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Massachusetts & has authored ‘Process Innovation’, ‘Mission Critical’, and ‘Mastering Information Management’. Lawrence Prusak is the Executive Director for IBM institute of Knowledge Management. He has taught in several leading universities on Knowledge Management & holds credits to several journals, including the ‘Sloan Management Review’, ‘California Management Review’, etc.

Nine detailed chapters spanned over 179 pages covers a wide range of knowledge agents, markets, players, roles, technology platforms, culture, & behavioral myths on the subject. The authors elicit the objectives with real time case studies drawn from more than 50 large corporations across the pacific with extended themes of thought leaders, such as Dorothy Leonard Barton, Nonaka, Taeuchi, Paul Lomer, Tom Steward & many more …

So, why all of a sudden knowledge management? Kick starts the loop between the author and the readers. In a new car development process, Ford wanted to replicate some designs from their initial model ‘Tauras’ – but none could be found within the company who has any know how, similarly – Harvesters previous knowledge to build truck factories in Russia could have been handy when the Russian governments re-approached for another set up show. Simple examples such as this, explain the need for knowledge notes across years and growth periods in organizations. Knowledge cannot be ignored in good, or at bad times. It’s an essential for companies, nations, communities and government sectors at large.

Very much contextual - knowledge is a derivative of an event, which translates to data, information, knowledge and leads to Wisdom management. Though for years these terms have been self confusing, but both the authors present a series of example to relate to the individual importance to each term. Prusak & Davenport argues, “The key to a successful knowledge initiative lies in experience and ground truths, which cannot be captured easily. The judgment & complexity of knowledge differs largely & that there are no thumb rules to a successful KM strategy”.

But, the effects of KM in organizations can be profound, eye opening & in some cases quite dampening. There seems to be a natural transition within companies towards Intellect driven business practices. 3M calls itself ‘A Knowledge Company’, Xerox – ‘A Document Company’, IBM – ‘Industry solutions unit’ and traditional models of product and service barriers are being fused as Knowledge within the company itself is maturing.

An example cited on British Petroleum Virtual Teamwork Program is an eye opener for knowledge in action. An 18month pilot at BP exploration with simple technologies such as email, desktop, video conferencing, multimedia, application sharing, shared chalkboards, chats, web browser was used to repair an equipment failure in North sea (while drilling in 1995) from a remote office at Aberdeen thru’ satellite link and desktop digital camera. The exercise saved cost for more than 150,000/-US$ per day and promoted communities of practices, churned best practices fair and promoted face to face meetings – creating a collaborative environment across regions within British Petroleum.

It’s also quite interesting to witness, how Knowledge Markets are shaping in our current economical, social & organizational disposition; the age old ‘Gharana’ broking system dominates the market with sellers and buyers as active participants. Incidentally - the price system engine is far to complex than mere financial transactions in a knowledge management market. The authors contrast reciprocity, repute, and altruism as the biggest benefits and trust as the base asset for successful knowledge transfer across human mindsets/organization boundaries.

The Greek Agora & age old Roman forums are still very much part of the knowledge market phenomena! The Japanese seems to have taken a lead in mastering similar philosophies within organization boundaries – Dai-Ichi Pharmaceutical have created what is called modern – “Talk Rooms” facilitating open environment of discussions while on work. Face to face meeting, Free sharing of information, Share fairs, Best practice awards, Organization knowledge maps, Chat rooms, Gossip centers, are the natural elements incorporated by companies to reflect their contributions towards changing times and knowledge cultures. As mentioned by Steve Jobs of Apple Computers, “It doesn’t make sense to hire smart people and then tell them what to do and what not to” will be a serious agenda in consideration in the life of knowledge management for years to come.

Three consecutive chapters dedicated for Knowledge Workers explain in detail how managing knowledge can be formally structured & what that could mean at each step. Nonaka & Taeuchi’s, ‘The Knowledge Creating Company’ and Dorothy Leonard Barton’s, ‘Wellsprings of Knowledge’ are quite well known reference to the process of generation, codification, & transfer, the authors embark with.

Though, Corporate Acquisition is by far the most used and common means of acquiring knowledge in the corporate circle, but Davenport warns of alarming effects, explaining the case for EL Products when they bought over Electro Luminescent Lamps, highlighting the study of people, culture, process and technology towards a successful acquisition process. This could mean a lot of care and consideration beyond normal means of a set up process.

While organizations are trying to grapple with other strategies of creating a knowledge generating company; the method of dedicated resource centers and fusion technique are becoming quite successful in many places. Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center), Ernst & Young’s Center for Business Innovation, Anderson Consulting technical research center at Southern France, IBM Consul ting’s dedicated competency center, Motorola – McDonald – Merck research & learning institutes have set great examples in this segment across communities.

An example cited by Nonaka and Takeuchi on Matsushita’s innovation of the first Automatic bread making machine challenges many thought leaders on our time – Bringing teams across Rice cooker, Toaster and Coffee Making division – Matsushita’s knowledge initiative proved, ‘Innovations occurs at the boundaries of mindset and does not require organization territories’

But above all, knowledge generation will require careful consideration, prioritization, adequate time & support from top management. Companies need to commit to resources, libraries and promote knowledge activist within themselves. Followed up with, well devised method of recognition for knowledge workers and a well defined strategy that can be nurtured. A death of a knowledge worker can end an organizations capacity to change with times!

Coding tacit and explicit knowledge in the process of developing a successful knowledge management initiative is a major milestone for companies leaping in towards such as strategy. Davenport and Prusak observes, that a codification process needs to address a proper organization knowledge modeling, assembling a detailed map, people skill mapping, with lot of reasoning, relevance and usability established. They explain in detail how companies like, HP, Microsoft, Hoffman La Roche, Ernst & Young rate their internal knowledge codification process and conclude, ‘If more than a (33 1/3 percent) third of the total time and money resources of a project is spent on technology, the project becomes an IT project’ – embarking on the need of art & not science in this development process.

There can be well defined knowledge transfer strategies in organizations, but the level of access to attention increases drastically with company’s culture argues the authors. A pragmatic equation of Transfer = Transmission + Absorption rounds the discussion with explanations of how each of the members in a organization contribute towards a successful knowledge transfer strategy. How quickly is knowledge disseminated (Velocity) and how well this is absorbed/used (Viscosity)?; are key factors in consideration towards a knowledge enabled organization. The 3M culture, embedded in their daily working schedule is a case in point. How researchers, sales people, product managers are encouraged openly for innovation grants & knowledge fairs leads to innovative development of new product every year. One of the most famous results of this openness was the invention of open scotch tape by Dick Drew, remarks the duo.

If the role of generation, codification, & transfers are important in the life of knowledge management, the coaching approach of the torch bearer, the ‘Chief Knowledge Officer’ is off a prime focus on how he navigates thru’ the wealth of organization knowledge. It is ‘He’ who juggles with multifaceted tasks of a librarian, a project manager, sales person, designer, financer, & implementer.

Assisted by his team of knowledge worker, project leader, & senior knowledge executive – he (CKO) is responsible for building an infrastructure, culture, & pay off economically. Incidentally, it also depends on the organization structure on which model of knowledge team structure will eventually assist in laying the foundation. Anderson Consulting & HP set a good example for being a knowledge heavy organization & a non CKO managed lot. A central CKO role, trying to influence divisional knowledge plans & policies could be wholly inconsistent in such a situation.

Embedding knowledge management within systems has also been a huge area of research for years, but with the proliferation of the World Wide Web – its potential seems to be ever evolving. The Internal knowledge requirements are well catered by Notes, and other similar workflow collaborative systems, & external needs are broadly taken care by the net and its predecessors. Tools like GrapeVine, Hoovers have helped companies to link external knowledge & filter intelligence, but the shortcomings of tacit capturing systems have re-enforced knowledge workers to reorganize their ‘Tecknowledgy’ in accordance to their needs for focused knowledge environments.

These focused environments call for a high level of user acceptance & weights on the time to find the solution. Some common environments are 'Case Based Reasoning', 'Expert System', 'Constraint Systems', Neural Nets' etc.

Varyingly; all of these systems put together still do not cater to the richness of knowledge repositories. Knowledge grows with usage & sharing. Some of the named factors leading to the success for Knowledge richness, according to Davenport and Prusak - relates to the development of senior management support, clarity of vision, language and wisdom, link to economics or industry value with multiple channels of knowledge transfer. These show us, how many of factors rate in comparison with technical infrastructure for a successful knowledge project within a company.

Lastly, the authors highlight the need for choosing the right beachhead to launch a successful knowledge management initiative. This would obviously require a strong understanding of organization beliefs, culture and aspiration, since this would involve a close debate between non knowledge generating activities and possible k-links. Putting a personnel manual or ISO procedure online, Or, launching a campaign on "Every man a knowledge manager" just doesn't prove anything of knowledge management in organizations. As a successful knowledge manager, one must know the trade off between learning and doing, simultaneously - a healthy tension between knowledge & action can play a critical role on the success of knowledge management as a practice, says Davenport and Prusak.

In sum, Knowledge Management is not a rocket science at all. It involves the learning’s of people, process & technology. Impeccably meshed to bring out the hidden factors - suppressed in routine activities & building instinctual business nerves within every business - living in the edge of such turbulent times, this books serves as a beginners guide to building such practices and will have a very high regard in the life of knowledge workers for years to come!