Knowledge Management and Negotiating Meaning in Technical and Scientific Reports

Came across this blog posting by Steve Barth on the topic of working definitions for the term Knowledge Management. Take a look.

Barth talks about the list of working definitions for knowledge management compiled by Ray Sims. I absolutely agree with Barth that it is much more effective to have multiple definitions for a concept than just a single idea. When Philip and I talk about knowledge management, our discussions often begin with the qualifier "it depends on......."
A quote in Barth's piece I want to share with you here:

I prefer multiple definitions because clarity and agreement cannot be assumed. Meaning must be negotiated and confirmed. Even if it's only a temporary agreement or working definition for the task at hand, that represents a position triangulated from the multiple points of view of all participants. You'll have a much better commitment to success if consensus was earned rather than enforced.

Meaning must be negotiated and confirmed. This is an important concept not just for developing a working definition for a term like knowledge management, but it is also an approach critical to the conveyance of knowledge in scientific and technical report. We see the process of negotiated meaning played out, sometimes really well and other times quite poorly, in our daily work in the pharmaceutical industry. Those who buy into the notion that technical and research reports do more than just report data will endeavor to ensure their documents convey a clear sense of meaning. They will work during the drafting and review sessions to refine meaning and not just refine grammar and presentation.
Barth's comment that best outcomes occur through the process of consensus and not enforcement is important to keep in mind. My interest in this approach is to help ensure that objective assessment of a body of work is seen through relatively clear eyes and unfettered minds. See what Dave Snowden has to say about our inability to maintain clear, focused objectivity. In particular I see Snowden's effect called "self-confirmation" interfere with the process of constructing meaning in documents. Snowden describes self-confirmation as follows:

Self confirmation our ignoring any evidence that disturbs our pre-judgements or hypotheses and means rationalization means that we only search for data that will support the pre-judgements.

In our McCulley/Cuppan work we have seen far too many times discussions on what to "say" in a document driven by personality, where it is the loudest or longest exhortations or often pay grade of the commentator that will decide what message or messages will or will not appear in a document. Certainly not a best practice approach for effective management and representation of knowledge in business documents.


Originally published on our Knowledge Management blog