Analisi - knowledge management case studies - Aetnanet

Design and implementation
In order to reach the organisational goals the following instrumentation of the knowledge
management system (i.e. knowledge infrastructure) was designed and implemented. The
following categories will be discerned: leadership & management, organisational structure &
HRM, processes and Information & communication technology.
Leadership and Management
No mandate from the top
At the moment the New Ways of Working group doesn’t get any funding from the top, they
have to market their services like any other consultant and find sponsoring Operating Units
for their R&D efforts. In the beginning New Ways of Working received a limited amount of
seed money from the top to develop and present their ideas on knowledge management and
the potential it might have for Shell. Following this initial stage they got R&D funds, coming
from a variety of Operating Units who were willing to invest in this new initiative in order to
enable more and better knowledge sharing. With respect to consultancy activities, New Ways
of Working get paid their hourly rates by customers in Operating Units asking services from
this team, e.g. all the Production Chemists in the Exploration and Production Operating Units
who want New Ways of Working to help them build a common interest network on
Production Chemistry for them.
Bottom-up
New Ways of Working started (see also: Organisational structure and HRM
Common Interest Networks
Shell has around 60 common interest networks worldwide and is in the process of combining
them into less, but larger communities with a broader scope. Each network covers a certain
related set of topics, part of their discipline. For example, the drilling engineers part of the
wells network are discussing about drilling ‘ultra slim’ holes and the people who purchase
drilling related equipment discuss their topics in their part within the same network. The
people joining a network are sometimes part of the core network and sometimes in the
periphery of the network and jump in whenever something that draws their attention comes
by. In order to ensure that the community remains active a moderator provides support. In
many cases a moderator moderates between 1 – 3 days each week. The most successful
larger networks have a fulltime moderator, funded by the Operating Units with a major
interest in the business processes discussed in the network. The moderator is:
• the ambassador and marketeer of the community;
• the community builder;
• responsible for creating and maintaining momentum in the community;
• managing, sometimes even editing the content;
• ensures questions get answered;
• and requests (and chases) for contributions.
The best expert is usually not the best moderator: other people may stop contributing if a
moderator keeps adding comments to contributions from others.
In larger, globally operating, networks three other roles are identified to support the
community: a Subject Focal Point, moderating a part of the network, Local Coordinator
energising all the members in his/her Operating Unit and a Global Coordinator acting as
chairman and energiser for the total community. For an explanation of their necessity and
their tasks is refered to the section called: Errore. L'autoriferimento non è valido per un
segnalibro. - Implementing new organisational structure slowly.
Appraisal system
People do get recognised in a community by their contributions and by exposing their
knowledge. This can occasionally contribute to financial rewards: a promotion can be
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analisi-KM case studies.doc - 25/5/99