Measuring KM Measures, targets & rewards David Gurteen Gurteen Knowledge Bogota, June 2010
Aug 20, 2015
Measuring KMMeasures, targets & rewards
David Gurteen
Gurteen Knowledge
Bogota, June 2010
Begin with the end in mind
A talk on measures, targets and rewards
An explanation of the Knowledge Café
A Knowledge Café on the topic
The context
Start with the business issue Measures Targets Rewards
Start with the business issue
The measures will then naturally follow
Business issues and outcomes
“People will not share their knowledge” is NOT a business issue
“Implementing a knowledge sharing system” is NOT a business outcome
Business issues and outcomes
“Slowness to market of new products” is a business issue
“Shortening the time to market of new products” is a business outcome
Business outcomes
These are not business outcomes– Doing KM– Improving knowledge sharing– Creating a learning organization– Creating a knowledge driven organization– Setting up communities of practice
These are business outcomes– Cutting costs; Improving profit– Improving quality– Reducing staff turn over
Measure against business outcomes
Business outcomes– Cutting costs; Improving profit– Improving quality– Reducing staff turn over
These can easily be measured Doing KM cannot!
Understanding measuresUnderstanding measures
Understanding KM measures
Two things can be measured
1. Measure the knowledge of an organization– Intellectual capital
2. Measure outcomes of ‘knowledge in action’– Say a KM project
My interest is in outcomes – demonstrating the value of a KM project
Some considerations when measuring things
Beware the word “Measure”
Beware the word “measure”! Other words: performance indicator, metric,
ROI (return on investment) Performance indicator is usually best Measures and metrics imply an exactness
that is usually not achievable Its ok 'to measure' but you don't create 'a
measure‘ but an ‘indicator’
What is the ROI of KM?
Common question There isn’t one – only an ROI on the business
outcomes Distinguish between
– estimating an ROI before a project i.e. justifying the expenditure
– after or during a project i.e. demonstrating value
Its hard to estimate a financial ROI before a project
Why measure?
Could be for one of several purposes– To conform to laws or regulations– To deliver on a promise or agreement– To meet a service level agreement – To justify your existence – To enforce performance– You have been told to– To prove to yourselves you are not wasting time– To provide feedback that facilitates learning
Keep asking the question why!
What are the real objectives and are measurements the best way of achieving them?
Don’t measure for its own sake!
Beware not measuring
Your manager may not have asked for measures But when the going gets tough you had better be
able to justify your existence Your manager’s manager may have different ideas Your manager may change! When cuts have to be made – KM is high on the list!
(KM means Kill Me!)
Plan to measure before you start
You should plan to measure before you start a KM project - not after
What you measure and how you measure will affect how you do things!!
Too often knowledge managers don’t plan to measure up front!
There are multiple stakeholders
Multiple stakeholders will 'measure' you depending on their perspective
Don’t assume– you know what the right measures are. Ask your
stakeholders!– they will measure you by the measures you have
agreed to provide them!
Understand what is important to them You may be measured on their 'gut feel’
Prime stakeholders
The sponsor– Agree & measure what’s in it for them!
Senior management– Agree & measure on business outcomes
Staff– Agree & measure on what's in it for them
Two types of measure
There are two types of measure– you can measure activity
e.g. creating an ideas database
– or you can measure business outcomes e.g. improved innovation
Focus on outcomes not activities
Too often we measure activity rather than outcome
And we try to measure & justify KM projects on activity rather then outcome
Sometimes activity is the only proxy we have but too often we focus on activities at the expense of outcomes
Examples of measure of activity
Number of documents captured in a database Number of times a document is read Number of meetings held Number of active communities of practice Time taken to complete a task
Examples of measure of outcome
Bid to win ratio Increased sales Decreased costs Improved quality Reduced development time Reduced staff turn over Percentage of customers happy with service
according to customer satisfaction survey
Activities v Outcomes
Measuring activity is useful as it can be a good indicator that things are going well
Having 10, 20 or 30 communities of practice is meaningless in terms of business outcome
The real measure is the impact on the business This should relate to the business purpose for which
the communities were created e.g. getting new products to market faster
Some things cannot be measured
Cynefin domains– Simple– Complicated– Complex– Chaotic
You cannot correlate cause & effect in the complex domain
You cannot say this was an outcome of my activity And thus things cannot be directly measured
Measures distort
Measures distort behaviour Have unintended & unimagined side-effects Can be detrimental to the whole! You tend to only get what you measure Measuring one thing implies that others not
being measured are not important
Softer measures
Outcome based measures Activity based measures
Anecdotal stories – Success stories– Focused on outcomes
Surveys and polls– Can provide numbers
Better measures
To provide feedback to facilitate learning
NOT for control or conformance
Must be developed, owned and bought into by the people involved otherwise they will be ‘gamed’
They are personal learning tools!
When a measure becomes an objective it ceases to be a good
measure!
Targets
Do not set targets
Do not set targets
Do not set targets
People are often given ‘targets’ by which they are ‘measured’
A command & control way of trying to force people to change
Targets have similar detrimental effects to rewards e.g. impose an unthinking solution
Rewards and imposed targets will be gamed Targets need to be agreed and bought into
Examples of poor targets
First piece of baggage should arrive in arrival hall within 10 minutes of plane touching down
Patients when booking an appointment should not have to wait more than 48hrs to see their doctor
In-patients in A&E should be seen by someone within 30 minutes of arrival
Beware of gaming of targets
A measure or target that is based on a simple metric such as a number or time interval is probably a bad one as it can be too easily “gamed” – too simple to reflect the complexity - the
multidimensional & contextual aspects– a simple ‘satisfaction survey’ that measures
‘customer perception’ is better
Rewards
Do you believe we need to reward knowledge sharing?
Do not reward
Do not reward people for sharing their knowledge
Alfie Kohn and Dan Pink
Punished by Rewards by Alfie Kohn
Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Dan Pink
Rewards
Research shows that giving rewards (even praise) actually result in worse performance and destroys intrinsic motivation
To the best of my knowledge, no controlled scientific study has ever
found a long-term enhancement of the quality of work as a result of any
reward system.
Do not reward
Credit: Alfie Kohn
Do not reward
Rewards punish Rewards rupture relations Rewards ignore reasons Rewards deter risk taking Rewards undermine interest
Loving what you do is a more powerful motivator than any goody including money
Credit: Alfie Kohn
Rewards Punish
Threats & coercion destroy motivation and so do rewards
Rewards are manipulative “Do this and you will get that” is not much different to
“Do this else here is what will happen to you” When people do not get the reward they hoped for
they feel punished The more desirable the reward the more
demoralizing it is to miss out
Credit: Alfie Kohn
Rewards rupture relations
Excellence depends on teamwork Rewards (especially if scarce) destroy
cooperation Incentive driven employees will not ask for
help from their manager when they need it They will conceal problems from their
manager to appear infinitely competent
Credit: Alfie Kohn
Rewards ignore reasons
To solve problems people must understand the causes
They ignore the complexities of the problems Each situation calls for a different response Rewards tend to blindly promote a single
solution
Credit: Alfie Kohn
Rewards deter risk-taking
People are less likely to take risks; to explore possibilities; to play hunches
The No. 1 casualty of rewards is creativity
Credit: Alfie Kohn
Rewards undermine interest
Loving what you do is a more powerful motivator than any goody including money
Rewards are controlling! If people focus on getting a reward they tend
to feel their work is no longer freely chosen and directed by them
If they have to bribe me to do it - it must be something I don’t want to do!
Credit: Alfie Kohn
So how do you encourage people to share their knowledge and work better
together?
Alfie Kohn
Pay people well Pay people fairly Then do everything possible to make money
(rewards) off people’s minds
Incentives, bonuses, pay-for-performance-plans and other reward
systems violate this last principle by their very nature!
Bob Buckman
Our approach to KM is far more than stick or carrot.
We say, "Knowledge Sharing is your job. Do it!"
As a reward you may keep your job.
Intangible Rewards
Opportunities for Personal Development
Recognition
Loving what you do is a more powerful motivator than any goody including money
David Gurteen
We cannot change other people's behavior - only they can do that!
Threats, rewards and praise do not work We don't need to be told what to do. We
need to understand the world better & then we will see what needs to be done for ourselves
So how do we better understand the world?
How do we understand better?
Through being involved and engaged in the world and
through open conversation!
Questions
The Gurteen Knowledge Cafe
Conversational Cafés
A conversational café is a simple process for bringing a group of people together to have open conversations about a topic of mutual interest with a specific business purpose in mind
Examples– World Café– Knowledge Cafés– Gurteen Knowledge & Innovation Cafés
Different forms of Café
Many forms of café adapted to different purposes Gurteen Knowledge Café & World Café
– Learning and engagement Gurteen Innovation Café
– Surfacing issues– Refining issues and problems– Developing responses– Inspiring action & innovation
AARs, peer-assists, retrospects could be considered forms of Café
The birth of the Gurteen Knowledge Cafe
London, Sept 2002
Conversation
The most powerful knowledge sharing and learning tool that we have at our disposal
Business is a conversation
Business is a conversation because the defining work of business is conversation - literally.
And 'knowledge workers' are simply those people whose job consists of having interesting
conversations.
David WeinbergerThe Cluetrain Manifesto
• Conversation is central to all that we do
• Its our job!
Conversation is a learning technology
Conversation is the most powerful learning technology ever invented.
Conversations carry news, create meaning, foster cooperation, and spark innovation.
Encouraging open, honest conversation through work space design, setting ground rules for
conversing productively, and baking conversation into the corporate culture spread intellectual capital,
improve cooperation, and strengthen personal relationships.
Jay Cross, Informal Learning
Jay Cross
Conversation is a meeting of minds
Conversation is a meeting of minds with different memories and habits.
When minds meet, they don't just exchange facts: they transform them, reshape them, draw different implications from them, engage in new
trains of thought.
Conversation doesn't just reshuffle the cards: it creates new cards.
Theodore ZeldinConversation
Theodore in an Oxford Historian
Dialogue
The kind of conversation I’m interested in is one in which you start with a
willingness to emerge a slightly different person.
Theodore ZeldinConversation
Theodore in an Oxford Historian
Principles of Dialogue
Suspend assumptions, do not judge Observe & listen to one another Welcome differences & explore them Allow taboo subjects to be raised safely Listen to your inner voice Slow the discussion Search for the underlying meaning
Dialogue is based on the work of the
physicist David Bohm
Summary
Business is a conversation Conversation is a powerful learning
technology Conversation is creative Understanding is more important than
knowing more Dialogue is the key to quality conversations
Conversation?
What is the role of conversation in business?
How important is it?
How would you encourage more?
The Gurteen Knowledge Café Process
Café Process
Talk + question Small group conversations Whole group conversation in circle Round-robin individual sharing in circle
Key Aspects of Gurteen Knowledge Cafes
Relaxed, non-threatening, open conversation No one is forced to do anything Everyone is equal No table leaders No reporting back Sharing circle: individual summary at end No overall summarization or attempt to reach consensus No capture on flip-charts Outcomes: what people take away in their heads & how they
act on what they have learnt
Knowledge Café Examples
National Audit Office– What should we do with social tools?
Dubai Holdings– Evening on the canals of Amsterdam
StatoilHydro– merger, management training, retirement, transfer of
technical expertise
PortalParnership– A sales tool
Questions
“How do we measure the impact of KM?”
David GURTEEN Gurteen Knowledge Fleet, United Kingdom
Tel: +44 7774 178 650 Email: [email protected]
www.gurteen.com
If you would like to receive my free monthly Knowledge Letter that is now in its 11th year
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