The future of knowledge management conference

Our annual APM Knowledge SIG conference on Thursday 6 July 2017 was a roaring success! The theme for the day was the future of KM, with a focus on what the future might mean for the P3M profession.

The presentations from the day can be viewed by clicking on the speaker names below.
Here are a few highlights from the day:

• The opening presentation by Judy Payne on KM past, present and future generated some great questions. Can machines actually generate knowledge? That’s a tough one. I guess it depends on how you define ‘knowledge’. The English language is rather limited here, so perhaps some new words for different kinds of knowledge will emerge.  What role can PMOs play in KM? That’s much easier. PMOs are a natural home for KM in project environments – PMO people can spot learning opportunities, connect people and facilitate inter-project communication.
• Ron Young introduced us to his five dimensions of knowledge and innovation – a 5x5 matrix that makes it crystal clear where KM effort can be focused. Just not all at once! You can read all about it in Ron’s article. My favourite nugget from Ron is that KM is not just about knowledge sharing. It’s about deciding when to share knowledge and when to protect it. Couldn’t agree more, Ron.
• Ron Donaldson ran an excellent workshop so that we could both experience and learn how to run anecdote circles. What a powerful way of getting lots of people involved in generating insights from experience. There are so many ways this could be used.
• Rob Leslie-Carter gave us a whistlestop tour of Arup’s work on the future of project management. You can read the report for free. My personal highlight was Rob’s explanation of how the knowledge of a profession becomes more and more open as the profession matures.  Wouldn’t it be great if the APM Body of Knowledge was freely available online so that the whole P3M community could maintain and update it? 

Over the next few weeks we’ll be starting some discussions based on the materials in the covered. Whether you were at the conference or not, we’d love to hear your thoughts.

Judy Payne
APM Knowledge SIG Co Chair