Right up front, I'm giving Jack Vinson credit for pointing me to Russ Record's Fusion white paper. And I agree with both of them that there is a need for combining them. And, I think it's hard for people because it's change.
In the white paper, The Fusion of Process and Knowledge Management (PDF available through the link), Russ Records presents a definition and distinction for KM vs. Information:
His definition: “Knowledge management is an approach to discovering, capturing, and reusing both tacit (in people’s heads) and explicit (digital or paper based) knowledge as well as the cultural and technological means of enabling the KM process to be successful.”
Here's his distinction: Knowledge is differentiated from information in that there is an element of expert review and distillation where knowledge is concerned. As an example of this, I was recently looking for sample project plans to carry out a specific type of project. From a colleague, I received three different sample plans along with his recommendations about when each type of plan was best to use. The plans were information; his comments and recommendations were knowledge, which is where the real value lies.
Okay, jumping back in now. I agree that putting information into context is what makes it valuable. That's why company's that provide their sales teams and channel partners access to a database of files of information probably aren't as successful as they could be. It's kind of like a web search. If you google a topic and follow a bunch of links about it, you may have information, but there are distinctions in application that you won't know about and getting the desired outcome may take many tries to get right.
Compare that to providing information and adding context with discussion forums, success stories, comments, ratings and case studies that all tie to that information. So the company generates a lot of collateral information, but it's the knowledge that the company's sales reps and channe partners add to it through experience, that turns it into a valuable resource that helps companies grow.
What are you doing to make sure you marry knowledge and information in a way that's useful?
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