However, a lot (and some might say the most important kind) of knowledge is tacit/intangible. That is, knowledge that is hard to describe or codify, but still essential for doing something and doing it well, particularly anything novel. It’s the “underlying philosophy that guides what [organizations] do and why they do it.” That is by its very nature hard to capture and codify, but humans can be very good at learning it from experience and sharing it.

KM also tended to be run by folks who weren’t involved in the generation of the knowledge, so knowledge went in and rarely came back out. More value is gained in knowledge sharing and use, which is about turning knowledge into action (i.e. “doing”) and this is best done by the knowledge generators themselves telling what they know and often through stories vs. manuals.

Hmmm. Routine vs. Novel – sounds like ERP vs. BRP. Managed by “keepers” vs. shared by “doers” – sounds like what blogs, wikis, and social networks can help us do.

Looking forward to your other thoughts…

I also have wished for more success in KM over the years. I personally don’t believe it fails due to individuals wanting to horde knowledge. I think that often it fails because it is pushed top down and has never found a way to not put a huge burden on your most strapped resources. I think a more 2.0 approach is exactly what is needed to breathe new fire into the point of KM — more alignment between self promotion, corporate goals and knowledge capture and sharing is all good in my book.