How new technologies can help KM.

It was a great pleasure to present at KM Australia today in Sydney. My talk took a pragmatic look at how changing technologies can support…

Collaboration is about people.

| View I've just uploaded the presentation I gave today at a KM Roundtable meeting in Melbourne. A great group of people, lots of good questions, only just scratched the surface in the time we had available. (I think there's huge amount of value in all these types of groups. The simple act of getting together and sharing information face-to-face is immensely valuable. So if you're into KM, definitely look into the KM Roundtables, held in Victoria and NSW.)

Intranet questions (Brisbane, Australia).

I've just finished running a very enjoyable Intranet Planning Day workshop in Brisbane. Plenty of questions and lots of interaction, just the way I like it. For the record, here were the "big questions" raised at the beginning of the day: Getting management not to see it as a quick project? How to get staff interested and using the intranet? Best way to find out what users need? Right metadata, etc? Processes for publishing? How to engage management? Funding? Integration of systems? Content lifecycle? CMS? Search? Maintaining relevance? Ways to structure content? Content format? (HTML vs PDF) DM vs intranet?

Getting out from behind the podium.

There are generally-accepted principles of what it takes to be a good (or even great) presenter. One of these is to get out from behind the podium, to stand in front of (or amongst) the audience. To either project your voice, or to use a wireless microphone if the room is too large. Having spent a bit of time at several major conferences over the last month, I ask: why do all the rooms always have a podium for the speaker, or a table for the panel to sit behind? Conference organisers can do more to help people to be

Why are case studies at conferences often so dull?.

This is something I was idly thinking about today, and I scribbled down some notes that I thought I would share. First off, I think it's because people aren't putting themselves in the shoes of their audience when they are presenting, and considering how (and what) to share that would be of interest. Then I thought about the sorts of questions I think the presenters should be trying to answer. Typically, what they cover pretty well (and this is the dull bit): Who are we? What is our environment? What have we done? Why have we done it? A little

Beyond uncertainty.

I had an opportunity to talk with a good number of the participants at the recent Marcus Evans website and intranet conference. By the end of the two days, I think that many were pretty overwhelmed. It didn't help that a number of the presenters talked about spending literally millions of dollars on intranet, website or CMS projects, and getting very little in return. The web designers heard a lot about the critical importance of culture, people, and change management. The communications people heard a lot about the need for a content management system. The net result was a lot

Plenty of intranet goals.

The starting point for our recent Intranet Peers in Government forum was a discussion of possible intranet goals. Here is what the group brainstormed (in no particular order, and fairly unedited): Provide a reference tool for staff Target information to audience Achieve business improvements Provide best practice examples Establish corporate identity Support geographically isolated staff Communicate information consistently Support business processes Provide a common access point Reduce information overload (e-mails, etc) Provide information self-service Support skills sharing Support networking Reduce workplace costs Reduce information dissemination costs Improve decision making Improve public image Give access to centralised source of information Reduce