The power of “Yes and….” in KM and innovation

What we can learn from Improv Theater...

How many times have you hear…”Yes…but….”

What’s this telling you? What’s the person saying? Yes but…is really “NO…here is what I think.” Or "no..you are wrong." What does this do to a conversation? What does this do to your willingness to listen and learn? What does it do to creativity and innovation?

What if instead you hear “Yes…and.” What does it do to the conversation – what does it do to your willingness to listen, to learn and to build on the conversation?

On yesterday’s NPR program Fresh Air; the shows host, Terry Gross, interviewed Allison Silverman, the executive producer and head writer for the Colbert Report. Silverman talked about how many of the writers have backgrounds in improvisational theater. As part of this conversation she talked about one of the tenants of improv is the Yes…and. In this game you are always building on what the pervious actor had to say. And I suspect that if you have been to an improv theater you have witnessed the power of this technique.

Silverman talked about building sketches for one of last weeks programs. At the morning "pitch session" two ideas presented stood out. One centered on “President Obama – and the fly swatting” and the second on how one of the networks is "dedicated exclusively to his demise."

Through the power of "Yes…and" the writers drew a connection between the two ideas – and they merged into one powerful sketch – "Murder in the Whitehouse.” The news anchor from the network that has nothing good to say about the president – starts off with praising the president for his masterful swatting of the fly – but then quickly goes to “Extraordinary negative coverage” and the flies family in morning. They then bring in Jeff Goldblum – who played in Jurassic Park and a number of other films – got his start by playing the fly in the 1986 film “The Fly.” According to Silverman – these three parts to the sketch – all came from the use of “Yes…and…” The masterful hunter, the negative network and Goldblum.

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Murder in the White House - Jeff Goldblum
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So what does this have to do with KM? And what does it have to do with Creativity and Innovation?

Think of a scenario where a project just went very well. The conversation starts of – we did this to make this could well. Yes---and in addition we did this. Yes…and…did you know that team B did this – and it really worked well, perhaps we could add that to our process. Yes -- and next time we could do it even better if we....

Or – this project didn’t go very well. The conversation starts "here is what happened. We didn't plan this as well as we could have. We could have brough in someone with planning experience for just a few hours to get us started on the right foot - yes and I know just the person that could do that for us. We didn't didn't test this before we used it. Next time - we can build an extra day into the schedule for that testing..yes and make that day up here in the schedule where we had some extra time. Yes...and here are a could of other things that we could do to make it go better next time ---. Yes and we could do this as well ---. Yes – and if we avoided this it could be even better. Yes---and if we built in …. Yes...

Contrast this with. This project didn't go very well. We didn't plan this as well as we could have. Yes...but...it really wasn't our fault. We needed more time. Yes...but management wouldn't give us more time. We needed someone with marketing experience. Yes...but we couldn't get the person we wanted. We should have tested this. Yes...but we didn't have time...

Or think about innovation. We could do this…yes.. but…I don’t think that would work because…opps wrong technique.

We could do this…yes and if we got stuck we could to this. And we could bring in Fred who’s done this before and have him share his experience. Yes and we could talk to Laura – who tried something similar – but ran into some road blocks. We could talk to her about that experience as well. Yes...and...

The power of “Yes---and.” Do you have experience using similar simple techniques to promote sharing of knowledge – and building on ideas?

Inspiration

What inspires you? What is it in a person that you admire?

Last night I had the opportunity to photograph a bike race in Reno, Nevada (it's what my wife refers to as my hobby job). There were two things that really stood out for me - and that inspired me. Making me say - if these people can do this - what can I do?

The first was the hand cycle national championships. These are athletes that are physically handicapped in some way - usually involving lose of the use of their legs. These men and women were amazing. They raced for 35

minutes on very challenging and technical course - that is by no means flat. You try and power your self up a hill just using your arms.

The person that won the men's event, Alejandro Albor , puts out over 700 watts (for anyone that is a cyclist - and uses a watt meter - you know that for most people it's tough to put out this much power with your legs). Alejandro's next stop - is the world hand cycling championships where he will be one of the favorites to take the world title.

The second is an athlete - Chad Gerlach - who has made an incredible come back. When Chad was in his early 20's he was rising star in the world of cycling. He raced with some of the top cyclists in the world - including Lance Armstrong. He was on the inaugural US Postal Team. But then things went ba

d - very bad. During the off season Chad would party. In 2001 he started taking street drugs and by 2003 he was taking crack...and it was over. Up until less than a year ago he was homeless - and addicted. But someone gave him a chance to come back - Roberto Gaggioli a friend that is now running a cycling team called and asked him to join the team. And he is winning races and inspiring people. For the past two days - Chad has ended up on the top step of the podium - first in a race in Truckee and then in the Reno race. This Sunday - Chad will be racing in Nevada City - once again up against Lance Armstrong.

So what motivates you? What inspires you? For me - these two individuals show me that regardless of where you are - and what has happened - the possibilities for the future are endless.

For more on Gerlach - check out the article in Cycling News or the recent interview on NPR

I've just finished teaching my first online course - my first course as part of Cal State Northridge's Masters Degree in Knowledge Management (KM).  This has prompted me to start blogging on the topics of Distance Learning (DL) and KM.

The purpose of this blog is to discuss what I and my students are learning about both KM and online learning.

As you can see from the title of the Blog I am a firm believer in the notion that both KM and Distance Learning (DL) are contact sports.  By this I mean that for either KM or Distance Learning to be effective you must do more than install a technology and put up some content – it requires personal involvement.

What really struck me now that I am teaching in an online program are the similarities between DL and KM.  In both the participants are often not in the same location and in many cases don’t know each other very well.  They have a need to learn – but they aren’t sure who knows what (except of course the “professor is suppose to be the Subject Matter Expert - SME), both typically have access to some codified knowledge (the text, articles, white papers, lessons learned) – but much of what they “want” is tacit.  It’s the tacit knowledge that’s in the mind of the professor (or in the CoP it may be the SME), or – what they often don’t recognize is that what’s really valuable is the tacit knowledge that’s in the heads of the other students in the class – or in the minds of the participants in the Community of Practice. 

The key to success in both is engagement with the community

What I have found most interesting is that what it takes to make both KM or DL successful – is engagement with the Community (which is how I think of my students - a learning community).  In this light I believe that are several lessons that DL can learn from successful KM efforts and vice versa.

Let me start with a few of the parallels that I’ve drawn from working in the arenas of both KM and DL.

·         KM and DL are not self study.  KM is not about reading a book – or reading lessons learned.  And likewise DL is not about listening to some “expert” lecture.  They are both about engagement with a group that has a need and a desire to learn. They are about and exchange of both tacit and explicit knowledge.

·         A DL class is much like a Community of Practice (CoP).  In a DL program, especially one composed largely of mid career professionals, just as in CoP’s, much of the most powerful learning comes from the knowledge that the participants (students) share with each other.  This is knowledge that is based on their personal experience outside of the course setting.  But as in a CoP, for the DL students to share their knowledge there needs to be a clear “ what’s in it for me” (WIIFM).  If the participants don’t perceive they are getting value from their involvement they will quickly drop out of the conversation.  As in a CoP this value can come in a variety of forms.  Peer recognition, instructor (the boss) recognition or rewards (the grade) – and a sense that they are learning something in return.   

·         Content quickly becomes stale: A big issue is DL is the cost of developing online content and outside of education it’s developing and maintaining knowledge assets and lessons learned.  There is an attitude (and an economic driver) that says “I’ve developed this, I’ve produced it…and I’m going to reuse it…even if it isn’t current.”  But today’s lecture on KM – is tomorrow’s old newspaper.  A year ago – who had heard of Twitter?  How many had looked at how social media could (or would) influence a Presidential election?  How many were thinking about the power of conversation. 

And this same thing applies in the world of KM.  We are learning rapidly, the tools are changing quickly – our capabilities to engage, share, build on what we know and create new knowledge are constantly changing.  As a consequence – we in KM and in DL have to keep up with these changes if we want to be as effective as possible.

·         The tools for engagement:  The number of “collaborative tools” that are available today to activity engage people is incredible – and these tools are applicable for KM and for DL. 

In the past in DL it was recorded lectures and the students using something called Blackboard.  In industry it was the attempt to turn tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge by creating a “lessons learned database”(that few ever used).

But today we have tools that can keep content fresh – and very current – and that keep people engaged in conversation and in sharing what they know in order to learn and create something new and better.  Want to know the latest in KM check out Twitter and use the hashtag #KM.  Want to hear from some of the gurus in KM or DL – check out their blogs.  Want to create something that is a living asset – put together a wiki and give it to people that have a compelling reason to create content that they can reuse and get value from.  Want to get a message out to your community – or your students, use twitter.  Want to share your latest thoughts with your community or your students on a current topic – blog and ask for their response.  Or you don’t like to write, but prefer to talk (ah you must be a professor) use a pod cast.  Want them to engage…get them to blog.  Want to reach beyond the “class room” use tools that can be accessed by people outside of your class – or your community. 

·         The need for engagement: This takes me full circle to my first point – KM and DL are not self study – they are contact sports.  What we have found is that if you just put a tool out there for the community to use – or for your students to use - chances are you will not be very successful.  In some cases we have had faculty that thought they could be effective by providing the lectures and limited engagement with the students.  Or corporations have said – we will build a lessons learned data base – and you will use it. The students called these faculty “plug and play.”  Corporations call these “lessons recorded.” As you can guess the students quickly became disengaged as do the people that are supposed to capture the lessons.  In the case of the students they did enough for the grade – but little more.  In corporations the data bases quickly became stale. 

In contrast instructors that participated in discussions, asked students to share their experience…and asked why this is important and relevant and finally brought closure to discussions (this is what stood out, this is what we learned, this is why it was important) got students engaged and took the learning beyond “let me tell you what you need to know” to a rich learning exchange.  In my experience the same is true in KM – by engaging the community and asking – what would you like to know in order to make your job go better or what do you know that others should know?  And then providing vehicles for people to connect to share what they know.

In the next few blog posts I’ll talk a little more about these parallels and what the two practices can learn from each other.