A Folklorist Meets Hollywood (Page 2)

Karen Dietz

The Consultant's Role

The consultant's role in an organization is either as an advisor and facilitator, or as an implementer of a solution using the consultant's product (customizable software or training package). Companies hire consultants based on areas of expertise, recommendations and the building of personal relationships. Usually consultants come into an organization to assist them in answering a question, solving a problem, or facilitating a project that will result in improving efficiency (reducing expenditures) or increasing revenues.

The most difficult task consultants have is working with the client to truly articulate the problem and the question(s) to be answered. In my experience, most people rush too quickly to provide a solution and implement it, without first carefully knowing what the real problem is. For example, many companies believe that the best and first thing they can do in KM is product a "yellow pages" of who-knows-what ("Know-how's Not Easy: How to Keep Knowledge Management from Flickering Out," ComputerWorld Leadership Series, March 1997; "An Interview with Tom Davenport and Larry Prusak, authors of Working Knowledge: How Organizations Manage What They Know, @Brint.com 1998). Well, in large companies, those "yellow pages" could easily become obsolete within a week or a month as people transfer to other duties in other areas/geographical locations of the firm, or out of the organization entirely. The "yellow pages" solution does not even begin to address the true problem of the lack of knowledge and information being shared in the organization, and the lack of processes or attitudes that allow this to happen on an ongoing basis.

Once the true problem is identified, a series of questions can be formulated such as:

1. What are we really trying to measure?
2. What questions and their answers would yield us the greatest value?
3. What research methods are best used to provide us the information we need?

These three questions focusing on steps 1-3 in a KM project are sometimes the most time-consuming for the client and the consultant. They are also the steps the client most often resists, usually because of time pressures and the demand to quickly provide solutions.

Once the research project is underway and the results tabulated, the consultant enters into the next most critical stage of working with a client. The research is produced and given to the client as a product. But let's be clear here about different types of consultants. In very broad-brush strokes, two general categories emerge: (1) consultants who sell a product. For example: a consulting firm that sells the building of KM databases that clients can customize to their environment. The consulting company then works with the client to customize and help build the database. The second category (2) are consultants who sell their expertise, research and facilitation skills. My activities fall into this category.

In the second category of consultants, creation of a product to deliver to the client is not the main focus. The focus of the Report for the client and the consultant is the recommendations provided at the end. Recommendations contain specific action steps, the processes the client needs to take to solve the problem. Readers will notice that the recommendations at the end of the accompanying Report are still in a series of questions, since the client was still wrestling with defining the problem.

Sometimes specific outcomes (creation of a database) can be suggested in a section on recommendations. The consultant walks a fine line, however. In my experience, there is danger when a consultant offers a specific outcome to a client because the client will then not 'own' the solution. The solution becomes the consultant's solution and if the client does not implement it, that's OK, because it was the consultant's answer in the first place.

The best scenario is when the client, based on the consultant's recommendations, works with the consultant to determine the action steps the Company is to take. As such, the consultant's role is NOT one in producing a product per se, but in identifying and facilitating processes. The consultant moves into the role of facilitator in implementing the action steps the client and consultant determine together as a result of the consultant's recommendations. The client conducts the bulk of the implementation work. The people within the organization must always craft change for it to be meaningful and long lasting. Real change in an organization occurs when it is sanctioned from the top, but implemented from the bottom. Change does not readily happen when dictated from Sr. Executives.

KM Research

Corporate politics, funding, levels of KM expertise, time crunches and other factors shape the actual KM project. Ideally, the steps in a KM project (and most consulting projects) follow this general outline:

1. Researching and articulating the problem.
2. Researching and articulating the question(s) to be answered.
3. Determining KM project research methodology(ies).
4. Determining research scope, population, time frames, output, financial outlay.
5. Re-crafting the research methodology, scope, population, time frames, output, etc. depending on finances.
6. Conducting the research.
7. Tabulating and evaluating results.
8. Recommendations or suggested action steps.
9. Implementation of recommendations/action steps.

Ideally, in any KM project the researcher wants to conduct a thorough enthographic study (steps 3-7). Once a complete understanding is gained about who, what, where, when and how different kinds of knowledge is shared and under what circumstances, the researcher can begin working on designing a KM system with the staff who will distribute this knowledge.

CEI KM Project

This research project I was involved in with CEI dealt with the second step in a KM project: researching and articulating the question(s) to be answered. As a consultant, I attempted to also assist them in the first step of articulating the problem. However, this company has a culture that is very closed and does not readily share information with others unless significant trust has been developed over time. This was only my second activity with this client and getting them to open up about the issues they were facing was like pulling teeth. As a result, in isolation they determined what they thought the problem was, along with the question(s) they believed relevant to answer, which they then informed me about. What I appreciated about the client was their willingness to at least spend significant time on these first two project steps.

So operating somewhat in the dark, the research I conducted is best described as 'pre-ethnographic' work. The Report is actually part of the conversation around: What is knowledge? What is the knowledge that is critical for us to consciously share and sustain in order to keep ourselves intact and viable as an organization? What is it that we don't know that will help us evaluate what we do know and what we need to learn?"

As a result, the Report was designed to be a reflective piece, an evaluation piece for the company. Another factor also played a significant role in how the Report was crafted: I was not sure who my actual audience was. Who would be seeing this Report: Creative staff? Technology staff? The marketing department? Senior business executives? All of the above? The client was not willing to give me a definitive answer, probably because they were not even sure how they would treat the information I gave them. Given the sketchy information the client provided, the choice I made was to provide a wealth of information. There are several Reports, consequently, rolled into one. The research model then became one of synthesizing a variety of theoretical materials that could assist the Company in its KM evaluation efforts. Hypotheses were put forth and at the end of the Report, recommendations/suggestions were provided about additional work that would further their KM project and require ethnographic activities.

Since this was going to be a research paper, four initial questions were formulated to frame the study:

1. Are the Company products created today as potent as products that were created in the past?
2. What information can the discipline of Folklore provide regarding the creation of potent works and their ability to last through time?
3. From the discipline of business, what are the elements that organizations need to have in order to create a sustained presence in the mind of people?
4. Are the existing design principles the complete answer to what creates product magic, or are they in the foreground while there is something operating in the background that needs articulating that is more powerful?

The model I used to describe the placement of the Company's current design principles in relationship to additional criteria was both the artist's model of background and foreground. I also focused on psychology's emphasis on the foreground ('known') information and background ('unconscious') information.

The words 'potent' and 'potency' are also used throughout the text of the Report and are introduced in the research questions above to describe the efficacy and production of memorable products. These words were used because they appealed to the mostly male population who would be reading the Report. Part of a consultant's deliverable requires words be used that continue to sell the project.

My research focused on illuminating elements essential to creating any meaningful work of art (oral or material) for a community or group of people. The sources that informed most of my work were Robert Plant Armstrong's The Affecting Presence and The Power of Presence, Christopher Alexander's Notes on the Synthesis of Form, Joseph Campbell's The Power of Myth, Dr. Allan B. Chinen's Beyond the Hero: Classic Stories of Men in Search of Soul, Diane Ghirardo's Architecture After Modernism, Robert Jourdain's Music, The Brian, and Ecstasy: How Music Captures Our Imagination, Susan Kent's Analyzing Activity Areas: An Ethnoarchaeological Study of the Use of Space, George Kubler's The Shape of Time: Remarks on the History of Things, Tyler Volk's Metapatterns: Across Space, Time and Mind, James Hollis' The Archetypal Imagination and Tracking The Gods: The Place of Myth in Modern Life.

From the business side, the work that seemed the most applicable was Ichak Adizes' Corporate Lifecycles and The Pursuit of Prime, along with James Collins' and Jerry Porras' Built to Last, Joseph Pine's and James Gilmore's The Experience Economy, Bernd Schmitt's Experiential Marketing and Marketing Aesthetics. These were necessary because with any KM or other project, it is important to evaluate the company's capacity to implement and sustain the project. If their capacity is weak, then additional work is required to have a successful project. If these weaknesses are not addressed, current and future projects will continue to be difficult, if not impossible, for the organization to implement well.

The end result of my work with CEI was a large document illustrating two things: the artistic and folkloric elements that form the Company's memorable products, and the business model necessary to sustain it.

The Report

The Report to the client is fashioned in a typical manner:

1. Statement of the problem.
2. Mention of why the client contracted with an outside firm.
3. Scope of the project.
4. Set the stage for a different point of view.
5. Discuss the material.
6. Discuss how the material impacts the organization and/or can be used to improve the organization.
7. Suggested next steps.

At the same time, the Report is somewhat a-typical. I decided that it should be framed in a more interesting way and in a format more applicable to this client in the entertainment industry. As a result, I treated the Report more as a story, blending both standard business objectives and a more creative bent. I chose the very well known fairy tale of Rapunzel to frame the Report. The reader will notice that each section of the Report follows the story of Rapunzel. A little campy, maybe, but it also added a level of tongue-in-cheek enjoyment for the reader within the organization.

The initial limited feedback to the Report was very positive, particularly concerning the section articulating core elements necessary to create a memorable work. Since the project originated from the creative departments, most of the readers were from those departments within the Company. The sections of the Report that dealt with the business model were difficult for them to digest, however. The feedback: enough of the creative staff were negatively affected by the discussion of the business model and its implications, that they found it difficult to work creatively for awhile.

As a result, the organization's response was to cut the business model information from the Report and share only the portions discussing the creation of affecting works. Regrettably, a combination of internal politics and funding issues did not allow for the entire Report to be more widely circulated among other departments, for ethnographic work to be conducted. This is not unusual, and it can be frustrating at times for the consultant. To date, additional work has materialized as result of this Report, but not as it relates to KM.

Once the modified Report was more widely circulated among the creative staff, however, I was told that the majority of the creative staff was rejuvenated. Both negative and positive reactions are beginning validations on the efficacy of the Report. However, it is just a beginning. Additional research and analysis along with ethnographic work is required. This would allow a more thorough testing of the hypothesis put forth in the Report and places the KM project on more solid footing. Part of the additional research that could be taken up by Folklorists would be an examination, both diachronically and synchronically, of the Company's products and their effectiveness over time using the information shared in this Report.

Conclusion

Working in business is hardly the task that I as a Folklorist was trained for, but Folklore is a discipline that many corporations can benefit from. I believe that now is the time for Folklorists to seize the opportunity to work in new venues and increase our visibility as we work to improve the lives of people in communities and businesses.

Folklorists, because of our ethnographic skills and expertise in knowledge transmission, are well suited to contribute to the field of KM. Since most knowledge and information are social constructs, are shared orally and informally, understanding how knowledge is shared by conducting a formal ethnography is key. Not every group in an organization will share knowledge in the same way. Understanding this becomes very critical when two groups within an organization are asked to share knowledge.

One of the best articles on applying a Folklorist's skills to organizations is "Balancing Act: How to Capture Knowledge Without Killing It," by John Seely Brown and Paul Duquid, Harvard Business Review, 5/1/00. This article examines how cultural anthropologists conducted a solid ethnography of the ways knowledge is shared and transmitted among Xerox copy machine repairmen. From this understanding, the anthropologists and the organization were able to create a Knowledge Management system that supported the repairmen in their efforts around the world, and retained key organizational knowledge that is easily lost.

But why is KM in the business arena such a new and powerful phenomenon? There have been many discussions over the last several years about the information economy and the fact that workers today are 'knowledge workers' (The Rise of the Knowledge Worker by James. W. Cortada, 1998; The Distributed Mind by Kimball Fisher, 1997; and Managing Knowledge Workers by Frances Horibe, 1999). Now, more than ever, the assets of the company are in the heads of their employees. Once an employee leaves a company, a lot of vital information and knowledge also walks out the door. As a result, companies are focused on developing systems that help preserve knowledge and keep the business functioning. The question "How do we transmit our knowledge and keep our communities, families, artwork, occupational knowledge alive?" has been the purview of Folklorists since the beginnings of the discipline.

After reading the article and Report, if there are additional questions or comments, I welcome further discussions. I can be reached at kdietz@polaris-associates.com.

Appendix A: Works Cited

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