Recent Findings from the GLOBAL MAKE Awards

Key Findings

Business leaders, analysts and investors constantly ask: "What are the economic and competitive advantages of pursuing a business strategy based on knowledge leadership?" Based on the findings of the 2009 Global MAKE study, the benefits of this approach are tangible and significant.

Successfully managing enterprise knowledge yields big dividends. The 2009 Global MAKE Winners trading on the NYSE/NASDAQ showed a Total Return to Shareholders (TRS) for the ten-year period 1999-2008 of 9.6% - over four times the average Fortune 500 company median.

Other findings include:

- Enterprises with long-term knowledge-driven strategies are continuing to invest in innovation, knowledge sharing and collaboration, and human intellectual capital - especially skills and competencies development - and will emerge from the global recession in stronger positions.

- The global economic downturn is accelerating the consolidation of key business sectors, including airlines, automotives, computers, consulting, defense, energy, information technology, Internet, media and pharmaceuticals. By the year 2012, there will be 3-5 global companies in each of the major business sectors. Those companies with strong knowledge-driven strategies are most likely to survive and prosper.

- Organizations around the world are facing leadership challenges in developing knowledge workers. This MAKE knowledge performance dimension had the lowest average Winners' score. A combination of factors - the retirement of growing numbers of 'baby boomers' and difficulties in recruiting talented new knowledge workers from the small pool of 'Generation Y' individuals, is forcing organizations to devote significant resources to human intellectual capital management.

- A growing number of organizations are taking on 'Global' characteristics - especially consulting and professional services firms, financial services, energy and media companies. These 'Global' organizations tend to operate as 'independent' companies within a Federal structure and without the traditional corporate head office.

- While the number of European organizations adopting knowledge-driven approaches is expanding, the number of European-headquartered Global MAKE Finalists and Winners continues to decline. The top-tier of European companies is falling behind their Asian and North American competitors at the cutting-edge of the Knowledge Economy.

The Elevator Pitch for Enterprise 2.0 - ReadWriteEnterprise

The Elevator Pitch for Enterprise 2.0 - ReadWriteEnterprise

Reorganise for resilience - lessons for KM

Reorganize for Resilience: Putting Customers at the Center of Your Organization by Ranjay Gulati

In an era of raging commoditisation and eroding profit margins, survival depends on resilience: staying one step ahead of your customers.

Sure, most companies say they're "customer focused," but they don't deliver solutions to customers' thorniest problems.

Why? Because they're stymied by the rigid "silos" they're organized around.

In Reorganize for Resilience, Ranjay Gulati reveals how resilient companies prosper both in good times and bad, driving growth and increasing profitability by immersing themselves in the lives of their customers.

This book shows how resilient organizations cut through internal barriers that impede action, build bridges between warring divisions, and transform former competitors into collaborators.

Based on more than a decade of research in a variety of industries, and filled with examples from companies including Cisco Systems, La Farge, Starbucks, Best Buy, and Jones Lang LaSalle,

Gulati explores the five levers of resilience:

1) Coordination: connect, eradicate, or restructure silos to enable swift responses.

2) Cooperation: foster a culture that aligns all employees around the shared goals of customer solutions.

3) Clout: redistribute power to "bridge builders" and customer champions.

4) Capability: develop employees' skills at tackling changing customer needs.

5) Connection: blend partners' offerings with yours to provide unique customer solutions.
This is a piece of personal knowledge management but has a lot of relevance to knowledge management and the increase of collaborative software to tackle it.
We just need to convince managers and people that there is something in it for them.