^The APQC Blog

According to the The New Reality of R&D  article in the May 2014 issue of Fast Company magazine, organizations are no longer investing large amounts of money into long-term research that only offers a return on investment way down the road. Instead, they are teaming up with other organizations that have the necessary resources to improve the amount of time it takes to see a return on R&

Want to get a content management geek fired up? Start talking about wiki software. The wiki can be a place to store definitions for our corporate acronyms and jargon, a spot to post reports and meeting minutes, and a space to store information about past projects.

In my last post on making the most of technical expertise, I talked about three knowledge gaps technical leaders are contending with: turning mid-career employees (aka “nex’perts”) into experts, speeding up the learning curve for novices and new hires, and creating new innovations and solutions. Earlier this year, APQC surveyed more than 750 people to find out what they’re doing to close these gaps and which tools and approaches are most effective.

Admittedly, I have carried a banner (and passion) for knowledge management (KM) for 2 decades. APQC’s research and hands-on work with our members has resulted in a proven framework and a formula for successfully implementing KM; yet we hear time and time again of “failed” KM implementations. We go into strategic design and planning knowing that one of the 2 variables in every KM implementation is culture. And, still, how people react to KM is what keeps us up at night. What gives?

For the past year, APQC has been doing in-depth research on the topic of leadership. We've looked at everything from the causes of the leadership deficit to the different types of leadership styles preferred by most organizations today.

Have you ever wondered what the leadership culture is like at your organization? Does your organization have an environment that promotes leadership development?

Lisa Austin, Manager, Knowledge & Information Management, and Georgette Suggs, Document Management Specialist -- KM, from Williams and Bush Brothers & Company talk about unwritten rules that will make or break your KM program, how leaders create unwritten rules, and how KM Gamification can help.

You can contact Lisa Austin at www.thekmcoach.com

Sue Baktis, Senior Manager with Accenture, talks about how vocabulary, standardization and buy in from key stakeholders are the keys to building the right knowledge management taxonomy.  She also explains how to create good taxonomy that will help boost business goals.

Last month, APQC hosted a webinar with Lawrence Merritt, Jr., Manager of Global Environmental Policy at Ford Motor Company’s Environmental Quality Office. Merritt discussed Ford’s implementation of its environmental operating system (EOS). Ford has established a robust manufacturing environmental strategy with well-defined targets for environmental metrics such as water use and waste sent to landfills. Ford's EOS enables it to translate these targets into concrete, actionable items in its manufacturing plans.

It is no secret around APQC that I am a big fan of Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla Motors and CEO and Chief Designer SpaceX and SolarCity.

Not only is he a remarkable engineer, designer, and visionary (check out the products he has developed here), Musk is committed to making the world a better place. He is a “giver” in the parlance of Adam Grant’s book Give and Take.