12 Principles of Knowledge Management - …（12知识管理的原则,u2026）.pdf

12 Principles of Knowledge Management By Verna Allee Understanding knowledge is the first step to managing it effectively. Here are a dozen characteristics of knowledge, and some tools and approaches for making the most of the knowledge assets in your organization. Winston Churchill said, The empires of the future are the empires of the mind. Tom Peters said, Heavy lifting is out; brains are in. Stately or slangy, its a fact that knowledge is edging out buildings and gear as the essential business asset. Even advertising and marketing use such words as knowledge, intelligence, and ideas. When many companies must innovate or die, their ability to learn, adapt, and change becomes a core competency for survival. Most seek more knowledge through training, education, and career development. Every business is a knowledge business; every worker is a knowledge worker. The knowledge economy has brought new power to workers. Many are free agents, contingency workers that make up almost a third of the U.S. workforce. Workers own the means of production-their knowledge. They can sell it, trade it, or give it away and still own it. As a result, the ways we manage people have undergone a dramatic, fundamental shift. Knowledge is perishable. The shelf life of expertise is limited because new technologies, products, and services continually pour into the marketplace. No one can hoard knowledge. People and companies must constantly renew, replenish, expand, and create more knowledge. That requires a radical overhaul of the old knowledge equation: knowledge = power, so hoard it. The new knowledge equation is knowledge = power, so share it and it will multiply. Widespread noncompetitive benchmarking and best-practice sharing show how eagerly we are embracing the concept of knowledge sharing. Hubert St. Onge, who led the development of the knowledge management approach at Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, sees the primary challenge as making an organizations u