TMA World Viewpoint 31: Knowledge and learning in the Borderless Workplace
•
0 likes•774 views
Terence Brake discusses how access to knowledge has changed dramatically with the internet and global digital networks, allowing fingertip access to vast amounts of information. However, traditional knowledge management systems have not kept pace with the digital age. Brake advocates for more dynamic and collaborative knowledge systems that facilitate knowledge sharing and creation between individuals. TMA World has developed an online platform called Learnspace that provides learning resources and enables collaboration to support the development of critical capabilities for borderless work.
Report
Share
TMA World Viewpoint 31: Knowledge and learning in the Borderless Workplace
- 1. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace: Beyond Nationality Terence Brake Head of Learning & Innovation, TMA World
- 2. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 2 The greatest revolution in my lifetime – at least for me – is finger-tip access to the world’s knowledge and information.
- 3. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 3 I grew up in a time when knowledge was predominantly in printed books, and the only access point to those books was a CARD CATALOGUE!
- 4. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 4 People were another source of knowledge, but my networks were limited to just a few individuals. Now my networks can be global.
- 5. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 5 In organizations, knowledge was – and sometimes still is - trapped in business and functional silos.
- 6. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 6 That must change if companies are going to compete in a hyper-competitive, fast- changing and knowledge-based economy in which there is also an increasing shortage of knowledgeable and skilled talent.
- 7. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 7 Collaboration is critical to leverage what knowledge and skills are available and to continuously innovate and be agile.
- 8. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 8 Unfortunately, there are many knowledge management systems that have not kept pace with the times.
- 9. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 9 Many people have become disenchanted with clunky repository-based knowledge management systems. There are many reasons for this: lack of integration of knowledge systems with organizational processes, systems designed without key stakeholder input, a lack of understanding of the barriers to knowledge transfer, difficulties in representing the knowledge assets in user- friendly ways, a lack of transparency on the part of contributors, difficulties in finding an appropriate level of specificity in the contributions so that users can determine usefulness (although tagging can help).
- 10. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 10 As well as making improvements to the above, we must also change how we perceive ‘knowledge’.
- 11. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 11 The traditional knowledge-management approach tends to treat ‘knowledge’ as something solid and static - an object, a thing - something that can be captured in a database and used time and time again.
- 12. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 12 Some knowledge can be used time and again like the laws of physics – although particle physics has presented classical physics with some mind-numbing conundrums in the past few decades. Scientists will tell you that all knowledge is tentative, something can happen tomorrow that turns respected science on its head -
- 13. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 13 You mean the earth isn’t the center of the solar system? Well, who would have guessed? Knowledge is as much a verb as it is a noun. ” “
- 14. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 14 While the storage, retrieval and distribution of ‘object’ knowledge is still important to 21st century business organizations, equally important – if not more so in today’s environment – is the development of borderless systems and processes that enable the dynamic creation, sharing, and learning of knowledge (knowledge embedded in individuals and communities as well as documents and databases).
- 15. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 15 Knowledge and learning and development systems need to be integrated into one. Think of a system that not only stores past and current knowledge, but enables knowledge creation processes and sharing to be developed dynamically in borderless collaborative relationships - an adaptive system that accommodates not only whole- enterprise knowledge sharing and capability development needs, but also the existing and emergent needs of different knowledge and practice communities within them.
- 16. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 16 With these needs in mind, TMA World has developed a flexible online platform (Learnspace) enabling users to access formal knowledge/learning resources, as well as provide capabilities for collaborative knowledge creation and learning. Users can not only access over 1000 TMA World learning resources individually, they can also build them into customizable Learning Paths. Users can also interact with one another to share knowledge, experience and skills. They can also upload their own knowledge content and learning resources and build/share learning collections built from those provided by TMA World.
- 17. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 17 With these needs in mind, TMA World has developed a flexible online platform (Learnspace) enabling users to access formal knowledge/learning resources, as well as provide capabilities for collaborative knowledge creation and learning.
- 18. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 18 The TMA World content targets what we call the critical4 borderless work capabilities Borderless Collaboration Cultural Intelligence Digital Fluency Matrix Working These critical4 capabilities are explored in my e-book: The Borderless Workplace: The critical4 capabilities for the new world of work available for free on the TMA World website. You can also learn more about Learnspace at the site.
- 19. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 19 Webinar Twitter Blog Viewpoints and articles Publications Written by Terence Brake, Director of Learning & Innovation at TMA World. Our new Borderless Working e-book series About Us Visit www.tmaworld.com/insights to discover the latest thinking from our experts on global, collaborative, cross-cultural and virtual working. There you’ll find links to our:
- 20. Knowledge and learning in the borderless workplace © Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 20 Above all we’d like to hear from you directly, so please don’t hesitate to send any comments, questions or feedback to us at: enquiries@tmaworld.com Or visit our website: www.tmaworld.com About Us Visit www.tmaworld.com/insights to discover the latest thinking from our experts on global, collaborative, cross-cultural and virtual working.