Tim Wood Powell     The value of knowledge

This spring has been uncommonly busy, and I regret that has caused me to slip a couple of self-imposed deadlines here.  Here’s what we’ve been up to.

Blended Value

I continued to work with TKA Director and branding expert Jay Gronlund on our Blended Value initiative — which seeks to redefine strategic enterprise goals beyond the limits of shareholder value, and to incorporate Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) factors in a balanced mix.

Knowledge-Based Security

Next up was a small pilot intervention for a section of the Special Operations Command of the US Department of Defense.    It seems that “knowledge” has great value not only where economic conflict is concerned, but also where geopolitical conflict is concerned — especially in this era when the nature of military conflict is continually shifting.

Knowledge to Value

Following that was a major address to the second annual summit of the International Management Consulting Association, with many of their members working in the Middle East and Eastern Europe (include the former Soviet republics).  I presented an initial treatment of a new methodology “Knowledge to Value”, which is designed to systematically mine enterprise knowledge in support of business development strategies.

Information and Knowledge Strategy

Columbia University’s innovative IKNS program continues to provide stimulating challenges.  Through the end of this year I am facilitating four consulting teams made up of master’s-candidate students.  I play the role of coach and quality assurance for these “in vivo” project that give the students a chance to exercise their frameworks and other classroom learnings in live client situations.

One project involves developing a competitive analytics capability in a retailer that has recently grown significantly through acquisitions.

Another project involves implementing centers of excellence for a major telecommunications company to more effectively manage core functions that have recently been decentralized.

A third project for an artificial intelligence software company involves looking at the changing nature of “knowledge work” and how it is likely to evolve in the near future.

A fourth project for a technology-intensive medical equipment company involves reengineering the ways in which their service technicians access and use information.

I’ll also be presenting the students with an interactive knowledge-value “super-modeling” methodology that I developed for a client a few years ago.

Board Technology Readiness

TKA colleague Patric Hale and I are working with executive recruiters BoardBench Companies to implement a diagnostic tool to rapidly assess the technology-readiness of any organization’s board, as well as to develop services to remediate those shortfalls revealed as a result.

Pharmaceutical Security

We’ve signed a long-term contact with a closely-held company in the pharmaceutical security space.  I will serve as a corporate director and their head of Corporate Development — with major responsibility for accelerating the company’s growth in enterprise value toward a “liquidity event” such as a buyout or IPO.

That’s all for now — stay tuned for further developments.  If you’d like details on any of these initiatives, please contact me directly.

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