For Brad Sidwell, CIO of Ice Miller, a law firm in Indianapolis, the need for KM became painfully apparent during a meeting with a prospective client that wanted to know whether the firm had worked with any of its competitors and, if so, what kind of work was done. "We discovered that we had no clue," Sidwell says.

To get started on a KM project, Sidwell defined the scope of the data he wanted to collect and organize?information on past and current clients, what work had been done for them, and their legal preferences. Each lawyer’s knowledge and expertise had to be gathered and stored for others to access. Sidwell chose a product from Interface Software called InterAction to help set up a database for collecting client information. From a technology standpoint, the project is a success, Sidwell says, though he admits that the firm still struggles with motivating lawyers to contribute personal knowledge about old clients. (They are more willing to contribute information about new clients.)

By taking a proactive approach to KM, Sidwell’s firm is in the minority, says Skip Boettger, chief knowledge architect at software company PTC’s global services division, which is based in Needham, Mass. Usually it takes some kind of disaster to jolt a company into understanding the business benefits of KM. "Whether it’s low profit margins or overspending, it takes a lot to get a CEO’s attention," Boettger says. "But it doesn’t take much for a business to realize it can improve the whole process of gathering and organizing knowledge. The key is that you have to focus on the business need, whether it’s a problem you want to solve or a process you want to improve upon."

Once companies determine the business need, they can get a handle on the nature and scope of the intellectual assets they want to manage. Then they can determine how KM will affect the work routines of employees, Boettger says, which is an essential step to moving forward.

Show and Tell

How executives introduce a KM project to their company?and how those executives help the employees adjust to changes in their work routine?can make or break the project. "It’s not a system solution, it’s a people solution," says KTP’s Nir. "It’s about sharing as a whole organization, not just about the knowledge itself."

In spring 2000, when Paul McKeon, a former partner and chief e-business officer at Ketchum, a New York City-based public relations company, planned the rollout of his company’s new knowledge management system, he knew changing the staff’s work routine and culture to incorporate the sharing of relevant knowledge would be a challenge.