Tacit Knowledge and Social Networks

I’ve always tended to hang my KM hat on the value of tacit knowledge and helping organizations leverage that mostly untapped resource.  Those that have been readers of KM News for any length of time are aware of my definition of KM - KM is about connectedness; connecting people to people and people to information to create a competitive advantage. 

Clearly we have a revolution taking place with respect to social networks.  What are social networks doing?  Creating and extending connections of course.  The context (business, pleasure, …) of those connections varies but still allows for developing relevant connectedness. 

Do social networks allow us to find out what we don’t know, do they allow us to share our knowledge with other people, do they empower and leverage the collectives knowledge?  The answer to all those questions is YES.  So why are structured organizations so slow to adopt social networking and collaborative tools like Wiki’s within their “walls”…