Tim Wood Powell     The value of knowledge

I recently managed to get the Knowledge Value Chain® boiled down to an eight-minute introductory video—then had a couple of people comment that it should ideally be half that length!  So here, for you the time-challenged, the short-attention-spanned, and the just plain busy, are the key things that—if I had two minutes with you in the proverbial elevator—I’d try to make sure you came away with.

• Creating value from data is a process. It takes time.  It has various elements that must be coordinated.  It may not be immediately obvious how to do it—it takes planning and practice.  The good news is that you can learn the process, and you can improve at it.

• Each step in the process has a cost and benefit added. The skill is in keeping the latter higher than the former by minimizing the costs and barriers to value, and by maximizing the benefits.  If you can do that at each step of the process, then the whole process itself will have a positive ROI.

• Knowledge and intelligence are not the end of the chain. There is a whole other set of things—decisions and actions—that need to happen later before value is created.  Are you fond of thinking that “Knowledge is Power”?  Sorry, but it’s not.  The two are very different.  You can integrate knowledge with power, in which case it becomes organizational intelligence.

• Great “DIKI” alone—data, information, knowledge, and/or intelligence—does not insure great results. In business, there’s no prize given for having the best information.  You can, for example, have great intelligence—then leave it unused, or use it to make non-optimal decisions.

• Plan DOWN, execute UP, communicate DOWN. The three major phases of a knowledge-based project happen in reverse order to each other.  Planning happens from the value proposition (or expected benefit) down.  Execution happens up through the chain.  Communication focuses again primarily on the value proposition.

• Knowledge-based disciplines (IT, libraries, corporate intelligence, market research) create value for themselves only to the extent they create value for the enterprise. There is no distinction.  You need to create impact and ROI in the business functions you’re serving, measured on their own terms.  And you need to do this in a way that is provable and can be readily communicated.

• There are two approaches to creating greater value.  One approach is “doing things right”—tactics.  That’s where the KVC can help you.  There’s more information on this site about that.  The other is “doing the right things”—strategy.  We’ve been working on that, and will tell you more soon.  The tactical and strategic approaches to value enhancement are complementary—and they’re both essential.

There it is, seven key lessons in about 50 words each.  For a slightly more in-depth look, check out the video.

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