Vol. 5 No. 2 – November 2002

Please believe me when I say that I did not start out to make this a portal issue of KM News, but that looks like what I have done. I hope you find this issue to be useful informative and interesting to read. If you would like to know more or discuss directly with my thoughts on the role of identity and resource management in KM send me an email and we can start a dialog.

Enjoy!
Brad Hoyt
Editor, KM News
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KM News is proud to be associated with Braintrust 2003.  Braintrust is the 5th Annual Knowledge Management Summit. The conference speakers will share real-world advice on how to implement and improve KM practices that can be embedded in business processes (innovation, product development), how to measure the results of KM efforts, and how to inspire a creative and innovative corporate culture. It will also demonstrate which tools and technologies enable collaboration, improved productivity, efficiency and operational excellence. The program will be heavy on CASE STUDIES from corporate practitioners rather than THEORY, and emphasize PEOPLE over TECHNOLOGY. Register using the following link and save 15% off the registration fee! https://www.iirusa.com/braintrustmem/index.cfm/Action=PreReg/t=m

Commentary:

Convergence: It seems that Portals have finally arrived at a point where they are providing the kind of value predicted in the breakthrough Merrill Lynch “Enterprise Information Portals” report released in November 1998. The report predicted the consolidation of several related but at that time separate technologies within the enterprise — “We believe Enterprise Information Portals will emerge from a consolidation within and between the Business Intelligence, Content Management, Data Warehouse, Data Mart and Data Management markets.” While the Merrill Lynch report did not include knowledge management in the list of converged items there is no doubt that KM is part of the convergence or more correctly the items referenced in the Merrill Lynch report converged as KM.

Due to the convergence in the portal marketplace we are seeing an upswing in interest in portals and a corresponding increase in value derived from portal implementations. As many long-time readers remember, I consistently beat on the technology vendors for trying to make KM a technology, which it is not. It is undeniable that portals, whatever name you apply to them, are a technology, and that portal technology complements KM quite nicely. I find it interesting that the convergence we’ve been seeing for the last 18 months has finally added collaboration and extended communications capabilities to the fold. In this new converged world we have BI, DW, Content Management, Community, Collaboration, Messaging and Identity and Resource Management. This is quite a collection of independent technologies that provide incredible value when truly integrated.

My prediction is that authentic information management practices will garner acceptance with organizations of every size and that additional convergence through portals will provide users and organizations with ever-greater value. Over the next 12 months we will start to see an even greater understanding of the value of integrated identity and resource management amongst vendors and users of portal technology. This trend was started in late 2001 when Netegrity purchased DataChannel, moved into the mainstream with Sun integrating its identity products with its portal and most recently with Plumtree partnering with Oblix and others to provide integrated identity management.

Of course Identity and Resource Management are important for more than just portals, but that thought will have to wait for another time.

Interesting Reading:

articles, web sites, or books that I’ve found interesting.

Eli Lilly: Speeding Recovery
CIOInsight
- A really interesting article on how Lilly is using information technology and good information management practices to reduce time to market of new drugs and improve organizational performance. This is taking place through the alignment of IT and information management with the core business values. KM doesn’t get anymore practical than this.
http://www.cioinsight.com/article2/0,3959,637252,00.asp

Office Behavior: Why Can’t We All Just Get Along
Business 2.0
- In this article Tom Stewart talks about reciprocal altruism. This is a very insightful article that every CxO should read.
http://www.business2.com/articles/web/0,1653,42521,FF.html

Documentum Acquires eRoom
- This bit of news while interesting all by itself, is much more significant when one thinks about it in the context of the convergence is outlined early in this issue. Is Documentum on to something here???
http://www.documentum.com/products/launch/collab_ecm.htm

Portal/KM Mix Gains Mindshare
eweek.com
- You’ll have to work hard to get around the KM is technology bias from this writer, but once you do you read some useful information. It is my opinion (not so humble) that when most technology trade publications talk about KM and portals they are in fact talking about information management. Please keep in mind as you read this article that there is more to KM than good information management practices.
http://www.eweek.com/article/0,3658,s=709&a=24894,00.asp

Knowledge Management: Value is Relative
eweek.com
- Yet another eWeek article confusing information management with knowledge management. I did find the article interesting and useful once I mentally started substituting IM for KM – try it and it will
http://www.eweek.com/article/0,3658,s=709&a=24895,00.asp

Standards to Drive Services
eweek.com
- If you are interested in Portals and Web Services this article is for you.
http://www.eweek.com/article/0,3658,s=709&a=24897,00.asp

Tools of the Trade
eweek.com
- This is one of the best and most succinct articles I’ve read recently on the importance of taxonomies. If you are involved in an IM project you must stop and read this article. No it won’t change your life, but it just may give you some little insight in the value a good taxonomy brings to the table. I’ve created large and small taxonomies in my career and the one thing I’ve come to understand is that you are truly never done with your taxonomy.
http://www.eweek.com/article/0,3658,s=709&a=24896,00.asp

Knowledge Management Takes Community Spirit
CIO Insight
- The subtitle of this article says it all – “…it’s not about how you capture knowledge but how you create and leverage it.” You will find this interview with Etienne Wenger to be insightful and useful.
http://www.cioinsight.com/article/0,3658,s=25229&a=26907,00.asp

Enterprises struggle to contain ‘Infoflood’
TechRepublic
- Here’s an overview of Gartner’s 2001 Information Overload survey. The results are not earth shattering but are indeed interesting, even a year later. It does appear that KM and IM are once again confused.
http://www.techrepublic.com/article_guest.jhtml?id=r00620020422ern01.htm&page=1

10 Myths About Knowledge Management
ComputerWorld
- These myths were true in 2001 and they are still true today.
http://www.computerworld.com/cwi/story/0,1199,NAV47_STO55870,00.html

Lessons in eLearning
ComputerWorld
- This is a great little article on eLearning and the lessons learned getting eLearning started in an organization.
http://www.computerworld.com/careertopics/careers/story/0,10801,64464,00.html

KM Jobs:
KM Career Opportunities and Links — let me know of any opportunities and I’ll post them here (and don’t forget to tell me when the positions are filled). An asterisks (*) denotes a new item.

Positions:
There are several news listing www.kmnews.com/Jobs/KMJobs.htm

Job Sites:
KnowledgeFarm, http://www.knowfarm.com/kjobs.html
Enterprise Software Career Center, http://www.softwarejobs.com/erp.html
@Brint, http://www.brint.com/km/ken/jobs.html

Upcoming Events:
events I am interested in, and think you should be too. If you attend a conference that you heard about through KM News, tell the conference promoters.

November 2002

December 2002

January 2003

February 2003

May 2003

Products/Tools:
I’ll try and point you to interesting products, tools, and companies that are dabbling in the KM space. We continue to use the I, P, and S categories to provide additional context around technologies and tools. The Categories are: I – Connecting People to Information, P – Connecting People to People, and S – a Service. These categories are based on my definition of KM.

Documentum 5 from Documentum (I) – www.documentum.com
With Documentum 5 we see the convergence of  Content Management, Community, Collaboration, Digital Asset Management.  I’m not so much impressed with Documentum’s products as I am with where they are going and what they are trying to accomplish.  The company has been around for many years and until recently was known mostly as a high-end document management product company serving the pharmaceutical industry.  With the recent release of Documentum 5 and several acquisition (eRoom, TruArc, etc.) they have shown that they understand where the market is going and more importantly what their customers need and want.

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