support.

Why E-learning is the most preferred choice these days for the mediation > Knowledge, training or teaching in schools, universities, companies, industries and companies or groups? E-learning market is focused on e-learning assets, e-learning objects, flexible e-learning content creation and integration services platform. E-learning is not a technical limit, or a platform for learning practices so that they, ultimately, the best of our knowledge and management solutions for the dissemination of knowledge are defined. With the technology of mediation> Knowledge and Learning, is the formation of the industry has seen a steep rise. E-Learning solutions are web-effectively provide usable content, flexibility in delivery, reporting and management. For example, 2006 survey figures that nearly 1000 million videos are downloaded every day from Youtube visitors. Let us discuss types of e-learning:

Virtual classroom is a kind of distributed learning environment, inculcate synchronous content and experiences. Virtual Learning Modeland accepts the structure and the services of formal e-learning program to earn online distance learning degrees. Learning materials, online tutorials are made available, places for the posting reviews, comments, questions have been raised in this virtual paradigm provided. Virtual classroom is touching all vertical markets, because they are easy to use and Web applications. You can provide learning management system (LMS easy) for the management of various contemporary units, this training methodology. Online Learning is another e-learning paradigm that depends on the course structure and teaching material on the Internet (in PDF format delivered in general) for the learner via a computer network technology with digital interface.

Rapid E-learning is used mainly for training / education of non-technical students, the most gripping Adobe Learning tools or objects to learners through the creation of rich learning content to lure Flash. This education different destinations experts (SMEs) and studentsshared e-learning content as a stand-alone multimedia portfolio element in a secure environment. Mobile Learning is another e-learning paradigm based on the availability of portable digital devices and ubiquitous network allows you to exchange information and experience, if you move on to. With Flash and multimedia applications have penetration of WebSphere, dynamic web pages started replacing older static websites. E-learning has also productive access to online learningby imparting knowledge in a simplified and interactive way quickly and easily. The quality of education has also greatly improved and improving economic conditions of developing countries. Proportion of online students increased from day to day, so many institutions offer online courses at a lower interest rate. E-learning, you helped to make the higher education of your desired location.

Distance learning has to be agile as different technologies used with e-learning. BlendedLearning is gaining visibility as an e-learning program offers distance learning and face-to-ask. In higher education, and Managed Virtual Learning Environment will be provided to manage all aspects of the online course through a consistent user interface across the network. Many online institutions have begun, with academic degrees online, providing online support and online learning materials / manuals, buy online text-books, online registration, online checking out online forms,Online counseling and at times face-to-face learning. E-learning offers the flexibility to learn, from any place, if you have Internet access available, there is no time limit e-classes can make students asynchronous access, and there are no processing costs here. Initial development costs are high, but they decrease exponentially with the increase in the number of learners. Major pitfall is no coincidence that the students for face-to-face interaction; get results is poor in case of cooperative work permit.

Many technologies are in e-learning, these technologies are broadly into 2 groups: sync (exchange of information at the same time shared with other participants, regardless, for example, online chat) and asynchronous (participants to a certain point , such as blogs), forums. E-learning services are based CBL (Computer Learning for learning with computers), using CBT (Computer Based Training for the training of people to computer applications), WBL (WebInternet-based training with interactive methods such as bulletin boards), video conferencing. In short, I would say that the Internet is the best collection of online data, smuggle, distribute its resources to different channels with e-learning extraction of most of it, and to promote in an interactive way to and usable strong sense of social presence . Online Education, online degree, virtual universities, traditional universality

Deepa Singh

Business Developer

Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com

Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com

Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com.

Asset – make your knowledge management

Sharing knowledge

As CEO of your company, it is your job to grow your business, the face of your company and the development of new products or services. This means to convey your knowledge to your team so that they can deal with the day to day, your business without you. This is very hard as an entrepreneur, because your company is "your baby." Remember, parents must let their children so that they can grow. Likewise, you need to grow your business. Ie, give your team the information they need to keep your business running smoothly, whether you are.

Schedule Knowledge "Download" Meetings

Schedule regular meetings or phone calls to your team kept informed of any new opportunities, changes in customer, project progress, products or information that may affect their work or your business. This also means the exchange of information that is relevant to your industry or your competition by. An informed and empowered employeesso that from day to day in your company without cause itself. It also makes the employees feel involved in the success of your business. And, as Martha Stewart says: "This is a good thing."

New Info Library

Creating an information library is a great way to share knowledge. It optimizes knowledge and power and prevents redundancy.For example, if you produce client presentations, marketing materials, website content or processes to considerthis information in a common file such as Google Docs or on your in-house server. Your employees can pull themselves out of these docs when creating new documents, instead of starting from scratch, which can be a huge waste of time and money. Libraries also contribute information to the consistency in communication6.s and brand management. Ideally, create templates that you enterprise-wide application that the coherence strengthened. Even using templates according to their own guidelines as a business leader, reflect, shareTheir visions and expectations with your team that creates the cohesion and quality assurance.

Creating Processes

Processes can provide companies with liquid flow and quality control. They often show a way for the complementary products and services, which means more money, develop. Processes to create schedules for your team then took the guesswork as you want – and expect – to be done. Processes to maximize time and ensures consistency within the Organization and the customer interface. Promotion of team input on the processes and your employees can receive information that can affect the process. It is so important for your team to share their knowledge with you and your colleagues as you share your knowledge with them. Employees often have insights and information but do not take the above as the time to listen.

Make a plan. Set Goals.

Many entrepreneurs "Shoot From TheHip. "They deal with issues as they arise. While that would certainly be understandable (especially for young start-ups), it is important to be as clear as possible about your long-term and short-term objectives so that your team can target their efforts and assets with these objectives.

The setting of targets and clarifying the strategies needed to achieve these objectives allows an optimal sharing of knowledge. Why? Because if your team is pleased about your goals, it is clear they can realize what is necessary to help youreach those targets. The key is clear and specific in your goals and strengthen your team helps you achieve these goals. Create an open platform where your skills and goals for your business. Then ask your team how they can help achieve these goals. You will be surprised at the hidden reserves, resources and knowledge your team if you show them the possibility of a part of the success of your business.

Ready to Set YourselfUp for Success?

Are you interested in creating a system that puts you, your team and your company for success, but not sure how to get started? Whether you're a one-woman operation, a 50-person department head or CEO of a company are, is there a way to

Deepa Singh
Business Developer
Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com
Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com
Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

Leveraging The Enterprise-Wide Knowledge Base

The safety and efficacy in the Six Sigma project relies heavily on the effective use of enterprise-wide knowledge of the implementation of the project team. Hope for the best would hardly make sense if the team lacks overall knowledge of the goals, customs and the wealth of knowledge and practices throughout the organization in specific and cross-industry knowledge in general. It is well know for the implementation of the project team is essential for alternative Practices and strategies within the organization are available, and current status of the project.

Existing businesses benefit from the Knowledge Base in Six Sigma

To expand the knowledge, than in any of the following companies:

1. The How and Why of the process, the implementation of the objectives and change management strategies
2. The knowledge about the company, including the goals and the current co-existence of alternatives, etc.

But it is easystriking that the availability of information is available on both a chronic shortage. The way to look at moving situations like this with the familiar tools for knowledge sharing such as brainstorming, innovation and organization of ideas that help will be ideas from the box.In essence, Six Sigma is not self-sufficient, and somehow, inexplicably, still in a rut that it is enough to solve the problem, if one is found alive. So, as a logical Therefore, they wont habits, the lines between tool-specific knowledge and skills, the missed opportunities due to lack of initiatives for innovation and broader perspectives will be drawn.

Valuable land out of knowledge about the project

Enterprise-wide knowledge is quite capable of an all around contribution to the overall cause of the Six Sigma implementation. Combat a complex problem with problem-specific specialization is meaningless and the efficiency of project teams on edge.Take a look at DMAIC again in the measurement of the stage, choosing the right metrics is only half the job. But the knowledge about how to simplify and easy, and in the control of the stage things rationally question: How could anything be better? Why was it errors, such as measurement and control processes for the best implementation can be automated, etc.

Opportunities for the use of Enterprise Wide> Knowledge

Take the 2-bodies, which are very effective ways of knowledge to the surface.

1. Retrospect Retrospect than the profits of a pilot project or a current project and discuss the reports of an inspection. Retrospect provides an insight into the reasons for success or failure to win.
2. Action Reviews This is a fact-finding exercise on the difference between two parameters, such as focus, what has happened and whatplanned.

Access to enterprise knowledge can be possible not only by the violent property. Use of sympathetic and facilitation techniques must be used to make cross-departmental knowledge. Some other techniques to bring this knowledge to the surface, are hereinafter

1. Peer Assist Program, the face-to-face interactions
2. Rating contextual relationships between the projects
3. Final, stage-specific, project documentation

Deepa Singh
Business Developer
Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com
Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com
Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

Dispelling the myths on Knowledge Management

mba students at the global business school (gbs) recently had the opportunity to interact with one of the leading authorities on knowledge management and strategic management ron sanchez, professor of strategy and technology management at international institute for management development, lausanne, switzerland. sanchez, who has authored several books on knowledge management and strategic management, remarked, "knowledge management is an essential part of strategic management process. in the knowledge economy, organisations are no longer driven by their physical assets but by the value of their knowledge." suggesting that there is a confusion about what knowledge management exactly is, sanchez added, "people tend to use the terms data, information, and knowledge interchangeably, but the three concepts are quite distinct theoretically and in practice. until we get straight the essential differences between data, information, and knowledge, it is impossible to design or implement a real knowledge management system." he then explained, "data are simply observations, often including some form of measurement. information, however, is the meaning derived through the interpretation of data. essentially, information is the discovery or awareness of patterns in data. knowledge results when our interpretation of available information - ie, patterns in data - leads us to identify and believe in cause and effect relationships. these essential interpretive processes must be there to progress from data to information to knowledge." sanchez emphasised that it is like the nervous system of an organisation. he said, "it gives an organisation powerful tools for making sense out of data and information, and for disseminating and implementing new knowledge within an organisation. every activity that we perform today in most organisations is supported by it facility of some kind. in knowledge management activities, it is an essential enabling technology." sanchez, nevertheless, refuted the idea that knowledge management is all about it. asserting that knowledge management is a fundamental process of the knowledge economy, he remarked, "knowledge management comprises three main factors - designing learning cycles into all activities of an organisation; developing ways of systematic applying new knowledge in the activities of the organisation; and in the process finding ways to help convert the personal knowledge of individuals into organisational knowledge, and vice versa." sanchez has been developing a new perspective called 'competence-based strategic management'. the genesis of this new approach to strategic management lies in the notion of organisational 'core competence', introduced by indian american management guru c k prahalad and garry hamel in early 90s. sanchez's approach goes beyond and attempts to create a bridge between the internal capabilities of an organisation with its external competitive environment. in this approach, competence is a property of the organisation as a system. "competence is the ability of an organisation to sustain coordinated deployments of resources in ways that enable the organisation to achieve its goals," sanchez said. "to achieve true organisational competence requires principles for the design of organisations as flexible, adaptive, open systems."

Deepa Singh
Business Developer
Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com
Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com
Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

Knowledge Management Strategy: Beyond Change Management

Knowledge Management (KM) is a relatively young concept, having been introduced less than 30 years ago. For many business management practitioners, KM is evolving into a proven strategy for their organizational success. But there are still many leaders out there that are struggling to understand the power of KM. In order to clarify this ongoing struggle, it's important to define what KM means in today's business setting. An extremely important question is: What is Knowledge Management and how can it help my organization? 

There are many definitions for knowledge management, including Wikipedia's that states KM comprises of a range of practices used in an organization to identify, create, represent, distribute and enable adoption of insights and experiences. I'm partial to a definition I found in a thesis paper written by Dr. Michael Kull that simply defines KM as a business model for which companies can move from an industrial age of running a business into the information age. I don't know which one of Dr Kull's interviewees stated this definition, but for me, it sums up my feelings on how KM is changing the way businesses ought to be run today and into the future. KM is a relatively new model and has only been around since the mid 1980s. There have been may pioneers who have written and spoken about KM, and Peter Drucker,a business management expert and author, has been on of the most influential and prolific thinkers about the KM movement. 

The pioneers describe KM as having three phases from its inception. The approximate phase dates reflect the first phase occurring from 1985 to 1994. This phase was centered on collaboration and information sharing. The second phase, from 1994 to 2002, centered on information management and software advancements. The third phase, from 2002 to the present, centers knowledge innovation and the management of intellectual capital and intellectual assets as the primary business strategy. Phase three will continue to impact how leaders conduct business processes such as customer management, marketing management, information management and performance management. For example, with the advancement of Web 2.0 technologies, workers are able to communicate and share in multiple formats like the popular social media sites or in company blogs, wikis or private web portals known as intranets. 

The KM movement is shifting from the old school process of team meetings and water cooler discussions to the online world of instant messaging, emails, twitter (a micro blogging platform), Facebook and online virtual meetings. It is a larger model than just implementing change management initiatives seen during the total quality movement and six sigma days. As workers and business processes continue to evolve with these technology enablers,leaders are being challenged to re-tool how they lead knowledge workers. The old management process of building organization charts in a hierarchy fashion is being enveloped by empowered workers who don't want to be controlled, but rather allowed to be innovative and creative to build customer value. The 20th century business leadership curriculum is in conflict with how 21st century workers expect to be lead. KM is at the heart of this leadership evolution being witnessed today. KM as a management strategy is definitely gaining traction and is here to stay.

Deepa Singh
Business Developer
Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com
Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com
Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

Knowledge Management (KM)

refers to a range of practices and techniques used by organizations to identify, represent and distribute knowledge, know-how, expertise, intellectual capital and other forms of knowledge for leverage, reuse and transfer of knowledge and learning across the organization. It suffices crucial issues on organizational adaptation, survival, and competence threatened by unpredictable environmental change. Generally, it represents the organizational processes that aim synchronous coalition of data and information processing capacity of information technologies, and the ingenious capacity of human beings. In simpler terms, knowledge management strives to make the most out of the knowledge that is available to an organization, generating understanding, incrementing awareness and knowledge in the process. 

Knowledge management is an evolving discipline. While knowledge transfer (an aspect of KM) has always existed in one form or another, formally through apprenticeship, the maintenance of corporate libraries, professional training and mentoring programs, and — since the late twentieth century — technologically through knowledge bases, expert systems, and other knowledge repositories, KM programs claim to consciously evaluate and manage the process of accumulation, creation and application of knowledge which is also referred to by some as intellectual capital. KM has therefore attempted to bring under one rubric various strands of thought and practice relating to intellectual capital in the economy; the idea of the learning organization; various enabling organizational practices; and various enabling technologies. 

Knowledge management may be viewed from different perspectives. Techno-centric view focuses on technologies, ideally those that enhance knowledge sharing & growth, frequently any technology that does fancy stuff with information. Theoretical view concentrates on the underlying concepts of knowledge and truth. People view engages on bringing people together and helping them exchange knowledge. Process view endeavors on the processes of knowledge creation, transmission, transformation, and others. Organizational, ponders on ‘How does the organization need to be designed to facilitate knowledge processes?' and ‘Which organizations work best with what processes?' And ecological contemplates the interaction of people, identity, knowledge and environmental factors as a complex adaptive system In addition, as the discipline is maturing we see an increasing presence of academic debates within epistemology emerging in both the theory and practice of knowledge management. 

KM professionals may use a specific lexicon (tool to enhance knowledge in vocabulary) in order to articulate and discuss the various issues arising in knowledge management. Knowledge Management programs are typically claimed to be tied to specific organizational objectives and are intended to lead to the achievement of specific targeted results such as improved performance, competitive advantage, or higher levels of innovation. Organizations should undertake knowledge management programs. In doing so, they would gain competitive advantage that comes with improved or faster learning and new knowledge creation. KM programs may lead to greater innovation, better customer experiences, consistency in good practices and knowledge access across a global organization, as well as many other benefits.

Deepa Singh
Business Developer
Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com
Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com
Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

Does Teaching Online Really Take More Time?

There are certain widely held ideas about how time is used in distance education. One is that distance education “takes more time” than face-to-face teaching. This is one of those axioms that people accept and repeat, but don’t think about. Because as soon as you start to think about it, questions arise: Exactly what takes more time? Course development, or teaching? How much more time does it take? Does it take less time to teach the second time you teach it? What about the third? What takes longer to master—the technology, or online pedagogy? Lee Freeman, who administers the online MBA program at the University of Michigan-Dearborn, decided it was time to answer those questions and maybe challenge a few misapprehensions about time in online teaching. He surveyed instructors in all different schools and colleges of his institution. He came up with some useful facts and busted some myths.

The big findings

What Freeman calls his “big finding” is that, relative to face-to-face development, online course development really isn’t as terribly time-consuming as people say. The extra time spent developing an online course as opposed to a face-to-face course is proportionately similar to the extra time spent teaching the online course compared to classroom teaching. And guess what? “Teaching [online courses] isn’t all that bad either,” as Freeman says. “Basically,” Freeman says, “after the second or third time the instructors are comfortable with it and that learning curve has been reached.”

This curve is reached relatively soon for online pedagogy and even faster for the technology itself. “After the first or second time people were comfortable with the technology and beyond that they figured out how to teach it,” Freeman says. In Freeman’s research, it appears that it takes an instructor a little longer to figure out what they want to do with the course pedagogically than to become comfortable with the technology. “That’s one of the biggest things, that the technological learning curve is shorter than the pedagogical learning curve,” Freeman says. “The technology’s not the problem. It’s not what’s making people take longer when they teach.”

Second (and third) time’s the charm

Freeman was able to demonstrate that, once past the first online course, there is a significant reduction of instructor time. This leads him to believe that much of the complaint of excessive time consumption probably comes from the first-time experience. One implication of this is that, if instructors can be conscientiously coached through their first online experience, they are likely to find things much better on successive tries. Freeman’s data doesn’t challenge the assumption that it takes longer to develop an online course than a face-to-face course. What he has established is that the teaching, as well as the development, become less time consuming, and that that change can come as early as the second or third time out.

Four lessons for distance ed administrators: 

What are the lessons for distance education administrators in Freeman’s investigation? The research suggests four ideas: 

• Make sure faculty understand that they’re starting something new. You have to make sure faculty understand that, while they may be teaching the same content, there is going to be a bump that they have to climb over. It’s going to take some time and some effort but it will get better. 
• Teach your faculty to think about their course in a different way, to be ready to do things differently. Let them know that teaching online gives them an opportunity that they may overlook in the classroom because they are habituated to the way they have always done things. In teaching online, the nature of the technology allows and sometimes requires teachers to change things. Whatever kind of change that may be, the directors and instructional designers, while not pushing any particular technique, should always be showing what’s available and reinforcing new ways of doing things. 
• Use your instructional designers. As the faculty member is developing the course with the instructional designer, the designer should be on the lookout for time consuming approaches. If they see that the teacher setting up a time consuming situation for themselves, the instructional designer should alert them and where possible suggest ways to get the same results by doing things differently. 
• The more an administrator knows about the process of course development, the better he/she can manage.Program managers and administrators should be sure that they understand what online instruction takes and that they communicate it well. If they do, they will face fewer instructors coming back saying they’re never going to teach online again. As Freeman says, “Let them know that what happened the first time is not going to be the constant truth of what’s going to happen every time.”

Deepa Singh
Business Developer
Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com
Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com
Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

Preparing K-12 Teachers to Teach Online

Greg Kearsley & Robert Blomeyer

Online courses have become very popular in higher education and with the emergence of virtual schools are becoming common at the K-12 level (see Clark, 2001; Vail 2001). While most universities and colleges have established training programs to prepare their faculty to teach online, school systems are just beginning to address this need.  As McKenzie (2001) notes, preparing teachers to teach online needs to involve a lot more than the short workshops typical of inservice training. Hannum (2001) describes an extensive state-wide initiative in Colorado. The Concord Consortium and Illinois Online Network both have successful online teacher training programs. A number of online learning system vendors such as Apex Learning, Blackboard Inc., and eCollege also offer online teacher training programs, although these tend to be tailored to their systems.

This article describes some of the issues associated with preparing school teachers to teach online based upon recent work at the North Central Regional Educational Laboratory (NCREL).  While the focus of the discussion is K-12, most of these issues also apply to higher education faculty and instructors in the training domain.

Can anyone teach online?

One of the first issues to be considered is the requirements for an effective online teacher (Fuller et al., 2000). These include:

• n     be able to sit in front a machine for at least an hour or two every day,
• n     enjoy one-on-one interaction (as opposed to lecturing or group presentations),
• n     be flexible in teaching approach and willing to experiment, and
• n     be prepared to do a lot of writing/typing.

Although these don’t sound like particularly demanding requirements, many otherwise excellent classroom teachers are unable to satisfy them. Some teachers have great difficulty establishing a routine of being online regularly and spending so much time interacting with individual students.  Sometimes this is an access issue and sometimes it is a matter of being comfortable using technology (see next section). Note that a passion for teaching and the subject matter involved is another requirement, but almost all teachers possess those qualities.

Preconditions for online teaching

In addition to the personal qualities just mentioned, there some preconditions that online teachers must satisfy such as:

• n     have convenient (home) access to computer/internet,
• n     be very comfortable with the tools/system to be used to teach online, and
• n     have first hand experience as an online learner.

While many teachers believe that access to a computer at school will be adequate for their online teaching activities, in most cases, this doesn’t allow for enough time online and a machine at home is needed. In order to teach well online, a high degree of comfort with the tools and systems being used is required (e.g., discussion forums, chats, Powerpoint, Blackboard, etc.). And teachers should have first hand experience as online learners in order to understand how to be effective in an online environment. The latter two preconditions are most easily satisfied by providing training via an online course using the tools and systems they will be using when they teach.

What competencies do online teachers need?

While there is no commonly accepted standards (yet) for the skills and knowledge needed to teach online, here are some competencies that are closely aligned to the National Educational Technology Standards (NETS) established by International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE):

• n be proficient using the basic elements of online courses: email, threaded discussions, real-time conferencing (chats),
• n  be able to describe the characteristics of successful distance learners,
• n  be able to describe techniques for effective online teaching,
• n  be able to evaluate the quality of online learning programs,
• n  be able to explain the ethical and legal issues associated with online education,
• n  be able to explain the accessibility issues associated with online education,
• n  be able to describe strategies for integrating online and classroom instruction.

These competencies are over and above the ability to determine the best way to use online teaching for a given subject and student and in addition to the personality characteristics mentioned earlier Why would anyone want to teach online? The other side of the coin is how to convince teachers to try teaching online. Here are some of the benefits that may entice teachers:

1. n    convenience of when and where they teach,
2. n    more individual contact with students,
3. n    challenge of trying something new,
4. n    wealth of online materials available, and a
5. n    safer and less anxiety-producing teaching environment.

In some cases, teachers are paid a supplement for online teaching and this is a financial incentive. In addition, teachers may be interested in learning to teach online because they feel that it will increase their career opportunities. Online teaching strategies Certain teaching strategies are associated with effective online courses:

• n     student-centered activities,
• n     facilitation and moderating,
• n     problem-based learning,
• n     collaborative learning, and
• n     peer evaluation.

While some teachers may be familiar with, and use these methods in their classroom teaching already, for many teachers these are new approaches they need to learn. However, before they can use them well in online teaching, they need plenty of opportunity to practice the strategies – another function of online teacher preparation classes. Facilitation (i.e., getting students to interact with each other and the content) is probably the most important strategy that online teachers need to employ (Collison et al, 2000; Salmon, 2000).

Online teaching effectiveness

The following behaviors are associated with effective online teaching:

• n     providing timely and meaningful feedback,
• n     creating learning activities that engage students,
• n     keeping students interested and motivated,
• n     ensuring students interact with each other, and
• n     encouraging students to be critical and reflective.

These behaviors constitute criteria for evaluation of online teaching. For each behavior there needs to be a definition of minimal acceptable performance as well as exemplary performance. To assess online teaching effectiveness, these behaviors need to be evaluated during the delivery of online classes. Most existing teaching evaluation does not assess these kinds of factors. WorkloadOne well established fact of online teaching is that it takes a lot more time and effort than traditional classroom instruction. Some of the considerations associated with this factor include:

• n     providing student feedback can be an open-ended task,
• n     online courses are a 24/7 learning environment,
• n     keeping up with technology requires a lot of time/effort,
• n     teachers need to learn strategies to manage workload, and
• n     teachers may want more compensation for online teaching.

The increased level of effort needs to be reflected in teaching loads and probably financial incentives. Burnout in online teaching is likely to be a bigger concern because of the extra workload.  Needless to say, the workload issue is likely to be a contentious one for teacher unions and school administration.

Online teachers need a lot of support

Both students and teachers need a lot of support in online courses. This support can include:

• n    technical assistance,
• n    administrative assistance,
• n    instructional design assistance,
• n    counseling, and
• n    help for special needs.

While teachers should not be expected to provide these different types of support, they are usually the first contact that students make when they have problems. A well organized distance learning program will have properly trained staff to handle each of these types of support. For a good description of how frustrated students can get when adequate support isn’t available, see Hara & Kling (1999).

Completion of online training

Getting teachers to complete online training programs is difficult even under the best of circumstances. Reasons for non-completion include:

• n  online teaching is not what they expected or not want they are interested in,
• n the workload in an online class is too demanding for them and/or they lack the time management skills needed for online learning,
• n  they are plagued by technical problems with their computer or internet connection that prevent them from participating fully, and
• n  they are not encouraged to teach or learn online by their superiors, colleagues, or family.

In order to deliver successful teacher training, these issues must be addressed in the design of the program. Ironically, these are all the same issues that online teachers have deal with as well. They apply equally to teachers and students.

Making choices about technology use

Teachers and school administrators need to be able to address the following questions:

• n When are online classes appropriate/inappropriate for a given subject, group of students, or school?
• n When does it make sense to combine online and classroom learning?
• n When should online technology be combined with other media (e.g., video or audio conferencing)?
• n When is better to use technology in the classroom but not remotely?

These are not easy decisions to make considering the many factors to be taken into account (see Black, 2002). The important thing is that these kinds of questions are asked and discussed on a routine basis rather than just assuming that online courses are the right choice. It is critical that there be an open dialog between teachers and administrators (as well as parents) regarding technology use since all parties have different points of view.

Development of online teaching materials

The materials used in online courses can be provided or developed by teachers themselves. Even if they are pre-developed, teachers may want to customize or supplement them. Some of the considerations here are:

• n    creating online materials is very time consuming and usually requires specialized design skills and use of authoring tools,
• n    ownership (copyright) of materials usually resides with the institution not individuals, and
• n    online materials need to be matched to curriculum standards and state/federal requirements (e.g., privacy of student records).

For these and many other reasons, it is probably unrealistic for teachers to develop their own online teaching materials, although there are certain aspects, such as lesson plans or student handouts that may be done by teachers themselves. There are extensive collections of course materials available online that teachers should become familiar with during their training and encouraged to use in their teaching activities.

Certification?

While almost all teachers who teach online must have appropriate state certification for the subject area and grade level they teach, this certification does not specifically cover online classes. Given the additional competencies and considerations outlined above, many organizations that offer online courses require that teachers have specific online teaching qualifications – usually fulfilled by taking their own training program. This can be frustrating for experienced online teachers who want to teach for multiple institutions, each of which requires its own certification. Another aspect of this issue is when teachers teach online courses with students in states that they are not certified for. What is needed is a widely accepted set of national standards (like ISTE NETS) that all certification programs are tied to.

Research Needed

While we know quite a lot about online learning, there is relatively little research about online teaching. In particular, issues such as how to assess online teaching abilities and what strategies work best for certain teaching situations aren’t well understood. Some examples of relevant research include Anderson et al. (2001) who propose three major online teaching roles, Rossman (1999) who describes successful facilitation techniques for asynchronous discussions, or Roblyer & Wiencke (2003) who propose a rubric to used to assess interactivity in an online class. A number of university faculty have published personal accounts of their online teaching strategies (e.g.. Furr, 2003; Morrison, 1997) and we need similar descriptions from K-12 teachers to provide the basis for research studies (i.e., collections of best practices). Achieving a better understanding of online teaching will allow us to design more effective online teacher training.

Conclusions

In addition to all the issues just discussed, there are some practical considerations to be considered such as when the training should be offered, its duration, and costs. In most cases the training is offered shortly before a teacher is about to teach online and is usually 6-12 weeks in duration. However, this may not provide adequate time for teachers to acquire and practice the competencies involved. In fact, most teachers don’t fully appreciate and understand the complexities of online teaching until they have taught their first actual course, even if they have completed a thorough training program. Programs that involve a supervised practicum (teaching an actual course) are clearly a good idea. Costs for online teacher training programs vary widely, as well as who pays. In some cases teachers are paid to participate; in others they are expected to pay. The later includes the case where online teaching skills are obtained as part of a graduate degree program. When they are provided as required training by an institution, they are normally free to participants, sometimes with a stipend paid for completion. Ultimately, teachers may receive adequate training to teach online as part of their basic teacher preparation (i.e., at schools of education), however, this is not likely to be true within the near future.

Acknowledgment

This article is based upon presentations made by the authors at the NCREL Conference on Technology, Naperville, IL, June 2003. The views expressed are those of the authors and do not represent NCREL.

Deepa Singh
Business Developer
Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com
Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com
Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

Online Teaching- What is it ?

Online Education for Kids – Teachers Initiative

Online education is an approach to teaching and learning using Internet wherein Internet is taken as a technology that supplements as well as compliments traditional teaching. Web based tools are used to enhance the learning and teaching experience.  Online education in India is mostly restricted to as a part of distance education with in-betwee face-to-face meets. As far as school education is concerned, it is limited to projects and assignments. As in the western world here also teachers will have to and even have taken the initiative. Here are a few benefits that the students will get when they adopt online learning along with the teacher’s.

 Features of Online Education

•   Online learning is a self-learning experience where in the student can set a pace that suits him best

•   It gives the students a chance to explore the subject they are working on.

•   Students work in a more collaborative and interactive environment.

•   Online projects give students an opportunity to pursue their special interests

•   The student is not bound by time or regional boundaries. 

•   It costs less than appointing an individual tutor

•   Online guidance is usually available on education websites

•   This initiative enhances computer and Internet skills that is useful

•   Online discussions help expand the viewpoint

•   Online projects allow children to experiment with different approaches

It will be a positive step on behalf of the teachers to introduce online assignments and interaction platform for the students. To begin with you may just post the assignments for the class students online or start a discussion and invite students on it. You will see the difference. Students who don’t interact in class participate actively.

Deepa Singh
Business Developer
Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com
Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com
Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com

Pros and Cons of Earning an Online MA in Education

any teachers, administrators, and other professionals skip the classroom and earn a degree in education through the internet. Education is one of the most popular majors on the web. But, while there are many benefits of earning this degree, there are also a few drawbacks to consider. So, if you’re considering enrolling in an online program to earn your MA in education, check out these pros and cons: 

Pros: 

Your salary is very likely to increase
• If you are a teacher or an administrator, your income may increase by the number of graduate credits you have, even before you have the diploma
• You may have a competitive edge over other people applying for the same job
• You become eligible for teaching at a lower-division college level or administrating at a school (depending upon the focus of your degree)
• If you find a good program, you may be able to learn skills, information, and strategies that will help you in your day to day work
• Most online education programs can be completed completely through the internet or with just a few actual meetings.
• Most online education programs can be completed in a relatively short amount of time (1-3 years)
• The majority of employers won’t care that you earned this degree online

Cons:
• If you are looking to teach in a primary or secondary school, you may find it difficult to get hired since schools will generally be required to pay you more (a lot of public school look to hire teachers they can start lower on the pay scale)
• School is expensive and your salary increase may not be able to pay back your tuition for many years
• Many educators find it challenging to work in a high stress environment and have papers and other coursework due at the same time
• A large number of students complain about the poor quality of education courses offered by universities
• If you are a teacher of a subject other than education, earning a MA in your field of teaching may open more doors in your professional life

Deepa Singh

Business Developer

Web Site:-http://www.gyapti.com

Blog:- http://gyapti.blogspot.com

Email Id:-deepa.singh@soarlogic.com