How to use Knowledge Management to control a pandemic

Since March, I have been asked how can Knowledge Management help me (or my company) to control this or any pandemic. The answer I give them is to treat this pandemic like any other operation your company was in prior to the pandemic but your environment now has some more barriers to overcome before your clients can get to purchase your goods or services.

Part of this is to be aware of the environment we are all facing. Be aware of the trends and where the outbreaks are occurring. A good source of information is the John’s Hopkins University COVID-19 Tracker

Another source of information is the Center for Disease Control where they give advice on how to protect yourself and others from this disease. Also your state and local governments have policies in place to help prevent the spread.

So what are other ways Knowledge Management can help contribute to the larger fight against this particular problem. The work from home or remote work policies for companies need to be reviewed and updated to make sure both quality of service as well as the internal information the employees share can be accessed wherever they are located. Even after this pandemic has run its course, companies should practice how to operate outside of the office spaces. This is something the corporate world can learn from the military.

Having operated in Iraq, Kuwait, Korea, Malaysia, Japan and other areas in the world I can honestly say that the most meaningful take aways were those times we operated outside of the normal headquarters and worked in either a combined environment with the host nation or joint environment with the other services. We all learned from each other and this was also done in remote areas away from the cubicles.