EDUCAUSE Southwest Regional General Session: Knowledge Sharing: Some Myths and Ideas, and a Little IT

This is a summary of the EDUCAUSE Southwest Regional Opening General Session, February 20, 2008

Knowledge Sharing: Some Myths and Ideas, and a Little IT

Jean E. Engle

Chief Knowledge Officer,

NASA/Johnson Space Center

MS. Engle was the NASA Johnson Space Center CIO until she recently accepted the challenge of becoming one of the few Chief Knowledge Officers in the government.  She noted that there are many differences between the two roles. 

She provided background information about NASA and JSC.  Many do not realize that NASA has multiple centers around the country.  These all began as competitors rather than partners but this has changed over the years.  Engle described the passion in the community for their work.

JSC is the integrator of all things about manned space flight.  It is the home of the Astronaut Corps and, as it is primarily known, “Houston, we have a problem” Mission Control.  The actual workforce is about 3000 civilians and 14000 contractors.  Ten thousand of these people are “inside the fence.” There is a lot of diversity between all the pieces which includes different HRs, different cultures, and more, that keep them from working as well together as they would like.

JSC owns the 3 largest programs:  Shuttle, International Space Station, and Constellation – crew exploration. They plan a moon to Mars ship by 2015, and an Earth to Mars ship by 2030.  The Shuttle program, with 130 successful missions and 2 catastrophic failures, will be retired in 2010 after 11 more launches. This means there will be 5 years with no US presence in space.  The International Space Station will rely on the Russian space program with the exception of some things that can go up only with the larger Shuttle before it is retired.  The ISS will soon be 6 person supportable and be able to do true science.

Moving back into her talk on knowledge management and its challenges, she described Knowledge Management (KM) as the ability to capture the right information and pass it on to a person who needs it.  KM is critical in this era as we face a major workforce transition and changing skill set needs, i.e., Shuttle skills are different than will be needed in the new programs.  The average age at JSC is 45.  As with other organizations, many are approaching retirement and knowledge they have has gone uncollected.

From planning conversations with the CKO from Goddard Space Flight Center, Engle shared the Top Ten Myths about Knowledge Management which is adapted from several sources

10. Culture change can be mandated from the top down (what should managers do)

9. Collaboration effort can be “purchased” or “sharing be rewarded” (these are not   sustainable and quality is not good.  Reward from personal satisfaction is best)

8. KM can be outsourced

7. Anybody (who isn’t busy) can do KM

6. KM can be solved by buying the right software

5. KM can be independent of the business process

4.  Communities of practice can be established from the top

3.  KM is about centralizing knowledge content to use it more efficiently

2.  KM is really about databases

1.   KM is an IT function and should be given to the CIO

Actions that Engle took to implement KM were

1.  Benchmarking

• Studied approach looking at various entities (Rolls Royce and others – these were companies that had pressing need) inside/outside government and the aerospace industry. 
• Consortium studies with the American Productivity and Quality Center (APQC)
• Working with her Goddard SFC counterpart

2.  Assessment

• Center-wide knowledge management maturity assessment which provided insight into how much knowledge sharing was occurring and where
• Identified strengths and gaps/barriers – the identified fractured organization was a big barrier

Engle noted that many people who hoard information are still among us and indicated the need to convince this generation to actively work on KM.  Some of the methods used are:

• Leadership – modeled behavior
• Local learning – which needs to be encouraged/fostered.  She indicated that there are only 5-7 types of info and we need to know how/when to share each of these)  Lessons learned at the local level are applicable across multiple organizations.  However, you must ask the question: Is this something that others need?
• Codify when appropriate –Goddard SFC tried to film 40 retirees to retrieve the critical knowledge they had.  It was expensive, no one watches it, so “why do that to your friends.”  Tacit knowledge is not something you suck out of someone and put on the web.
• Change management takes time.  She indicated that most companies successful at KM have been doing it for 7-8 or more years.

Notable:

Generational differences are a part of the equation.   NASA has 4 generations working side-by-side (GenX, GenY, Boomers, Traditionals) as does higher education.  The average age is 45.

What is on incoming undergraduates’ minds?

• Learning curve for new employees/younger generations, it is hard to come up to speed in the organization.  New hires say it takes 5 years to know the culture and how to get things done
• Technology gap; the technology is not what they are used to and not user friendly
• More engagement of younger employees is needed – “don’t just give me a phone, computer, and leave”

Engle believes if NASA doesn’t change they won’t be able to recruit in 5 years.

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For thoughts from GenYers who now work for NASA watch the GenY created slide set available at http://www.educause.edu/SWRC08/Program/13571?PRODUCT_CODE=SWRC08/GS01   (watch a second time for how this might relate to IT in higher education)

• They don’t understand why NASA doesn’t have wireless or why the NASA Web doesn’t say what NASA does
• They (the next generation) will pay $124 billon to get to the Moon/Mars by 1030
• They say NASA should forget the top-down way they are doing things – it’s already dead
• They say NASA needs to better understand the audience – because the audience does not see the point, understand the facts, and aren’t currently in a position to participate.
• Instead of NASA telling the audience what they want to share, GenY wants NASA to spark conversations with compelling stories that touch the GenYs– but please be timely and utilize social media.
• They want NASA to reclaim its image as a leader of innovation

The slide set also considers what this would look like via headlines such as “Astronaut Twitters from Space during EVA,”  Two Million Digg Votes for the Latest NASA Press Release,” and “NASA Switches Back to MACs”

The slide set went on to discuss the good things that NASA is doing but said

“There isn’t one ultimate communications strategy to solve NASA’s problems once and for all.”  GenY wants to be a part of the solution.

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More KM ideas

Google – installed but the story is much more complex.

Led to identifying repositories, beginning with websites

• Which is leading towards identifying usage of websites
• Which will lead towards document and content management strategies
• Supported by stronger taxonomies and metadata structures

Engle offered lots of healthy ideas for improvement

Process:

• Social networking
• Pause and learn – informal learning sessions (30 minutes)
• Integrate risk management with knowledge management – crucial to decision-making – good (not perfect) makes managers better decision-makers
• Information lifecycle management – scan and make it available for future generations – but with connection to get context of the info
• Tacit knowledge capture – interviewing retirees

Add in People and Technology

• Web-enabled high performance teams
• Knowledge sharing forums
• Case studies – teaching by providing context to a story
• Web 2.0 technologies- enabler for infusion, collaboration, and sharing  (everybody has a wiki but no one uses them

She suggested that they may bring people back to talk/teach/record (7 original astronauts are still living)

And she reiterated that they want to be tool independent.

Engle left us with Astronaut Eugene Cernan’s quote from the final Apollo mission:  “We leave as we came, and god willing, as we shall return, with peace and hope for all mankind.”

Engle requested that we visit the NASA website(s) and give them feed back. 

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Q&A

Q – Were there only the 4 students who did the slide set involved?  

A - There were 4 who did the slide set but many more who participated in focus groups.  (At least 44)  Engle also discussed a mentoring program for engineers.  The have 61 mentors for 900 engineers.

Q – What does NASA do to partner with universities?   And question about interns.

A -  Talk to NASA HR – and  they have a good program for interns which has doubled to 300.  These are made to have 24X7 availability rather than work hours. 

Q - Mentoring program?

A – The mentoring program is via the HR program.  It has been opened up to retirees and many have come back to mentor.

Q – Collecting knowledge from retirees?

A - Retirees are asked to “drop things off” and many are providing resources  (one individual gave them 150 boxes that the archivist is going thru)

Q - Does having retirees mentor mean that current employees will be encouraged to do so as well?

A – While current employees are always encouraged to mentor, there is now more work to do but no more budget. Resources are an issue.  Time is an issue.

Further comments:

 Not having so many layers between engineers and upper levels is better.  It used to be that you had to follow the chain of command – but after the Columbia incident people could come forward at any level.  Engle noted that GenYs  are not concerned about organizational charts and hierarchies don’t mean anything to them.  (Boomers like hierarchy)

Change must occur / we must move on / preferably as part of the solution rather than part of the problem.  She noted that Discovery (shuttle) is their baby and whether sending off to college, or to Smithsonian, it is a change that must happen.

Engle talked about issues around engaging kids, Second Life, etc, considered, but not all kids think alike.  They do their best to hear the younger generations but they don’t always reciprocate.  NASA interns do reciprocate but sometimes that reciprocation needs to be facilitated.

Other tidbits:

NASA offers competitions thru educational programs.

NASA has a watchdog site which get information faster than employees do.

The intern program has been expanded to include sophomores  (Engle began as a coop student with NASA when she was 19.)

Engles’s presentation materials are available at http://www.educause.edu/SWRC08/Program/13571?PRODUCT_CODE=SWRC08/GS01

An interview with Engle is available via podcast at

http://connect.educause.edu/blog/gbayne/educausepodcastanintervie/46264