Don’t be Left Behind: Learn How to Do a Knowledge Audit
Guy St. Clair
If you’re going to move forward with your KM/knowledge services initiative, you know you’re going to do a knowledge audit.
Why not learn from the experts?
Come to Philadelphia in June and hear what Guy St. Clair, Cindy Hill, and Dale Stanley have to say about the knowledge audit. Let them work with you so you can put this evaluation tool to work for your organization.
In The Knowledge Audit, offered on June 10th at the SLA Annual Conference, you’ll learn to:
- determine what knowledge assets and services people require to do their work
- identify your company’s knowledge assets
- assess how knowledge assets are (or are not) managed to meet the organizational objective (e.g., does the company’s knowledge strategy match its business strategy?)
What you’ll learn, in fact, is how to understand and evaluate the company’s knowledge sharing capabilities, positioning yourself as the company’s knowledge strategist. It all comes together when you take the results of the knowledge audit and lead the company in shaping the organization’s KM system.
It’s your job. Do it, and do it right.
Cindy Hill, a past-president of SLA, leads KM applications in her role as Library Manager for the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. Dale Stanley works with knowledge development and knowledge sharing (KD/KS) as Director of Literature Resources at Gilead Sciences in Foster City, CA. Guy St. Clair, also a past president of SLA, is President and Consulting Specialist for Knowledge Services at SMR in New York, NY and recently served as a panelist for the KM Education Forum, co-sponsored by Kent State University and George Washington University.
For more information and to register, go here.
Deb Hunt at LinkedIn’s KM/Knowledge Services Group writes:
It’s up to us as strategic knowledge professionals to take the lead and even propose a knowledge audit before anyone else in the organization does. Either way, we need to drive this process, get buy-in, and have a plan and timeline to see it through. When we can demonstrate the ROI that will result from the audit, we will be perceived as knowledge leaders who are an integral component to the success of the organization.
Lori Zipperer at LinkedIn’s SLA KM Division Group writes:
Guy – I wish I could be at this session as it looks great. But I wonder, does management actually KNOW to ask for a knowledge audit or are info pros the professionals who see the need for that? Has an awareness of the knowledge audit as the beginings of an strategic KM development process been noted by managers? Glad to hear it
Berte Schachter at the LinkedIn SLA New York Chapter Group commented:
No one yet has come up with a real method of measuring the value that information management provides, (many theories no real standards). If we can’t provide meaningful valuation in this economy, we will continue to see the decline of departments and resources seen over the last decade. It’s not enough that WE know our contribution to productivity to cost savings. We need to be part of the process our organization uses to demonstrate the worth of all departments. It ain’t easy but the alternative is worse.
Guy St. Clair responds:
Good point, Berte, and that’s why so many of us are so involved with looking to senior management, seeking ways we can link with them and their strategies (particularly their standards for measurement, metrics, ROI, etc.). We can’t (and shouldn’t) try to do this in a vacuum. It’s critical that this be a collaborative effort and one that, for the most part, must be initiated by the company/organization’s strategic knowledge professionals. Like you say, it ain’t easy but we just have to do it if our contribution is going to mean anything to the larger enterprise picture.
Thanks for sharing.