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IMT 589 KM Knowledge Management Institute Introduction. Robert M. Mason (special thanks to Jochen Scholl, who provided some slides that have been adapted for this session). Topical Overview. What is the point of managing knowledge? What does it mean to manage knowledge?
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IMT 589 KMKnowledge Management Institute Introduction Robert M. Mason (special thanks to Jochen Scholl, who provided some slides that have been adapted for this session) IMT 589 KM
Topical Overview • What is the point of managing knowledge? • What does it mean to manage knowledge? • How do we distinguish data, information, knowledge, and wisdom?
What is “Information?” • In a few words, what is your definition? • How does information differ from knowledge? In a few words, please give your definition
An Information Exercise 232456622 What do you see? Data? Information? 232-45-6622 Now what do you see?
What can a stone-age person from New Guinea see in this picture ?
What do we learn from this ? • Need knowledge • Experience • Context
ObservationsInformation Is… • In the eye of the beholder Can you discern meaning? Data vs. noise Does it provide an answer to a question? Data vs. information • Context-sensitive • Time (historical dimension) • Group • Culture/Code/language • Prior knowledge
Observations • Recursive Relationship: • Data and information require (prior) knowledge • Knowledge is built up from information and data • Information is socially constructed, it is not a “given” • “…[W]e must call into question that the idea that the world is pregiven and that cognition is representation. In cognitive science, this means that we must call into question the idea that information exists ready-made in the world and that it is extracted by a cognitive system…” Varela, F. J., Thompson, E., & Rosch, E. (1991). The embodied mind : cognitive science and human experience. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, p. 140
Philosophical Perspectives • Positivist: Reality exists as an objective world separate from ourselves; research enables us to observe it and deduce the rules that govern its behavior • Social Constructionist: There is a physical world, but our understanding of it comes from our interacting with it and with others. “Reality” is determined by agreement among a culture. • Example: 3 baseball umpires
Knowledge (Some Other Definitions) • K = I + U (Knowledge is equal to Information plus Understanding) (Brooking) • Knowledge is information in a context that supports proper decisions and actions (Penny) • The idea that knowledge can be slotted into a data-to-wisdom hierarchy is bogus (Stewart)
Knowing MENO. And how will you inquire, Socrates, into that which you do not know? What will you put forth as the subject of inquiry? And if you find what you want, how will you ever know that this is the thing which you did not know? SOCRATES. I know, Meno, what you mean; but just see what a tiresome dispute you are introducing. You argue that a man cannot inquire either about that which he knows, or about that which he does not know; for if he knows, he has no need to inquire; and if not, he cannot; for he does not know the very subject about which he is to inquire? [p. 4] Plato, Meno
The Tacit Dimenson “We know more than we can say” -- Polanyi, 1967 • Tacit dimension: • Present but inexpressible • “Intuition” • Subconscious knowledge • Motor skills • All knowledge has a tacit dimension
Experiential Learning Cycle(Kolb, 1984) Concrete Experience Active Experimentation Reflective Observation Abstract Conceptualization
Information and Learning Choo, 2001
Information “Value Chain” Sensory Awareness Interpretation Access / Transfer Creation Storage Application
Data, Information, & Knowledge Choo, 2001
Knowing and Not Knowing After Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham, 1969 Choo, 2001
Managerial Challenges Organizational Social Technological
Organizational Learning Huysman et al, 2002
Information Problem Spaces Wicked Problems Puzzles Problems After Michael Pidd, 2004
Information (Knowledge)Management “System” • Infrastructure • Technology • People • Processes • Culture of knowledge sharing • Forums: places (physical, virtual) for working through issues
LEVEL Syntactic Semantic Pragmatic APPROACH Technical standards Vocabulary Databases Metadata Dialogue Conferences Spanning the Boundary
Examples: Pragmatic Level • Maps, models, incentives • Dialogue: develop mutual understanding • “Workout” sessions (GE) • Forums (Buckman Labs, NASA)
Concluding Food for Thought Von Glasersfeld (1995) Knowledge is not passively received, but built up by the cognizing subject The function of cognition is adaptive and the serves the organization of the experiential world, not the discovery of ontological reality (p. 18) Maturana & Varela (1981) Everything said is said by an observer to another observer that could be himself
Think again about the stone-age tribesman who sees this image