APQC hosted our annual conference earlier this month, bringing together over 250 knowledge and process management professionals. The conference was an out-of-this-world journey where participants gained the tools and insights to strategically integrate, intentionally influence, and measurably impact their workplace. This post summarizes my key themes and insights from the event for those who couldn’t attend.
Key Themes & Takeaways
Disruption.
In many sessions throughout the conference, speakers and participants mentioned change, transformation, or disruptions. Change management is the number one priority for both process and knowledge management professionals according to our 2025 priorities research. Having a strong process management foundation is critical for organizations to navigate any disruption they encounter.
In the opening session, a great analogy was shared. Astronauts work “as normal” through any disruption. Organizations need to learn how they can plan ahead so they’re ready to encounter any disruption thrown their way and make it look like “just another day in the office”.
One speaker shared that change is the only constant, and fast paced organizations can’t rely on a legacy way of doing business or they’ll lose critical growth opportunities.
Frameworks and Architecture.
Frameworks help organizations structure their work, create a common language, and anchor the enterprise.
Qaisar Hayat with Geidea shared in his slides a great image that connected process work to the conference theme. Strategy represents how professionals can influence work, the customer’s expectation represents the impact seen from process efforts, and end-to-end business processes represent how organizations integrate their work.
In the session led by KK Wind Solutions, Flor and Sandra made a great point about process governance – while they shared what worked best for them, other organizations must find out what is going to work best for them, which may be different than another organization.
Hoarders.
Speakers throughout the conference discussed different types of barriers faced in process management work. A common theme was the “resistance to share knowledge”, or the “hoarding of process knowledge”. Employees varied in reasons why, but among the reasons were:
- They don’t understand the “why”
- There’s too much “art” or “expertise” in what they do, and it can’t be documented
- They feel it “decreases their job security”
While process documentation plays a critical role in the success of a process management program, the processes shouldn’t be documented to just “sit on a shelf”. Instead, make the documentation something that the end users will use – whether that’s a particular format, in a particular tool, or using imagery. Additionally, ensure it’s accessible by the people that need it, when they need it, and in a place they can easily access “in the flow of work”.
Find Your New Best Friend
The conference brought together professionals from around the world, in a variety of industries and functions, fostering new connections. The emcee, Lynda Braksiek, asked participants on day two of the conference how many new “work besties” they had acquired while at the event. Participants shouted out a variety of numbers, and one friend that can’t be forgotten is AI. AI was mentioned throughout the conference, and the keynote session with Jeremy Utley was no exception.
He focused on the notion that we “work with AI”, and we don’t “use AI”, meaning that we need to figure out how to collaborate with AI and consider it a teammate versus just a tool that you speak to. He also gave us another use of the acronym AI, augmented intelligence, which I really like. AI (artificial intelligence), much like process, can only do so much for professionals. Employees must learn how to work with the process tools and knowledge or work with the AI to become more effective.
I also loved his statement, “you’re never going to use AI in the kitchen if you haven’t used it in the living room” meaning that you have to practice how to use AI in everyday life and experiment with it so you can determine the best applications and use cases for your work life.
Closing Thoughts
I could only share so much in this blog post, but a wealth of knowledge was shared throughout the time at the conference from the main stage to breakout sessions, to networking conversations. I encourage you to view our conference overviews in our Resource Library to learn more!
Explore the conference summaries.