Innovation in the Mapping Process - How Do We Ensure an Efficient and Quality Process?

Written in collaboration with Naama Halevi and Carmit Shaked

When initiating knowledge management activities in an organization, we must conduct a needs assessment to define priorities and determine the starting point.

The mapping process can be long and tedious and consume many organizational resources. Additionally, sometimes the process's outputs (mapping report, presentation of findings for a pilot) may not be focused or clear enough, leading to significant difficulty in deciding which knowledge management activities are needed and in which units. Sometimes, there is a gap between the client's expectations and the final deliverables they receive.

This article aims to provide several guidelines and tools for conducting an efficient mapping process (requiring as few resources as possible from the organization) and of high quality (providing a broad yet focused basis for decision-making and prioritization that is acceptable and desirable to the client).

Before we begin, we must internalize several basic assumptions:

• It is neither correct nor possible to manage all organizational knowledge.

• The recommendation for selecting knowledge management topics will be derived from weighing several parameters: cost, benefit, marketing leverage, and chances of success.

• The client knows the organization in which they work.

Let's remember the purpose of the mapping process.

Its purpose is to define priorities for addressing knowledge management in various organizational units and determining the starting point.

This goal is based on the fundamental assumption that managing all organizational knowledge is neither correct nor possible. Therefore, we must map the knowledge needs of different units and tailor knowledge management activities to each unit according to work processes, core needs, and unit objectives. Only after such a mapping process can we define priorities for knowledge management activities that we will implement in each organizational unit.

One of the most important guiding principles we must follow throughout the mapping process is to identify and process information that provides added value beyond what the client already knows about their organization.

Reviewing the organization's business objectives, financial status, and so on may be very important for the mapping team but will not benefit the document reader or the client.

Another principle is goal orientation. For example, suppose we determine our final recommendation based on four parameters. In that case, we should incorporate references to them throughout the process (in personal interviews and workshops) to define them more quickly and establish a common language.

Now, let's describe several recommended tips for conducting an efficient and quality mapping process:

1. Preliminary information gathering: Collect and consolidate information before holding meetings in the organization. This activity will ensure that you focus on the interviewee's perspective rather than on generic information during interviews. Already at the kickoff meeting, request materials that will give you structural and cultural familiarity with the organization, such as:

   1. Vision, goals, organizational structure, main activities, relevant position holders, key people.

   2. Background on the units/departments we will meet - their main activities.

   3. Send a preliminary email to interviewees directing them to think about knowledge gaps using a limited set of questions. For example: i. Which of the activities you mentioned do you feel that information is missing or that existing information is unorganized or inaccessible to you?

2. Make sure to interview a representative population that meets several criteria, such as:

   1. Employees with varying seniority

   2. Employees at different hierarchical levels

   3. Change agents/opinion leaders/knowledge centers/experts in their unit

   4. Employees with important political status

   5. Employees who may express resistance to the process. Involving them at the beginning will reduce their resistance.

3. Maintain diversity in methods and adapt the means to the target audience A workshop where teamwork takes place, personal interviews using verbal as well as visual aids such as the "Mapping Circle" where the participant marks seven main activities within their responsibility and for each one indicates whether the knowledge required for each activity is complete or lacking; what would make it complete knowledge.

4. Be oriented not only to benefit but also to additional parameters. Throughout the needs assessment and thinking about knowledge management solutions, be oriented not only to benefit but also to other parameters that will help you determine the recommendation:

   1. Cost - how difficult it will be to initiate and manage such a project, what will be the strength of resistance

   2. Marketing leverage - to what extent the activity, if carried out, can excite and cause "viral marketing" in the organization. One that will sweep additional bodies and units to participate in knowledge management activity.

   3. Chances of success: What is the level of readiness of people in the unit for change/implementation of knowledge management activity?

5. Be innovative with deliverables. Write a concise document tailored to the client's character that details only things of added value to the organization, such as:

   1. Recommended areas for the knowledge management process

   2. Set of considerations underlying the recommendation

   3. Process knowledge map - marking points in the work process where knowledge management solutions will be implemented

   4. Presentation for initiating activity and choosing a topic for the pilot

This is how you will succeed in an efficient and quality mapping process. And also, finish with a smile :-).

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Want to learn more about knowledge creation?

Here are some articles you might find interesting:

• Key success factors of collaboration

• Testing yourself- Milestones in KM projects

• Case Studies in Knowledge Management - Book Review