Cannon-Lear Enterprises L.L.C.
Knowledge Consulting and Mediation Company
I had a great time talking Knowledge Management with Aurélien Vasinis, CEO of Brainsfeed. To hear some perspective on pay walls, the academic side of Knowledge Management, and Knowledge Management within the U. S. Department of Defense grab yourself a cup of coffee and click the link below. I will embed the video on this post soon.
Over this Covid-19 pandemic, I have been looking forward to being able to make those business to business networking connections again and gain more clients. One of the most important thing I have learned from this experience is how Knowledge Management can be done with your family.
The four pillars of Knowledge Management are People, Process, Organizational Culture and Tools. Applying these to your everyday day life can help with a multitude of things from the kids school and activities schedules, bills, doctors appointments, work schedules (yes even when WFH).
The people part of this equation is easy (your family) and each person has a role they play in the family unit. This includes doing the dishes to feeding the animals. Establishing what each person does helps manages what needs to be completed.
Process like it or not is just as important in the business arena as in the home. Processes on how bills are paid, what the approval process is for the kids to be able to get time on their Xbox or electronic devices. Establishing a clear process for your family on how things gets accomplished can help get things done more effectively.
Organizational culture, the family unit is a culture on its own. You have the parental unit(s) as well as the kid(s) and there is a definite cultural dynamic that comes into play on how situations are dealt with on a daily basis.
Tools so how do you keep your family organized, connected and be able to still be able to live. In my home, we utilize Microsoft Office products to include SharePoint and Outlook to keep our documents, bills and other important information where we can collaborate on any decisions that need to be made or have access to our information while we are out in the community. Another tool we use a lot of is whiteboards. I have a Kanban board to monitor my business and we have boards all thought out the house for kids chores, tracking medication, important events and bills. We also take handwritten notes exclusively on Rocketbook notebooks. In terms of our digital meetings we rely on Fireflies to capture audio notes which it does have the capability to transcribe the notes in order to search for information after the fact.
Looking back from the beginning of this pandemic until now, my family and I have gotten closer as well as become better stewards of our Knowledge that each of us has. We are also communicating better as a family.
If you our your company would like to know how Knowledge Management can help improve your business and your bottom dollar. Please feel free to contact me via email at cannonco@cannonco.net or by phone at 620-719-6004.
Back at the first of the year, I had a meeting with Benjamin Anyacho, a Knowledge Manager from the Texas Department of Transportation, at a local restaurant in Austin. I mentioned to him that we need to pool our collective resources and start having a conversation with other Knowledge Managers within the Austin and Central Texas area.
With the COVID-19 pandemic and the transition of many of us to work from home, we have been delaying the start of this KM Community. After talking with each other for the past few weeks we decided that it is actually a good time to start up and have conversations and possibly share ways we as a community can get to a place of the new normal.
On June 25th at 11:30 AM until 12:30 PM Central Time (in the US and Canada) will start the Knowledge Management Community of Austin (KMCA) Knowledge Cafe. We want to brainstorm with other Knowledge Managers within the Austin and Central Texas community towards a possible knowledge exchange. Knowledge management practice is increasingly becoming a sine qua non for business success. Several smart cities and regions are organizing themselves around KM practice and community.
Please register in advance for this meeting:
Zoom registration: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZUudOCqqjIoGdEdvRJGVonwU84W5DzAQVu1 After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
Information on Eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/knowledge-management-community-of-austin-area-tickets-106014347768?ref=esli&utm_campaign=201308&utm_source=LinkedInenivtefor001
Benjamin also created a LinkedIn group for this new community of professionals and is located at the following web site: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/12436066.
Over the past few weeks, a lot of companies across the globe have had to change their views on “telework” or “remote work” policies due to COVID-19, just to stay in business. After all of this, are we going to learn how to transition from the “9-5” work environment of office buildings and cubicles? Are there going to be more “remote work” jobs available in the workforce?
My experience working from home since the COVID-19 “shelter in place” orders started to roll through Texas has been both positive and negative. Here are some of my personal observations over the past month working from home.
| Spending time with my wife and kids | Home Schooling Kids |
| Developing ways to organize my business live and home life | "Honey Do List" |
| Declutter my digital documents | House Upkeep |
| Finding more opportunities to create a business network | Lack of focus time |
| Look at my business from a consumer aspect | Not able to study in a quiet environment |
| Connecting with old friends from high school and college | Not able to go out with friends to catch up in person |
| Look at my capabilities away from the office | The internet at my house cannot support my business needs and my kids school needs at the same time |
One of the major things I have learned from this experience is that is what service can I bring to the table to other companies that are going through the same thing. How are they communicating with their employees (Zoom and Microsoft Teams appear to have increased use quite a bit since this has started)? Not only talking to each other about work but the social interaction with each other is another reason why we work. One of my peers just hosted a videoconference about bringing the team together (completely optional) and just talk about whatever is on their mind (school, hobbies, family, etc.). This company truly cares about their employees well being and being able to do this has actually brought the team closer together.
How is business being done now? How are decisions being made (or are they)? Spending over 21 years in the military there were plenty of times where I had to work outside of the “office space” and still was responsible for reporting up to my leaders as well as coordinating my teams.
As an organization you have people and with that, you must plan on how to interact with them to be able to get your mission and vision accomplished in order to have the business survive. Developing a strategic level Knowledge Management plan for your company in a remote work situation. This can answer questions your employees may have when they are forced to work from home.
When developing this plan some things you want to keep in mind are connectivity, access, capabilities, benefits, and expectations.
Connectivity is not only is your business connected but are your employees able to connect to the company’s internal site to work. Access, is your internal portal, collaboration sites, communities of practice available while working from home? What are the capabilities your employees of working remotely (desktop, tablet, mobile, etc.
This is a presentation Mr. Cannon gave at the KM Showcase 2020. The video from the KM Showcase 2020 will be posted once it gets released from KM Institute
