3. BUDGET

 The provision of financial resources for sharing knowledge is often an unambiguous signal to staff that the organization has definitely decided to incorporate knowledge sharing into the way the organization functions. Funding will be needed to cover the incremental costs of the central coordinating unit, the technology, the communities and help desks. The main focus of the financial provisioning should be on support to operations. If more than 20% of the resources are being spent on technology, a review may be warranted as to whether knowledge sharing has become confused with information management.

In the more knowledge-intensive organizations, the expenditures for knowledge management can be quite significant. For instance, it has been estimated that the major consulting firms may spend as much as 6-12 % of revenues on knowledge sharing programs.  While few organizations could, or even should, attain these levels of spending, there does need to be recognition that knowledge sharing does not run on air, and appropriate funding needs to be provided.

4. COMMUNITY

    A frequently overlooked essential of knowledge sharing is community. In undertaking knowledge sharing programs, most organizations have found -- sooner or later -- that the nurturing of knowledge-based communities of practice is a sine qua non to enabling significant knowledge sharing to take place. Such communities are typically based on the affinity created by common interests or experience, where practitioners face a common set of problems in a particular knowledge area, and have an interest in finding, or improving the effectiveness of, solutions to those problems. Various tools can be used to strengthen such communities, including the establishment of specific work objectives for the community, the provision of adequate staff and financial resources and management support to enable it to conduct its activities. 

5. TECHNOLOGY

    Clearly, the evolution of technology has created the scaling possibilities for sharing knowledge in ways that were almost unthinkable before the web. Technology extends the reach of knowledge far beyond the immediate confines of its creators. And yet, it is key to remember that the knowledge and understanding resides in human minds, only a fraction of which ever become explicit. As a result, technologies that draw on the tacit understanding of human beings face-to-face meetings, telephone, video-conferences are destined to have a permanent place in knowledge sharing efforts, no matter what new technology tools emerge to transmit explicit information.

     Information technology may, if well funded and implemented, provide comprehensive knowledge resources that are speedily accessed, interactive, and of immediate value to the user. However there are also many examples of knowledge systems that are neither quick, easy-to-use, problem-free in operation, or easy to maintain. The web, for example, frequently creates information overload. The development of tools that support knowledge sharing in an appropriate and user-friendly way, particularly in organization-wide knowledge sharing programs, is not a trivial task. 

     Thus although some have suggested that technology is the easy part of knowledge management, practitioners often find that developing user-friendly IT tools that people actually use, is in fact one of the more difficult aspects of knowledge sharing. The potential of the technology is there. However reaching agreement across many units in large organizations as to how to design and use the tools can become a major challenge, if sufficient resources and skill and collaborative spirit are not applied at an early stage.

6. INCENTIVES

     Since knowledge sharing usually entails a change in the way the business of an organization is conducted, often it entails a shift from vertical "look up and yell down" modes of behavior to horizontal knowledge-sharing behaviors. It is important that the relevant behaviors are reflected in whatever incentive systems are in place in the organization. Thus, it is important that the value of knowledge sharing be reflected in the on-going personnel evaluation, periodic merit review or pay bonuses of the organization, so that managers and staff can see that knowledge sharing is one of the principal behaviors that the organization encourages and rewards. It is important that knowledge sharing be designated as one of a small number of core behaviors, that are rewarded in the performance review system. Getting agreement across a large organization to focus on knowledge sharing, as one of a small number of core behaviors is not easy, and even when accomplished, does not have any instant effect. In the short run, there is often cynicism and posturing, but the experience of organizations, particularly the large consulting firms, is that over time such a change sends an unmistakable signal throughout the organization, which does accelerate the intended behavioral change. 

7. MEASUREMENT

     Organization-wide knowledge sharing programs require significant investments and will entail major management effort, as well as behavioral changes throughout the organization. In large organizations, an underground current of information sharing and water-cooler conversations will provide a running commentary of the progress of implementing the initiative. In this flow of anecdotal information, it will be difficult for anyone in the organization to get an accurate sense of what is happening, given the likely large scale of activity, unless systematic efforts are in place to provide reliable information on both progress and shortfalls in performance. Without measurement, there is an ever-present danger of premature abandonment of successful efforts, or alternatively, of complacent continuation of unsuccessful efforts when course correction is needed. Putting in place a system for measuring progress will therefore be an essential step for a sustainable knowledge-sharing program. 

     In the early stages of the program, the focus will inevitably be on inputs (such as dollars invested, or staff recruited) and activities (such help desks or communities established, or knowledge resources made available). As the program takes shape, the focus of measurement will increasingly shift to outputs (numbers of queries responded to, amount of material downloaded from the web, or usage of electronic tools) and outcomes (such as changes in turnaround times or unit costs, or comparisons with competitors).

     Ideally, one would like to be able to go on to measure the impact of knowledge sharing, but it is important to recognize that few, if any, organizations, have been able to establish the clear causal links between inputs and outcomes that would convincingly demonstrate impact. One can show correlations between inputs and outcomes, but the causal links between the inputs and outcomes are particularly difficult to ascertain in a corporate environment when many factors and changes are simultaneously at work, and the management is trying to integrate the elements, not differentiate them.

     The paradox is that the more the organization is successful in mainstreaming knowledge sharing as the normal way of conducting the business of the organization, the more difficult it will be to isolate the impact of any particular actions or expenditures in knowledge management. Nevertheless, the measures of inputs, activities, outputs and outcomes can go a long way to reassure skeptics that the effort to share knowledge is worth it.

 SECOND GENERATION ISSUES

     In this article, I have signaled seven basics of knowledge management -- strategy, organization, budget, community, technology, incentives and measurement -- that need to be put in place to launch an enterprise-wide knowledge-sharing program. Once these basics are in place, then the attention can turn to second generation issues, including measuring and accelerating the culture shift, integrating knowledge sharing with learning and research, streamlining the structures that were needed to launch the knowledge sharing program, strengthening the communities of practice, and improving the technology tools. 

    The approach adopted here sees knowledge sharing as an integral component of business strategy. Knowledge management is not something separate from the rest of the organization, requiring a separate organization and staff. The basics are aimed at weaving knowledge sharing into the fabric of the organization in order to enhance overall enterprise performance.