00:00:05
well
00:00:05
knowledge assets are the knowledge
00:00:07
drivers of an organization's success
00:00:10
and they can be unstructured tested
00:00:13
knowledge
00:00:14
so an example there would be the deep
00:00:16
expertise of
00:00:18
key personnel or knowledge assets can be
00:00:21
structured
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explicit knowledge codified
00:00:25
examples there would be patents
00:00:26
copyrights intellectual property rights
00:00:28
in
00:00:29
codified form what is interesting with
00:00:32
knowledge assets is that
00:00:34
the more you structure the more you
00:00:35
codify knowledge the easier it is
00:00:37
to share that knowledge both internally
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and externally
00:00:41
so an excel spreadsheet very structured
00:00:45
knowledge can be shared in milliseconds
00:00:48
via
00:00:48
the internet whereas deep expertise or
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experience it takes more time
00:00:53
to share it with other people the other
00:00:55
thing that i think is important about
00:00:56
knowledge assets is to think of the term
00:00:58
assets like you would with physical
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assets there's some pieces of knowledge
00:01:03
that are just not
00:01:05
valuable from the point of view of the
00:01:07
firm
00:01:08
and there's others where that knowledge
00:01:11
is basically fundamental to your ability
00:01:13
to compete
00:01:14
and this is where we start to
00:01:17
distinguish between
00:01:18
knowledge assets and let's say strategic
00:01:21
knowledge assets which are the
00:01:23
pieces of knowledge that make a
00:01:24
difference in your ability to compete
00:01:26
and prosper
00:01:32
well it's interesting when it comes to
00:01:33
physical assets you have a balance sheet
00:01:35
that shows you
00:01:36
what you own or process and it's more
00:01:38
difficult more tricky
00:01:40
when it comes to knowledge so with a
00:01:42
knowledge map
00:01:43
we intend to really identify
00:01:47
the key knowledge resources that
00:01:50
underpin
00:01:50
an organization's competitive advantage
00:01:54
and we map them along two dimensions one
00:01:56
is the structure of knowledge
00:01:58
unstructured or structured tested
00:02:00
explicit
00:02:01
and the second dimension is the level of
00:02:04
diffusion
00:02:06
is it undiffused do only a few people in
00:02:09
the organization have that knowledge do
00:02:11
many people in the organization have
00:02:12
that knowledge
00:02:13
or does the competition have access to
00:02:16
that knowledge or is it available
00:02:18
to the general public so those two
00:02:20
dimensions structure and diffusion
00:02:22
are important to map those critical
00:02:24
knowledge resources
00:02:26
a sort of simplified rendition of that
00:02:29
is depicted in the diagram that we're
00:02:33
looking at now
00:02:34
so what you have is the two dimensions
00:02:37
uh
00:02:38
to keep it simple highly diffused or
00:02:41
highly undiffused and then highly
00:02:43
structured or codified
00:02:45
and unquantified so that gives you sort
00:02:47
of four blocks in which you can place
00:02:49
your knowledge
00:02:55
traditionally very little when you look
00:02:58
at
00:02:58
knowledge management
00:03:02
there was a tendency to try to capture
00:03:05
all the knowledge in an organization
00:03:07
first of all this is not possible
00:03:10
it's really hard to capture all the
00:03:12
tested experience and put into
00:03:14
a computer system but even if it were
00:03:16
possible
00:03:17
you'd serve a cognitive overload because
00:03:20
it's just too much so what we propose is
00:03:22
really focus on
00:03:25
the knowledge assets that are critical
00:03:27
for success
00:03:28
that underpin performance so those
00:03:31
critical knowledge
00:03:32
assets should be mapped so that
00:03:35
the management can decide how to further
00:03:38
develop it
00:03:39
to create growth and competitive
00:03:41
advantage and sort of
00:03:42
associated with that is the fact that
00:03:46
you can take
00:03:46
knowledge in the four blocks that we
00:03:48
identified and each one of those blocks
00:03:50
has specific implications
00:03:52
for your ability to take that knowledge
00:03:54
and go out and create and capture value
00:03:57
from the marketplace
00:04:02
well the strategic management of
00:04:04
knowledge as we discussed just now
00:04:07
links knowledge to competitive
00:04:08
performance and
00:04:10
growth now with the entrepreneurial
00:04:12
management of knowledge
00:04:14
we try to understand how innovation
00:04:18
is created in organizations so how do
00:04:21
organizations big and small create new
00:04:24
ideas create
00:04:25
new knowledge how is that knowledge then
00:04:27
further develop in the pursuit of
00:04:29
innovation
00:04:30
how is it shared and applied in
00:04:31
different contexts so this link to
00:04:33
innovation which is really important
00:04:36
is captured by this entrepreneurial
00:04:39
management of knowledge with the
00:04:40
research initiative we try to create
00:04:44
research that has impact to really
00:04:47
balance
00:04:48
theory and practice so the outcome of
00:04:50
the research initiative has been
00:04:51
both academic publications and
00:04:54
practitioner oriented publications
00:04:56
and we've always also been able to build
00:05:00
a new executive education program
00:05:02
at wharton that deals with the strategic
00:05:04
management of knowledge assets
00:05:06
and going back to the 2x2 that we set up
00:05:09
earlier
00:05:11
each one of those blocks the top left
00:05:15
through
00:05:15
the inner bottom right
00:05:18
has specific challenges associated with
00:05:22
how you strategically deploy that
00:05:23
knowledge and how you
00:05:25
go about innovating so knowledge which
00:05:28
is uh
00:05:30
very codified and diffused out and
00:05:32
everybody knows it
00:05:34
the challenges are very very different
00:05:36
from basically being able to go
00:05:38
in the bottom left and capture the
00:05:40
expertise of your key people in the
00:05:41
organization
00:05:43
and think about how you can use that
00:05:44
knowledge to create competitive
00:05:46
advantage
00:05:51
with knowledge networks we try to
00:05:53
understand the linkages between
00:05:55
knowledge assets
00:05:56
so how are they related and how do they
00:06:00
interact
00:06:00
a little example would be looking at a
00:06:03
patent
00:06:04
on a new technology that would be one
00:06:06
knowledge asset and another
00:06:08
knowledge asset would be the experience
00:06:10
or expertise
00:06:11
of a key engineer that developed that
00:06:13
patent
00:06:14
so two knowledge assets linked
00:06:18
to one another that's a mini network so
00:06:21
the question is when we want to be
00:06:23
strategic about
00:06:25
knowledge development and the sharing of
00:06:28
knowledge
00:06:28
can we give away one knowledge asset and
00:06:31
hold on
00:06:32
to another knowledge asset so
00:06:36
looking at tesla for example last year
00:06:40
which opened up its patents
00:06:45
to competitors they might have given
00:06:47
away the patents
00:06:48
but they haven't given away the
00:06:50
engineers that worked on the patents so
00:06:52
it's very clever
00:06:53
you give something but the competition
00:06:55
not necessarily can do too much
00:06:57
with it because another part of the
00:06:59
knowledge network
00:07:01
stays within the organization and is not
00:07:04
shared
00:07:04
so to me there's sort of two challenges
00:07:07
one is as i look at my various knowledge
00:07:10
assets
00:07:11
can i think about ways of linking them
00:07:13
because if i link two knowledge assets
00:07:15
it allows me to come up with a new
00:07:17
combination
00:07:18
and that might be very very powerful and
00:07:21
then the other one
00:07:22
is how do i particularly with the more
00:07:25
tacit
00:07:26
types of knowledge how do i actually
00:07:28
identify that knowledge and where
00:07:30
we can get traction using that knowledge
00:07:32
in the competitive marketplace
00:07:38
well it's interesting that when we think
00:07:40
about open innovation and sharing
00:07:42
knowledge or giving away
00:07:44
knowledge before
00:07:47
you can decide what to share you have to
00:07:49
know what you have
00:07:50
so to me the first step in any
00:07:54
open innovation initiative or strategic
00:07:57
alliance initiative has to be
00:08:00
looking inside and thinking about what
00:08:02
are the critical knowledge pieces that i
00:08:04
have
00:08:05
and what are knowledge gaps what are
00:08:07
knowledge assets
00:08:08
that i don't have and might be able to
00:08:11
source
00:08:12
from the outside so i think it's really
00:08:14
important to
00:08:15
have a strategic knowledge map to then
00:08:18
make
00:08:19
informed decisions about who to partner
00:08:22
with and what kind of knowledge
00:08:24
to obtain from partners and if you think
00:08:27
about the
00:08:28
combination of two pieces of knowledge
00:08:31
in some novel way
00:08:33
in a way that's the essence of all what
00:08:35
what most entrepreneurs do
00:08:37
and the challenge then becomes is i have
00:08:39
a piece of knowledge and i may
00:08:41
underestimate its true value until i
00:08:44
start thinking about who else might have
00:08:46
knowledge that i can link up
00:08:48
uh so i don't have to have the new
00:08:49
knowledge myself
00:08:51
what i need to do is find some way of
00:08:53
identifying whether that knowledge would
00:08:55
be
00:08:56
useful for me to come up with some new
00:08:58
combination
00:09:03
there's a huge culture and political
00:09:05
dimension when it comes to the sharing
00:09:07
of knowledge
00:09:08
and when we look at people
00:09:11
and their motivations also in terms of
00:09:14
their careers
00:09:15
sometimes it's difficult to incentivize
00:09:17
them to to share that knowledge
00:09:20
i guess they are looking at
00:09:23
innovative technology companies like for
00:09:26
example google
00:09:28
ways to incentivize people to work
00:09:30
together
00:09:32
if they enjoy what they're working on
00:09:35
like
00:09:36
one day a week you can do whatever you
00:09:38
want to do but do it in teams
00:09:41
so there are ways i think how to bring
00:09:44
employees together
00:09:45
and take them the fear of sharing their
00:09:47
knowledge
00:09:49
and make sure that they contribute to a
00:09:52
common goal
00:09:53
i think that's important to establish
00:09:56
that goal
00:09:57
and make everyone feel comfortable to
00:09:59
work in a team
00:10:00
this may be an opportunity to put up
00:10:02
another chart
00:10:03
and that sort of shows you that up in
00:10:06
the top left hand corner of the chart
00:10:09
is where value lies because what you
00:10:12
have is undiffused knowledge so
00:10:13
other people want it and you have it and
00:10:16
what you have is highly codified
00:10:18
knowledge which is kind of easy to
00:10:20
replicate
00:10:20
and to use and here's where the dilemma
00:10:23
lies and that is that people up in that
00:10:25
top left hand corner
00:10:27
want to try to keep that value and
00:10:29
unless you
00:10:30
formally recognize that it's necessary
00:10:34
for that knowledge to be spread in the
00:10:36
organization
00:10:37
so you can go forward and prosper as it
00:10:39
were competitively
00:10:42
it just ain't going to happen so unless
00:10:44
you've got some kind of map that
00:10:46
shows you where the valuable knowledge
00:10:48
lies in terms of
00:10:50
getting fairly uh early returns on it
00:10:54
people are just not going to share it
00:10:56
well the second point is that
00:10:58
if you're up in that top left hand
00:11:00
corner what you really need to do is
00:11:02
have
00:11:02
have identified that the knowledge is in
00:11:05
that top left hand corner
00:11:07
and so to prevent people from trying to
00:11:09
retain the value of that knowledge by
00:11:11
not sharing it
00:11:13
you need to have that formally
00:11:14
recognized in your reward system
00:11:16
and that's a very interesting point in
00:11:19
that
00:11:20
within the company you would like to
00:11:22
share all your knowledge
00:11:24
but outside the company you have to be
00:11:26
strategic and you don't want to
00:11:28
necessarily share your knowledge with
00:11:30
the competition
00:11:31
so there is um yeah
00:11:35
a difference between internal knowledge
00:11:37
sharing and external knowledge sharing
00:11:39
but once you have the map once you know
00:11:41
what a structure was unstructured and
00:11:42
how diffuse it is within
00:11:44
you can make those strategic decisions
00:11:50
okay so if you have a look at the chart
00:11:53
what you have is you know in the
00:11:55
simplified world
00:11:57
uh is the four blocks and uh
00:12:01
there are companies that uh historically
00:12:03
have played in each one of those blocks
00:12:06
and it might be interesting just to talk
00:12:08
very briefly about that
00:12:10
if you look at the bottom left-hand
00:12:12
block this is where
00:12:13
the essence of your knowledge is deep
00:12:15
tacit expertise which is kind of hard to
00:12:17
articulate
00:12:18
and it's resident in the minds and
00:12:22
and experience of experts uh typically
00:12:25
what you'd find there's somebody like
00:12:27
goldman sachs
00:12:28
who's brilliant at being able to use
00:12:30
their financial expertise
00:12:32
to come up with new kinds of financial
00:12:35
instruments that they can
00:12:36
take into the marketplace and as the old
00:12:41
new changes they keep on changing as
00:12:43
well so the heart of their knowledge is
00:12:45
to be able to tap that expertise
00:12:48
a much more pragmatic example of that
00:12:50
would be somebody like bain as a
00:12:52
consulting firm
00:12:53
which is particularly interested in
00:12:55
deeply understanding
00:12:57
and being able to develop solutions for
00:13:00
the
00:13:01
customers new solutions for new problems
00:13:04
the top left hand side is uh is somebody
00:13:07
who would be
00:13:09
depending very much on using protected
00:13:11
knowledge which is being patented
00:13:14
so examples to this day of the most
00:13:16
prolific
00:13:17
companies in terms of patenting or
00:13:19
people like ibm
00:13:21
people like samsung people like canon
00:13:24
and the essence of their knowledge is to
00:13:26
keep on generating new protected patents
00:13:29
as we move to the right and the
00:13:30
knowledge gets more and more diffused
00:13:33
the companies up at the top right are
00:13:35
companies that are able to come up with
00:13:37
new combinations of existing knowledge
00:13:40
and i think a beautiful example and in
00:13:42
fact
00:13:43
the source of the concept of open
00:13:44
innovation
00:13:46
was mr lafley at procter gamble who
00:13:49
uh basically you know said why do we
00:13:52
have to
00:13:53
create new knowledge ourselves why don't
00:13:54
we go out and find solutions to the
00:13:57
you know to the problems and this led to
00:13:59
you know amazing products like the
00:14:01
swiffer for heaven's sake
00:14:02
he has a very very big business was just
00:14:05
created from
00:14:06
basically taking old mops and and
00:14:09
detergents and doing it in new ways
00:14:11
and then bottom right is perhaps the
00:14:13
most interesting and that is uh
00:14:15
is is companies that are constantly
00:14:17
experimenting with trying to find new
00:14:19
ways
00:14:20
of applying their existing knowledge and
00:14:23
our two favorite examples there is the
00:14:25
german company buyer
00:14:27
who for 110 years has been creating new
00:14:29
uses for aspirin
00:14:31
and every year they come up with new
00:14:32
uses for aspirin
00:14:34
and then the second one is w al gore who
00:14:37
basically took teflon
00:14:39
and is constantly innovating around the
00:14:41
use of teflon so
00:14:44
it's uh you know every every corner
00:14:48
or different places where you can play
00:14:49
and extract knowledge and capitalize on
00:14:52
it
00:14:53
i think for senior management it's
00:14:54
important to
00:14:56
think about what kind of knowledge
00:14:59
assets does my organization have
00:15:03
is it in the bottom left the top left
00:15:05
the bottom right
00:15:06
the top right and then how do i want to
00:15:09
strategically develop that knowledge
00:15:11
and there are opportunities for growth
00:15:13
in each
00:15:15
of those quadrants
00:15:21
well we've just published a harvard
00:15:23
business review article
00:15:26
about the topic we have
00:15:29
created a three-day executive education
00:15:33
program at wharton that
00:15:37
helps people understand what is
00:15:40
strategic about
00:15:42
the development of knowledge we have
00:15:44
experts like peter capelli talk about
00:15:46
the management of tacit knowledge
00:15:48
talent our advising for innovation
00:15:52
karl ulrich talks about technical
00:15:55
innovations
00:15:56
so interesting mix of faculty where
00:15:59
we discuss the challenges that come with
00:16:02
managing knowledge strategically one of
00:16:04
the things that i want to add to the
00:16:06
to the pot here is is that martin when
00:16:10
he did his dissertation on the topic
00:16:13
actually developed a way of simulating
00:16:15
the evolution of knowledge
00:16:17
we're making some fundamental
00:16:18
assumptions about the nature of the
00:16:20
knowledge
00:16:21
and then how that evolves using
00:16:22
different types of strategy for
00:16:24
knowledge development
00:16:26
and we continue to work on that
00:16:28
simulation
00:16:30
so that what you can do is if you have a
00:16:32
particular knowledge strategy in mind
00:16:35
you can test it in the simulation and
00:16:38
you know test 100 years
00:16:40
of knowledge development in in a few
00:16:42
minutes
00:16:43
so it's a very very powerful way of
00:16:45
beginning to look at the implications of
00:16:47
making certain
00:16:48
strategic moves in knowledge management
00:17:13
you
