My colleague Eric Mack has had the privilege this week of attending the International Workshop on Managing Knowledge Management in Pasadena CA.

Aerospace companies and government space agencies are working on a wide variety of methods to capture, store, organize, and distribute key knowledge from space experts and missions to explore space and the Earth around us. These successful methods often involve a set of policies, processes, people, and technologies in order to accomplish the goals of the organization. This conference looks to bring together that distributed group and provide a forum for shared understanding and conversations in how organizations are successfully managing knowledge for space missions and how we can, as a global community, do so in the future. Come meet with your colleagues and share what you are doing!

Distance prevented me from attending, but he live blogged it for me (and others). As a big advocate of live blogging conferences, I find this so cool … thank you Eric!

Here’s the sessions Eric blogged and a summary of the highlights / key learning points for me as I read through Eric’s contributions:

1. Opening Keynote and Welcome … The purpose of the three day workshop is to provide a forum for peer-to-peer exchange of KM experience and best practices for knowledge capture and reuse for space missions. KM in space agencies is a huge task, but critical/essential. Attendees shared their reasons for attending. July 17, 8.40am
2. Engaging Partners in a Virtual World … On the use of Second Life and other immersive worlds for teaching and learning. Some applications and examples of Second Life usage were discussed, including Starwood Hotels for engaging with guests about the design of new hotels. July 17, 9.31am. Eric got to have lunch with one of the presenters on Tuesday.
3. Systems Theory and Knowledge Management Systems … KM is critical in space agencies because 50% of aerospace engineers are eligible to retire … how to capture and retain that knowledge for future generations of engineers (eg, this one). There was a case study presented of Pratt-Whitney Rocketdyne, focused on how they used a systems theory approach to knowledge management: (1) determine the current state of knowledge processes; (2) identify and classify current KM systems; (3) identify behaviours associated with states; (4) identify overarching themes; and (5) implement a systemic KM environment. The speakers said that few formal incentives were needed to encourage participation, but you have to make it fun. July 17, 10.44am
4. Lessons Learned in KM and Virtual Collaboration … Key lessons: (1) use technology to help people interact with others; (2) video conferencing has traditionally not been good enough, but with the improvements in bandwidth and gear, there is increasing adoption within and between space agencies; (3) leaders in a video conference should talk less and encourage more interaction; (4) brainstorming isn’t effective within a video conference – there are other better tools; and (5) when a highly educated 25-year old joins a space agency, there needs to be a period of mentoring so as to bring them into the culture. The idea of a photo directory is good too. July 17, 11.06am
5. Creating a Learning Organization at NASA – the NEN … The NASA Engineering Network (NEN) is NASA’s knowledge sharing platform, combining content management, portal, search and a community. It contains a variety of engineering databases, which unfortunately don’t integrate well. Some databases are old and can’t be accessed directly. Key directions: expert location, sharing of best practices and lessons learnt, and knowledge reuse. July 17, 1.24pm
6. Connecting Related Records and Documents in KMS … How do we capture and organize our information so we can learn from it? Key direction: associating records, documents, interactions, and relationships with tasks or issues. NASA’s approach: giving each record or document a “Connect ID” for system-wide tracking. There was a discussion around taxonomies, the difficulties of keyword search, and the desired end goal (“ … proposed ways to organize records and documents so that the paper rocket engine matches the real thing so that when an engine is delivered to NASA it can be accompanied by a disk of its digital representation of records and documents“. July 17, 2.07pm
7. Does Your Organization Learn from its Mistakes? … The technology of KM is great, but in order for NASA’s KM strategy to work, a change of culture is required. NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center undertook a cultural analysis to determine receptivity to change (improvement?), and then developed a solutions map so as to address the top 10 day-to-day issues with knowledge sharing. They evaluated various tools and offerings, eg, SharePoint, Groove, others. End results: moved ahead with SharePoint 2007. Note, however, that this is a system for just one part of NASA; it’s not enterprise-wide. July 17, 3.26pm
8. Emerging Trends in Inter-Firm Collaboration: Lessons Learned from the Literature … Collaborative activities are an integral part of knowledge creation and maintenance. Knowledge doesn’t have a separate existence; it’s held within collective understanding and awareness. Organizations are no longer trying to do everything in house; they are forming alliances and working with best-of-breed providers on specific projects. The presenter, David Pender, spoke about conditions for success with collaboration initiatives, key understandings required for collaboration to work, hurdles and issues to overcome, holes in the academic research on collaboration (David – let’s talk!), best practices, and management challenges (of which I entirely agree especially about #2 in Eric’s list). July 17, 4.27pm
9. Collaboration in a Global World, Part 2 … Review by Christopher of one knowledge management system within NASA. Key capabilities: video nuggets for easily capturing and sharing knowledge, secure workgroups, remote meeting capabilities, and expertise profiling and location. The system is freely available, and is viewed as an enabler, not a driver. Christopher argued that subject matter experts should be driving the system, not developers/programmers. July 17, 5.01pm
10. Panel: Emerging Trends in Sharing Knowledge … The panel was composed of three KM practitioners. Linda from Canadian Space Agency: no formal KM initiative, but rather a number of initiatives, including internal databases, a new records management system, and a business intelligence project. Key challenges: communicating the value of KM, making search results relevant, finding good KM specialists, achieving widespread adoption, balancing open sharing with legislation on privacy, and the role of anonymity in reviews and input. David from Northrop Grumman: key direction is to implement better systems for linking people with other people; the firm has 12,000 people spread through the US. See training and process improvement as important enterprise focus points. Kiho from Pratt Whitney Rocketdyne: key direction is to focus knowledge sharing (via culture / people) and the learning aspect of KM. With respect to KM systems, the KM team engages with business users to understand needs and then advocate solution alternatives. July 18, 9.13am
11. Lessons Learned in Capturing Human Knowledge … Challenge: how to capture knowledge from the top people in each area of discipline at NASA, and then share it with the younger generation of engineers and scientists. One way of capturing knowledge is to interview the older engineers and record the interviews by video or audio for subsequent sharing (they prefer to go into the engeineers environment and interview directly where they work). Another key is to create sufficient trust so that engineers can talk about mistakes and what went wrong. Key learnings are included in courses for wide dissemination. July 18, 9.55am
12. Knowledge Management Activity at JAXA (Japan) … In terms of systems, the Agency is working toward a standardized approach to project management and knowledge reuse across initiatives. With respect to culture, a big challenge is that much of their knowledge is hidden because it is shared in-person. Sounds like a great opportunity for video interviews with Altus Learning involved to take the spoken transcript and make it intelligently available for wider sharing. If there are generalized national cultural issues that preclude detailed documentation, then perhaps that’s a way to proceed … July 18, 10.47am
13. Cultivating an Organizational Culture of Storytelling at JPL … JPL hosts a regular 1 hour story telling session, where someone speaks live about their experiences with listeners. People are encouraged to come and hear, and to share feedback and responses. Teresa, the presenter, spoke about how to prepare a story, the benefits of telling the story for the organization, and the benefits the storyteller gains. July 18, 11.07am
14. NASA’s Knowledge Management Architecture … Driving question: how do you sustain and improve organizational knowledge over very long projects, eg, 50 years? NASA’s model: people (collaboration, communities of practice, etc.), process (capturing and managing knowledge appropriately), and technology (eg, system interoperability, intelligent agents, expert systems, etc.). Other points: (a) people don’t visit your web site once and never return–they come frequently looking for new content; (b) knowledge capture, sharing and reuse should be part of business processes, not something separate and standalone; and (c) NASA is using a variety of Web 2.0 style tools for KM. July 18, 1.49pm
15. Into the Future: The Evolution of a NASA Intranet … Celeste spoke about the process followed for redesigning “Inside NASA”, one of the intranets for sharing NASA business-related information. A key focus was keeping the user in mind, but also communicating to the various stakeholder groups. July 18, 3.07pm
16. Apply Semantic Knowledge to KM … A discussion of how the tool of semantic technology can be used in KM settings. Advocacy of the idea of a common ontology across the organization, which can then be used to support complex information queries. Possibilities for semantic technology within NASA: traceability of engineering data, rapid prototyping, expertise locator, and improved reporting and exchange of data. July 18, 3.36pm
17. End of Day Two Discussion … Jeanne Holm, the conference host, moderated a discussion session via a black board. Discussion points: agencies will share information on what KM technologies they are using as well as their vendor evaluation studies, the KM discussions within NASA would benefit from wider input, attendees want to see more demos of KM systems, people need to become better adult learners, some ideas on how to ask people about mistakes and failures, and much more. Sounds like a great session. July 18, 4.27pm
18. Panel: Emerging Trends in Academic Research in KM … Ideas for research: (1) the impact of culture of knowledge sharing effectiveness, (2) spatial representations of knowledge for seeing information in context, (3) transformation of information to knowledge to wisdom, (4) identifying the barriers to KM and how to overcome them, (5) the social capital of organization, (6) KM for competitive advantage, (7) alternative mental models for thinking about KM in organizations (beyond technology), and (8) trust vs. respect in KM. July 19, 8.43am
19. Second Life for Knowledge Transfer and Collaboration … A discussion about how to use systems like Second Life for knowledge transfer and collaboration. The base concepts of Second Life were outlined (eg, explaining what the thing is), some discussions around how JPL uses Second Life for weekly team meetings, Second Life is good for some things (focus groups, meetings, discussions, tours, connecting with people) and bad for others (sharing large amounts of text, hosting very large events, complex simulations), a discussion of the security implications, a discussion of cultural sensitivities and acceptable behaviors in a virtual world (aside: you’ve got to read this paper to understand this issue), people who use avatars are often more expressive in collaborations, and much more. Fascinating. July 19, 10.04am
20. Legal and Ethical Issues in Knowledge Management … Issues around compliance, intellectual property, export/import controls, anti-trust, insider trading, national security issues, and liability issues of sharing knowledge. Three key rules: (a) don’t share IP with people you shouldn’t share it with, (b) don’t share something that is export controlled, and (c) don’t embarrass yourself or your employer. A fascinating discussion ensued about collecting knowledge for intentional use compared with capturing everything–the latter of which opens one up to liability issues if things go wrong and you didn’t use the knowledge you had available. July 19, 1.41pm

Wow, I’m exhausted and I only read the notes! As per Eric, thanks to all the presenters.

And thank you Eric … you diligently captured what you heard and shared it with the world, thereby being an excellent knowledge sharer and catalyst for future interactions. I send much kudos (but I’m holding your camera cable hostage until you come down under).