Knowledge Capital

Every business requires people, and it how you keep your key people that matters. You could lose every tangible asset-furniture, fixtures, buildings, cars, files, computers, and everything else-but as long as you kept your key personnel, you could be back in business again tomorrow, generating sales and making profits.

There are three types of knowledge that a business needs to survive and thrive. Personal knowledge, company knowledge, and market knowledge.

Personal knowledge is the specific knowledge, skills, education, background, experience, training, and core competencies that an individual owns and takes with her from place to place. The ability to write, to speak publicly, negotiate, to sell, to make presentations, to type, to prepare final statements, and so on, are all forms of personal intellectual capital. The more of these kinds of knowledge and skills that are relevant to your business a person has, the more valuable that person can be.

The process of interviewing and selection, as well as delegation, supervision, and promotion, revolves around the determination and deployment of these core skills.

The second type of knowledge is the knowledge of your specific company. This form of intellectual capital is very valuable. This includes knowledge about the processes and procedures within your business, the key personalities and their relationships to each other, your products and services and how they are developed, sold, and delivered, and all the other unique factors and features that make your business different from any other.

When a person works for a business for any time, that person absorbs an enormous amount of valuable information about how the business functions. This heightened knowledge and awareness has a real value. If you lose a person who is intimately familiar with many aspects of your business the cost of hiring and training a new individual to the same level of competence can be very high.

The third type of intellectual capital is specific knowledge about the market, your customers, and your competitors; and about your products and services, and the way they are marketed, sold and delivered. The kind of customer and market knowledge can be of inestimable value in the competitive market place. The longer a salesperson, for example works for a company, the more valuable he becomes in terms of his network of contacts and his intimate knowledge of customers-who they are, where they are, why they buy, and the various buying influences that operate on them.

Not long ago, a client company of my friend brought in a new controller who has been entrusted with the function of cost reduction. The controller glanced over the payroll and arbitrarily decided that the top salesman was earning too much money and insisted the corporate office that the commission of the salesman be cut, his territory be reduced, and several of his major clients be turned into “house accounts.”

The salesman concerned represented about 40 percent of the total sales of this medium-sized manufacturing company. When they told him that they were going to cut his commissions and cut his territories, thereby reducing his income by more than 50 percent he protested. He was of the opinion that he has with the company for more than 12 years and has taken a lot of pains in building his customer base.

The company refused to listen and they were of the opinion that the customers belonged to the company and not to him. The customer’s loyalty shall therefore be towards the organization and towards their products and services. Hence they felt that there is no reason for the company to pay such exorbitant money to service accounts. They categorically stated that if you’re not happy with these new arrangements, you can go somewhere else.

The salesman tried to reason with the management, but to no avail. Finally, he quit the organization and walked across the street to their major competitor, taking all the accounts, references with him. His old company’s sales dropped by about 40 percent the following year. They almost went bankrupt. They had no idea that the relationship between the salesman and his customers was perhaps the most valuable form of intellectual capital in the entire company.

The object of elaborating this point is that any employee who possesses personal knowledge, company knowledge and market knowledge is indispensable and the management at all costs has to ensure that he is taken care of. One needs to have more of these kinds of employees rather than having employees being filled against vacant positions. Such employees do not only add value to themselves but add immeasurable value to the organization, society and country at large.

The said article has been written by Mr. Iyer Subramanian. E Mail: iyerpdkgnm@yahoo.com, Cell no. 9892523163.

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What do you have to do to become a personal trainer?
I'm trying to find my life's calling. I'm very athletic and have been for a long time. I eat healthy. By talking to others, I've noticed that I'm much more knowledgable in the field of nutrition, weight management, and fitness than most people. All the knowledge I've gained is from living the lifestyle and a desire within me to live healthy. I'd like to help others achieve their fitness goals. What does it take to become a personal trainer?
Thanks

About Author

My name is Iyer Subramanian. My qualifications are as under. Bachelor of Arts, Diploma in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations, Diploma in Labor Laws & Labor Welfare, Diploma in HRM, Diploma in Training & Development.

I have around 25 years of experience in HR and write for Express Hospitality, Hospitalitybiz, Business Manager regularly on HR.

Customer Relationship Management Software

Customer Relationship Management Software also known as CRM is software that allows a company to manage their relationships with their customers by capturing, analysing, and storage of customer, partner, vendor details and also internal process information.

The key functionality of a CRM system is divided into 3 basic modules these are Marketing, Service and Sales and the 3 aspects of the system are Operational, Collaborative and Analytical (these can be implemented in isolation from one another).

Marketing

• The marketing module deals with providing functionality of short term execution of marketing related activities and long term planning within a company.

o Campaign Management – running marketing campaigns using different communication channels, which targets potential buyers using a product or a group of products as a message.

o Planning – making long term market plans which are quantitative or qualitative measures. These can be set for a period of time and for different product groups and geographies.

o Lead Management – generating sales related leads which then can be converted into sales, lead management deals with processing the leads by carrying out sanity checks and evaluating the genuineness of the information received and then deciding which leads are hot and cold.

Service

• The service function focuses on how effective the system is of managing customer service which is planned or unplanned. Below are some of the functions of the Service module: -

o Service Order Management

o Service Contract Management

o Planned Services management

o Warranty Management

o Installed Base (Equipment) Management

o Service Level Agreement Management

o Resource Planning and Scheduling

o Knowledge Management (FAQs, How to guides)

Sales

• The sales function focuses helping the sales team of the company to manage and execute the pre-sales process, making it more organized. The sales team in most companies are responsible for capturing any leads or opportunities, capturing customer interaction, the CRM helps them process this data and monitor it in the future.

o Opportunity Management – helps to organize all relevant data received and captured for a deal to be put into one place, it could hold data as expected budget, total spending, prospective customers, key players, products interested in, important dates and expected closing dates of a deal.

o Quotation and Sales Order Management – if an opportunity is reached the quotation phase a quotation is formed and if this is won the quotation is turned into a sales order – the sales order then gets passed to the ERP system.

o Activity Management – this represents activities that go on within the sales and service areas with the interaction with the customer including meetings, discussions, calls and emails.

Operational – this is the automation of customer support and the processes that include the company’s sales and service representative.

Collaborative – is the direct communication between the customers that does not include a company’s sales and service representative.

Analytical – the analysis of customer data which is used for a broad range of purposes.

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Jene Pedder is the webmaster of Synergy specialists of CRM Software.

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Customer Relationship Management Software

Customer Relationship Management Software also known as CRM is software that allows a company to manage their relationships with their customers by capturing, analysing, and storage of customer, partner, vendor details and also internal process information.

The key functionality of a CRM system is divided into 3 basic modules these are Marketing, Service and Sales and the 3 aspects of the system are Operational, Collaborative and Analytical (these can be implemented in isolation from one another).

Marketing

• The marketing module deals with providing functionality of short term execution of marketing related activities and long term planning within a company.

o Campaign Management – running marketing campaigns using different communication channels, which targets potential buyers using a product or a group of products as a message.

o Planning – making long term market plans which are quantitative or qualitative measures. These can be set for a period of time and for different product groups and geographies.

o Lead Management – generating sales related leads which then can be converted into sales, lead management deals with processing the leads by carrying out sanity checks and evaluating the genuineness of the information received and then deciding which leads are hot and cold.

Service

• The service function focuses on how effective the system is of managing customer service which is planned or unplanned. Below are some of the functions of the Service module: -

o Service Order Management

o Service Contract Management

o Planned Services management

o Warranty Management

o Installed Base (Equipment) Management

o Service Level Agreement Management

o Resource Planning and Scheduling

o Knowledge Management (FAQs, How to guides)

Sales

• The sales function focuses helping the sales team of the company to manage and execute the pre-sales process, making it more organized. The sales team in most companies are responsible for capturing any leads or opportunities, capturing customer interaction, the CRM helps them process this data and monitor it in the future.

o Opportunity Management – helps to organize all relevant data received and captured for a deal to be put into one place, it could hold data as expected budget, total spending, prospective customers, key players, products interested in, important dates and expected closing dates of a deal.

o Quotation and Sales Order Management – if an opportunity is reached the quotation phase a quotation is formed and if this is won the quotation is turned into a sales order – the sales order then gets passed to the ERP system.

o Activity Management – this represents activities that go on within the sales and service areas with the interaction with the customer including meetings, discussions, calls and emails.

Operational – this is the automation of customer support and the processes that include the company’s sales and service representative.

Collaborative – is the direct communication between the customers that does not include a company’s sales and service representative.

Analytical – the analysis of customer data which is used for a broad range of purposes.

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Deborah Barreau, Professor at UNC-SILS, discusses knowledge management and personal information management.

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Jene Pedder is the webmaster of Synergy specialists of CRM Software.

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INTRODUCTION

“The basic economic resource is no longer capital, nor natural resources, nor labor.  It is and will be knowledge.”

–

Peter Drucker

A nation’s standard of living is increasingly dependent on the competitiveness of its firm. Competitiveness is vital if the nation’s firms are to take advantage of the opportunities opened up for them. Knowledge management Portal (KMP) has become the latest strategy in increasing organizational competitiveness. It is the most innovative, creative, and important management concept.

Organisations are facing ever-increasing challenges, brought on by marketplace pressures or the nature of the workplace. Many organisations are now looking to knowledge management Portals (KMP) to address these challenges. Such initiatives are often started with the development of a knowledge management strategy. To be successful, a KM strategy must do more than just outline high-level goals such as ‘becomes a knowledge-enabled organisation’. Instead, the strategy must identify the key needs and issues within the organisation, and provide a framework for addressing these.

Every organisation has a unique environment, defined by factors such as:

• Purpose and activities of the organisation, Organisational history
• Overall strategic direction
• Organisational culture
• Size of the organisation
• Geographic spread, Marketplace factors
• Staff skills and experience, Available resources and

For this reason, each organisation has a unique set of needs and issues to be addressed by knowledge management. It is easy to jump into ‘solutions mode’, recommending approaches such as communities of practice, storytelling, content management systems, and much more.

Knowledge Management is one of the ‘critical success factors’. Identifying the needs within the organisation, and then design the activities accordingly. Hence KM acts as a vital tool towards gaining organisational Competitiveness

KM Methodology

Knowledge is what I know;

Information is what we know.

Knowledge has become the key driving force in the present day world. It is generally believed that the only source of competitive advantage in future will be the knowledge. Therefore, in this newly emerging environment, organisations are required to develop successful knowledge strategies, not only to compete and win in the market, but to achieve sustainable competitive advantage; this is possible only through KM Portal

In many ways it is technology that has been made knowledge sharing a reality – In the past it was impossible to share knowledge or work collaboratively with co-workers around the globe. Today it is a reality If implemented well and if people are trained and educated in its use, Knowledge sharing technology is good.

Interest in knowledge creation within organizations is growing at an astounding rate. The most effective way to create knowledge sharing culture is first to start practice at your level. The higher up the organisation the more effective you will be changing the culture but even if you are low down the hierarchy, you have an influence. Put in place the knowledge sharing technology and train and educate people in its effective use. The two together, People with appropriate knowledge sharing mindset and the appropriate knowledge sharing technology to support them.

Once the knowledge is created, Capturing takes place where in the knowledge database is created and all necessary data is been stored in the form of documents, Case studies and in various formats to be presented in usable format and there by making use of knowledge in the broader context.

Organizations receive massive amounts of information on a daily basis that they must gather, categorize, interpret and disseminate efficiently (Egan, 1998). Data such as sectoral news or market trends first comes in and needs to be captured. This process must be supported by established procedures of reporting, editing and publication. Filtered information must then be organized in maps. Mapping organizational knowledge is the most crucial activity in providing users with practical access to information.

In certain situations, it can be more than threatening for a worker to introduce knowledge into systems and actively search out that which others have introduced. It can also require a substantial amount of time and effort. Therefore, people need to be highly motivated in order to undertake such work. It is only when a knowledge manager adopts the principle of knowledge sharing for the whole organization that knowledge is shared and reused spontaneously.

Knowledge, in addition to being shared between employees, must be distributed by an organization to its employees. The dissemination of knowledge has a massive impact on the formation of competitive advantage. It is broadly agreed that in order to ensure the proper dissemination of knowledge it is necessary both to lubricate communication and nurture the right organizational culture (Gupta, 2002). Some organizations are beginning to evaluate and reward personnel who share and use knowledge. Such as IBM, Infosys, Buckman laboratories, Accenture, etc

Knowledge, in addition to being shared between employees, must be distributed by an organization to its employees. The dissemination of knowledge has a massive impact on the formation of competitive advantage. It is broadly agreed that in order to ensure the proper dissemination of knowledge it is necessary both to lubricate communication and nurture the right organizational culture. Dissemination also requires the transformation of highly individualized tacit knowledge into more widely shared explicit knowledge.

It is not the organizations which own the best knowledge that achieve competitive advantage but, rather, those that make the best use of it. In order to make the best use of knowledge it should be fully applied to the activities of the organization and this would require that all the other knowledge processes, namely, creation, dissemination and sharing, should be taking place.

 KM Strategy

Developing a knowledge management strategy provides a unique opportunity to gain a greater understanding of the way the organisation operates, and the challenges that confront it. By focusing on identifying staff needs and issues, activities and initiatives can be recommended with the confidence that these will have a clear and measurable impact upon the organisation. To be successful, a KM strategy must do more than just outline high-level goals such as ‘become a knowledge-enabled organisation Instead, the strategy must identify the key needs and issues within the organisation, and provide a framework for addressing these.

Knowledge management strategies and drivers must be reviewed from a human resources perspective. The human resources management department assists the leadership of an organization in identifying the sources of the required knowledge and the best way to capture it, as well as assessing mastery of knowledge among employees and determining the benefits of that assessment to the organization. It also establishes the link between organizational strategy and employee knowledge, identifying needs and narrowing gaps.

Knowledge management can be considered successful if employees understand how corporate knowledge adds value, how it is created, and why it needs to be managed. The role of human resources management can be summarized as follows:

(a) Training and developing knowledge workers;

(b) Developing managers and team leaders as knowledge coordinators;

(c) Building a knowledge-sharing culture.

Research Work Conducted to determine the KM Effectiveness towards Organisational Competitiveness

Objective of the Study

1. To study the effectiveness of Knowledge Management Portal (KMP) implementation in an organisation

2. To study the contributing factors by KM towards Organisational Competitiveness

3. To find the extent to which technologies, practices, tools and process help the organisation to generate, organize and leverage knowledge

Research Methodology

Research Design

Exploratory Research Design

Sampling

Unit: IT Organisation

Size: 100

5 Leading IT Organisations who implemented Knowledge Management Portal were chosen for the study and 20 Project Managers from each organisation was surveyed

Method: Judgment Sampling

Data Collection

Questionnaires

Major Findings

1. 52% of the Respondents approach Co-worker for gathering information for immediate solving of the problem
2. 78% of the Respondents say that the reason for contacting the co-worker for solving the problem is due to Faster pace in getting the information.

1. Majority of the Respondents (51%) says they use 40 – 60% of Explicit Knowledge (Documented/Codified) followed by Tacit Knowledge

4.       56% of the respondent says around 80-100% knowledge sharing culture exists among the team members than sharing among the teams

1. Majority of the Respondents (33%) says Problem Solving skill is developed to a large extent when using KM portal followed by Decision-making Skill (29%) and General Business Knowledge skill (22%)
2. Majority of the Respondents (39%) says they are interested to share Case studies in KM portal for helping others to solve the problem followed by Web sites and Book of Knowledge.
3.  48% of the Respondents Strongly agree that Corporate Intranet is the best Tool to share the knowledge followed by Brain Storming Session and Web Portals.

1. 62% of the Respondents say Important as Reason for using KM portal is, to ease collaborative work of projects followed to improve the use of knowledge from sources outside the organisation (60%)
2. Majority of the Respondents (29%) say Usage of KM portal is Very Effective to improve Knowledge and Skill of Employees.

10.28% say Km improves Clients and Customer Relation and 26% say

     Km helps the organisation to add New products, improve workers

     involvement and knowledge sharing across departments.

11. The Group resisted KM implementation in the Organisation was Management says 32% of the Respondents followed by R & D (21%) and HR Group (14%)

Specific findings related to Objective of the Study

1. Contributing Factors of KM towards Organisation Development

a)       To protect your organisation from loss of knowledge due to employee departure

b)       To improve the competitive advantage of the organisation

c)       To help integrate knowledge with in the organisation

d)       To increase efficiency by using knowledge to improve the process

e)       Improved Knowledge & Skills of Employees

f)        Improved Clients/ Customers relation

g)       Improved Employee Efficiency & Productivity

h)       Increased Flexibility in Development & Innovation

i)         Help the organisation to add new Services/ Products

j)         Improved involvement of Workers in workplace activities

k)       Loss of key personnel and their knowledge

l)         Removal of Information overload problem with in your organization

1. Effectiveness of KM

a)       Knowledge sharing Culture exist in the organisation among the team members to an large extent there by it proves the effectiveness of Km Portal

b)       Effectiveness of KM portal can be measured by the factors contributed by KM towards Organisational Development.

1. Tools and Technologies used by the Organisations

a)       Corporate intranets, Online Applications and Web portals will enable the effective sharing of knowledge among the employees in the organisation

b)       Best practices Repository, Tele conferencing, Video Conferencing, Electronic Discussions encourages effective Knowledge sharing

Conclusion

KM itself has come a long way and has a long way to go from where it is now. It is indeed a long journey and the trip has just begun. Organisations have to sustain competitive advantage. This is possible only through ‘Effective implementation of Knowledge Management Portal’.

A Key success factor in KM is getting optimal emphasis on each of the four focal area People, Process, technology and Content right from the early stages of deployment. The specific emphasis laid on each of these is a function of the organisational culture and business context. A useful way to verify the completeness of an organisational architecture for KM is to check whether it meets the following criteria

 “Knowledge management is necessary for companies because what worked yesterday may or may not work tomorrow” 

“Knowledge Management is the Innovative and Effective Aid to sustain Competitive Advantage”

 REFERENCES

1. Davenport and Prusak, “Working Knowledge, Harvard business
2. Laurence Prusak, Principals of KM
3. Nonaka and Takeuchi, ‘The knowledge creating company’ Number 3 1999 school press
4. Knowledge Management – A source of competitive Advantage – The Business Review, Vol 10,No 2, March 2004
5. Creating Knowledge Edge in Business – The quarterly journal of foundation for organisational research and education, New Delhi, Vol XXII No. 3 (Oct- Dec 2004)
6. Creating Knowledge in Business By Anuradha Padmanabhan, S. Govindarajalu and A. Vasumathi published an article on
7. Prasena, Benjamin Eliway – 2002 in “Knowledge Management, Attention, and Human Capacity and Capital building: An integrative framework and future challenges with in eBusiness environment”
8. Shabir A. Bhai in his article “Knowledge Management – A source of      competitive advantage” published in ‘The Business Review’, Vol 10, No 2, March 2004
9. James Robertson, Published on 2 August 2004 “Developing a knowledge management strategy“

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What would be a better certification to obtain, Knowledge Management or Certified Administrative Prof.?
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About Author

Faculty in a Leading Management school, Chennai. Research interest includes HR, Knowledge management.