Social Media vs. Knowledge Management
Wow, Venkatesh G. Rao writes the article of the year, Social Media vs. Knowledge Management: A Generational War. I'm going to have to reread this article and do some reflection before I have anything of value to add. Please do yourself a favor and read this article.
Note: Social Media, Social Publishing, Social Technology. I wish we could all settle on the same term.
About this CMS Enthusiast
Bryan Ruby is the owner and editor for CMS Report. He founded CMSReport.com in 2006 on the belief that information technologists, website owners, and web developers desired visiting sites where they could learn about content management systems without the sales pitch. Outside of his late night blogging hours, he is the Information Technology Officer for a field office in the federal government.
Comments
#1 thanks
... your comment made my day :)
Venkat
#2 Bias
My opinions are probably somewhat bias in that I have a strong interest in work cohorts as well as using new information systems in the enterprise. Though, Generation Y/Millennials are still a young generation and it will be interesting to see how they evolve through this decade's economic crisis.
#3 SM and KM Pt 2
Venkat offers some some reflection on his own article at: http://enterprise2blog.com/2008/10/socia... . Also check out, Rob Salkowitz's reaction to the article.
As I already hinted in a previous comment, I might have been too enthusiastic when I labled Venkat's work as the article of the year. However, this is an important topic and his points remain valid.
Just today, I was in chat discussing the role of IT people in my organization. My organization is still structured in a heirarchy with very roles between managers, union leaders, and employees defined (including how information is to be distributed). While this all seems reasonable to the baby boomer generation, it is a struggle for my generation (the X-Generation) but we go along with it anyway, and the Millenials are scratching our head thinking we're all nuts.
The formal structure of my organization has been shaped by the generations before me. While this may all look good on paper, in reality there are informal (and improved) methods for sharing knowledge taking place, yet organizations resist the new workflow. The reality is that if organizations don't embrace Enterprise 2.0, then managers and leaders at the top may find themselves cut off from vital and necessary information. These days, it is the wiki where the common employee finds the useful information and not the formal distribution points.
#4 Here is an example of where
Here is an example of where the two could co-exist and collaborate
http://www.knowledgeboard.com/item/2860/...
#5 Good KM link
Thanks for sharing the link. I do like IBM defining it as "knowledge sharing" instead of Web 2.0, social media, etc.
From the article, it doesn't sound as if KM and SM are co-existing. Instead it sounds as if IBM has allowed knowledge managment to evolve into knowledge sharing. The KM as an information system has adapted and changed by leaving he formal definitions of KM behind.