Are you really doing it right?

I was in a meeting the other day with and the subject of looking at learning from experience in a business context came up. We talked about some of the approaches that are commonly used and someone mentioned After Action Reviews came up. “Oh yes we do all that.” was the response, but I couldn't help feeling that in the way it was said that what he really meant was “Yes we do that but really its a waste of time.” It seemed to me that maybe it just wasn't being done right for that organisation.

One of the most important lessons I have learned is that attempts to cookie cut solutions and jemmy them into every instance where a similar issue appears to be present are almost always doomed to failure. That's not to say it is not a popular approach with some professional service firms that seek to commoditise “knowledge” and churn out templates of work client to client. Its little more than snake oil sales IMHO.

But that is not to say you can't reuse techniques it just means that doing so is usually much harder to do than you imagine, and that every single instance is unique and needs to respond appropriately to each particular circumstance if you are going to get value from it. By taking the harder route the approach evolves and develops richness.

AAR, Learning Review, Lessons Learned, call it what you will, (and you may well have to change the name to make it palatable) is one such technique and it does have a place in the KM canon but it is by no means easy. David Gurteen made me aware of this article by Nancy Dixon that summarises some of the challenges and has some interesting thoughts on how to approach it.

Kitchen Sink Economics?

Once again it seems that those who wish to deny the fundamentals and buck the obvious are being found out. The scorn of the powerful for simple truths has always irritated me.

A couple of years ago now I gave a lecture at my old business school where I talked about the financial crisis as a demonstration of the failure by the financial sector to understand Knowledge Management. To illustrate this I described my own personal experience or retail banking and how it had changed, and what that told me about the industries perception of, and approach to, risk and how I had expected, and predicted, the implosion. You cannot beat the mark one brain for bringing contextual insight and judgement to the complexity of risk. The would be Masters of the Universe in finance are just one more common example in business of those wearing the emperors new clothes. The only difference being is that in many cases I think some are aware they are naked (making their crime all the worse in my book), and there are some who are simply unwilling to listen to the lone voice that tells them they are.

Alas it seems to be happening again. Many people, me included, expressed considerable doubt about EMU and the launch of the Euro on the basis that it denied the existence of some fundamental flaws. Those being in this case - you cannot bring together economies that are radically out of step, remove the ability to respond locally to issues by effectively removing financial levers and expect it all to go well. Add to that the fact that you cant live beyond your means indefinitely as an individual or as a nation without consequences. Of course the powers that be said that this was not so, some how these basic rules didn't really apply in their new freakonomics world, and in any case the checks and balances were there that ensured that the economies were sufficiently converged to make this no problem. Yea right – obviously.

The other day there was a news report describing how modern attitudes to debt is different to the baby boomers attitude. Different to the extent that people now take on debt with little or no intention of ever paying it off, just spinning the financial plates. Well, let me say for the record – I don't agree and I tweeted it as a council of despair. Well, it seems that some nations and organisations seem to believe they can adopt the same notion and perhaps a nation actually defaulting on its debt is seen as not too important. I take no great pleasure in saying this or seeing the problems amount in Europe, but the situation with Greece will get worse. The situation in Germany will also get worse as it becomes increasingly obvious that many of the bail outs of the PIGS are flawed and going to land at the door of the German tax payer. Look at NAMA in Ireland as a perfect example.

Sometimes it is worth cutting through the crap that gets trotted out as the wisdom of the rich and powerful men in suits and remind them that many of the things necessary in life and business are learnt at kindergarten and basic economics is included.