I am expanding my consulting practice into the area of "Knowledge Management". I am especially interested in the transfer of knowledge and knowledge systems during the succession process (transfer of leadership, ownership, management between generations in family owned businesses). Some of my clients have organizations that are quite large and which rely on huge amounts of knowledge (both tacit and explicit). The technologies and procedures to "inventory" existing knowledge in an organization are in the very early stages of development and have more of a hunting and gathering approach than a farming approach. I think that OS may be a way to more deftly help organizations "know what they know"
Most of the knowledge that people swim in in their organizations is tacit rather than explicit. It is my impression that the linear approaches to inventoring tacit knowledge are like casting a net into water and pulling the fish out. You get content but no context. I am more interested in making the domain of tacit knowledge in an organisation visible without disrupting the complex, (even chaotic) sources of some aspects of tacit knowledge. My intuition is that OS could be used as a whole systems approach to making some of the tacit knowledge of an organization more visible and thus, giving my clients a competitive advantage in their market niche. I intend to use this when the opportunity presents itself wit a client. Does anyone have any experience with applications of OS in this kind of project? General words of wisdom would also be well received. Joe PauL
