The 'Knowledge Worker Syndrome' - widespread recognition and acceptance that in investment grade businesses
employees bring their informed brains to the business - not their hands. In successful, competitive businesses those brains are respected, informed, consulted, motivated, excited and personally
involved - always.
The shortage of Knowledge Workers - leading to pressures to apply Knowledge Workers optimally.
The need for innovation and creativity as the critical element in business success in investment grade businesses. This
can be seen as the need to innovate at creating innovation, which in turn means innovation in the leadership and management of Knowledge Workers.
The recognition that the substantial output from new investment grade businesses is knowledge - even though the embodiment
of the business may appear just to be a different way of selling an existing product (e.g. Amazon.com, where the knowledge created is 'what, how, why, when, where the customer - will buy without
having the product in physically front of them').
The change from the information society (data-for-control orientation) to the knowledge society
(knowledge-creation-and-application orientation).
The societal changes in personal attitudes that are occurring subsequent to the tumultuous 'information
society-re-engineering-downsizing-de-middle managementing' period of the 1990's. These changes reflect the attitudes of generation X'ers toward jobs (principally the addition of the 'need for
personal satisfaction' to the basic, historical 'need for personal survival' that dictated attitudes in the previous era) and the emergence and acceptance of the view that people are responsible
individually for their own futures - hence employees now manage their own future direction as independently-minded people and as business entrepreneurs.
The speed of development of technology-based change which make it impossible for any single person to competitively
'command-and-control' a business in the face of more effective competition that draws on team-knowledge-based approaches. Investment grade business use a combination of motivating factors to ensure
that every employee is working effectively as part of 'the overall team' and in 'one or more individual teams'.
The widespread development of comfort with the notion that the business environment is chaotic - the result of rapid and
unpredictable changes in markets and technology. This has created, in many markets, a truly competitive environment in which an individual business's best strategy for success is to focus on getting
the customer the best product by using all available creative tools.
It is our view that all these changes increase the critical importance of real, effective and complete bi-directional communication (i.e. discussion) between all levels and functions of employees in the application of the employees information (as well as in applying data entering the business from the outside world). Discussion has now become critical, because no single person can any longer manage a business competitively or understand a business completely because the competitive advantages conferred by motivated systems of brains (i.e. teams !) are overwhelming. Thus businesses dependence upon its employees increases enormously in knowledge-based businesses; creating the circumstance for effective discussion has therefore become a critical aspect of running a business.
Peter M. Senge's influential and widely read book "Fifth Discipline" has led to focus on the word "Dialogue". In these WebPages I frequently use the word "Discussion". The dictionary says "Dialogue" means: 'an exchange of ideas and opinions; a discussion between representatives of parties to a conflict that is aimed at resolution'; contrastingly "Discussion" is defined as 'consideration of a question in open and usually informal debate'. Because I am concerned with obtaining rapid results in a current business context I prefer "Discussion" because it implies:
Equality between parties - respect for the individuals knowledge and motivations in the current business
context, thereby improving the probability of open communication.
A lack of formality, implying to me a pre-existing, motivated interest on the part of all the parties in obtaining both a
personally satisfying outcome and a good outcome for the business.
A lack of a firm position that implies no pre-defined solution approach on the part of the parties, but rather a search
for a solution that fits each persons available knowledge (and therefore the here-and-now solution possibilities) plus a recognition that a solution can only be found after discussion has occurred. I
am particularly interested in ensuring that there is only conflict in the parties positions as the result of the existence of hitherto unexplored areas that lack shared interest, because I believe
that when people work in the context of a shared larger objective, mutual exploration of interests and knowledge leads to fast and painless conflict resolution.
An outcome-directed conversation motivated by time pressures (surely the normal business situation), rather than the steady on-going
information interchange implied by dialogue.
A discussion is an open exchange led or directed toward obtaining a solution that all parties believe is appropriate for the context of the problem or opportunity, with compromise being determined by the need to find a satisfactory outcome to the focused issue - "The Necessity", as discussed elsewhere in these pages - see Article 2: Necessity Defines the Creativity Sandbox. This results from our need to work effectively in a world that is constrained by the essential requirement to provide adequate, relevant solutions quickly, even though this may lead to compromise with current middle-term personal and business directions. Essentially we are driven by the fact that this quarter's results provide the opportunities to do better in the next quarter; and that there may be no next quarter if this quarter does not work out satisfactorily.
This is not to imply that business life has to be a series of isolated, pragmatic, short-term solutions.
Un-stated here is the essential need to learn from each of the short term situations so that the businesses systems can improve. Historically middle managers would do this learning and incorporate it into the next cycle of their businesses. With the demise of many middle managers as the result of the need to downsize and speed-up, businesses now have to find systematic new ways to identify, retain and apply this type of knowledge.
Discussion has to have a purpose or objective to be effective. For the same reason it also has to have a structure. This section briefly discusses these two points. Knowledge Worker businesses that want to optimally exploit use their peoples knowledge have the responsibility for ensuring that they understand these essential rules for effective communication in discussion.
The purpose(s) or objective(s) has to be defined by each individual participating in a one-on-one or group meeting before the discussion. The purpose or objective can be an exchange of information, discussion of a problem and proposal of its solutions, an exposure of ideas. Individuals must know clearly what they need to obtain from each discussion. Discussions are not an opportunity to air interests or justify positions or observe others or for mutual back-rubbing - they are one of the most valuable situations for the creation of substantial creative knowledge and are the main situation in which the magic synergy of the team occurs. They are also one of the best situations for the exchange and recording of such knowledge for the benefit of the business.
To make discussions work a structure should be present. The elements of the structure include:
Understanding the role of facilitative leadership in Discussion: knowing how to direct discussion toward
objectives by exploiting (and not overriding) the knowledge held by other people.
Knowing and accepting the responsibility for knowledge leadership - fundamentally the process by which individuals take
the risks that justify a business's investment. Individuals must manage the application of their knowledge in the context of a risk level the business has defined to them. This continually happens at
the micro-level in discussions with knowledgeable individuals able to make selection of possible objective solutions based on risks the business (not themselves) wants to take.
Defining to individuals the level of risk the business is prepared to take: encouraging people with knowledge to take
risks by defining the needs of the business to them so they can manage the risks for the business in full knowledge.
Putting the businesses vision into effect at the level of each micro-decision made by employees - making sure that
individuals are able to connect their choice of knowledge or solutions to the business objectives based on current accurate knowledge of those objectives.
The role of the businesses leadership - ensuring that the businesses leaders effect the outcomes of each individuals
thinking processes at the micro-level by guiding an open discussion of the businesses overall objectives.
Leaving the knowledge with the knowledge-holder whilst connecting it to the business's need for short term deliverables.
This means not transferring knowledge from people but instead applying it to the problems at hand.
Understanding the role of personal security, collegial friendship and fear in discussion. Every individual is different;
for the business to benefit optimally from each individuals knowledge the business must continually guide each individual so that these personal characteristics do not interfere with the optimal
application of the individuals knowledge in the businesses interests. Individuals must feel sufficiently secure that they feel no temptation to husband knowledge to protect of their own
interests.