Please find attached Jon’s PMIQ Chapter Meeting – Brisbane – 19 June 2013 Presentation.
The evening went well with many Q & A’s.
Truly Reconceptualising Project Knowledge Management update
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Category Archives: Project Management
Truly Reconceptualising Project Knowledge Management
PMIQ Chapter Meeting – Brisbane – 19 June 2013
* Click Here to Register Now *
| Introducing Dr Jon Whitty – Senior Lecturer, Project Management
Many organisations today are struggling with implementing the somewhat unclear concepts of ‘lessons learned’, ‘knowledge capture’ and ‘knowledge management’. This presentation tackles the problems with these concepts head-on and proposes a new practical conceptual model of building organisational knowledge through projects. What is innovative is that this new model has its roots firmly grounded in naturally evolved biological systems.The new conceptual model is practical and somewhat intuitive when properly understood. At the end of this session you will be able to immediately reconceptualise how your organisation truly learns and could better adapt to its environment. This talk is linked to this paper.
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Jon is my PhD Supervisor, I would encourage you to attend this presentation, as it represents the SyLLK model in another perspective.
Enjoy, Stephen
Managing knowledge in project environments
Tired of struggling with lessons learned? Confused about knowledge management? Want to find out how organisations can really learn from projects? What’s the connection between knowledge management and swiss cheese?
Knowledge management practices are notoriously difficult to standardise. Every project, every programme and every organisation is different – and what works in one place can be a disaster in another.
APM Knowledge SIG is holding an event where they will hear two very different case studies: one from Brendan McAndrew of Mouchel and one from Michael Norton of the Local Government Association.
Jon Whitty, senior lecturer in project management at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia, will then present a new way of thinking about how to build organisational knowledge from projects. Through discussion based on the two case studies, you will learn how to apply Jon’s model in different environments. (This is the model on which this pmlessonslearned blog is based on. Jon is my PhD supervsior).
At the end of the afternoon you will have some practical examples of managing knowledge and be able to rethink the way your own organisation could adapt its own knowledge and learning practices to its environment. (I am looking foward to the outcome to hear the SLLCK model feedback from the APM Knowledge SIG event)
This event is aimed at project, programme and portfolio professionals looking to develop their understanding of knowledge management beyond traditional approaches.
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Body of Knowledge references |
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| Edition | Section | Description |
| 5th | 3.7 | Information management and reporting |
| 6th | 1.1.5 | Knowledge management |
Truly reconceptualising project knowledge management
My PhD supervisor Dr Jon Whitty will be presenting ‘Truly reconceptualising project knowledge management’ at a UK APM Project Knowledge Management function on Tuesday 4th December 2012.
What better way to begin 2013 than with a new idea about how projects can enable organisations to learn, and how they can deliver projects better in the future.
Many organisations today are struggling with implementing the somewhat unclear concepts of ‘lessons learned’, ‘knowledge capture’ and ‘knowledge management’. This presentation tackles the problems with these concepts head-on and proposes a new practical conceptual model of building organisational knowledge through projects. What is innovative is that this new model has its roots firmly grounded in naturally evolved networked systems.
The new conceptual model is practical and somewhat intuitive when properly understood. At the end of this session you will be able to immediately reconceptualise how your organisation truly learns through projects and could better adapt to its environment.
Dr Jon Whitty is a Senior Lecturer in Project Management at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia. He leads and develops program and project management research and coordinates a Master of Project Management program. Jon is an expert in the application of evolutionary principles to project management matters. He also contributes to the discussion on complex project management and what project management can learn from philosophy.
He has been a member of editorial boards of project management journals, and regularly reviews research and scholarly articles. He frequently present papers at domestic and international project management conferences, and has written book chapters and published articles that present evolutionary and philosophical approaches to project management.
Many of his talks can be found on his YouTube channel
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Talk about Lessons Learned, KM and PM on LinkedIn
Talk about Lessons Learned, KM and PM on LinkedIn. Below are 4 recent LinkedIn posts all about Lessons Learned KM and PM. I have made comments and found some like minded folk who share a passion for Lessons Learned… Enjoy the links and reading
Project Manager Community – Best Group for Project Management
Lessons Learned Meetings – Dumb Idea?
Are waiting to do lessons learned meetings at the end of the project valuable or by then is it too late and they are just dumb?
49 comments
Project Management Link ( Project, Program & Portfolio Managers )
Hello Project Managers, What is “Lessons Learnt” or “Learning from Experience”?Is it about transferring relevant knowledge of an individual to the many?
Is it about “Experience is the best teacher”, and so we should always capture our important experiences and teach them to others?
Is it about not repeating mistakes of the past but repeating its successes?
Is it about collecting the individual tacit knowledge of the organization and transient them into the organization’s wisdom?
Personally I think it all of the above and more.
So my question is do you apply “Learning from Experience” in your organization? If so, how do you do it?
37 comments
PMO – Project Management Office
Learning Lessons from Lessons Learned
Experience is not what happens to a man; it is what a man does with what happens to him. During the last decade of last century, many companies had..
6 comments
We really need to talk about knowledge..
November 28, 2012 at 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM Crowne Plaza Reading
This event requires registration: http://www.apm.org.uk/event/we-really-need-talk-about-knowledge-knowledge-sig-courageous-conversations-event
How do we know what it means to manage a project? In this APM Knowledge SIG Courageous Conversations event, Dr Jon Whitty and Dr Judy Payne invite you to challenge preconceptions about project management knowledge.
Project management knowledge. Knowledge about project management. What is it? Where is it? Who creates it? When is it needed? Why is it important? Where is it used? Who owns it? These are some of the most difficult questions to answer about project management knowledge.
This interactive and stimulating event will address these questions and explore how our preconceptions about knowledge affect the way we feel and act; the role of professional associations; and how knowledge about project management develops – or doesn’t.
Please don’t expect definitive answers. This event is one strand of a conversation that we hope will lead to new concepts, new language, and better understanding of the issues relating to project management knowledge. It’s our profession. We want to encourage a greater confidence in the APM community to talk freely and fearlessly about new ways forward. Are you brave enough to join in?
Labels: Body of Knowledge, project management, professional knowledge
Event Organizer: Judy Payne (Practitioner, consultant and reluctant academic specialising in collaborative working, knowledge management and learning)
PM World Journal: Going Beyond Lessons Learned…
PM World Journal: Going Beyond Lessons Learned… I like it. David Pells is back as the Managing Editor for PM World Journal. You can read the first Volume-Issue at http://pmworldjournal.net/.
As you know I am passionate about lesson learned in the PM community so to have PM World back will only be a positive way forward to help us all share PM Knowledge. I welcome the following comments from the first issue:
“ The new PMWJ also represents a new model for publishing P/PM articles and papers. Going beyond “lessons learned”, we want to aggressively promote publication as a way to capture lessons learned and good practices in P/PM and to share that knowledge with those who may need it most – students, young project managers, and those in project-based organizations, industries and emerging economies around the world. In many cases, those are the ones where better, faster and more efficient delivery of project results can positively impact thousands of human lives.
Knowledge sharing can take many forms, which is why we offer various categories of articles and papers in the new PMWJ – featured papers, advisory articles, commentaries, editorials, case studies, personal stories, news articles. Some new knowledge is based on serious research, or experience on actual programs and projects. New lessons learned or good practices grow from specific applications, the solving of specific problems or participating on successful teams.
Lessons Learned Reports are too often prepared for internal distribution, after which they disappear into company archives, files or book shelves. Where possible, please consider sharing those lessons learned, experiences and successful practices with others around the world. Few are likely to be direct competitors; many readers will be extremely grateful.”
I am encouraged and support the goals of PM World Journal:
- to promote and support the creation of new program and project management (P/PM) knowledge;
- to promote and support the sharing of that knowledge with individuals and organizations new to P/PM or where such knowledge is sorely needed;
- to provide greater recognition and visibility for those who create new P/PM knowledge (authors);
- to provide a robust, easily accessible library of global P/PM knowledge and information; and
- to promote and support the use of modern P/PM for solving global problems.
I know I will be a regular visitor to this site and I plan to participate over my PhD research journey.
Cheers, Stephen
(PMBOK® Guide) — Fifth Edition draft – Lesson Learned comment accepted
A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide) — Fifth Edition draft ‘lesson learned comment accepted with modification’.
The Draft ‘A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide) — Fifth Edition’ is currently open for comments. I have made a couple of reccomendations (refer posted on ).
1) General comment for ‘lessons learned’. I am interested in understanding why Project Management methodologies and PM knowledge books seem to only use the term ‘lessons learned’? Perhaps the Project Management community needs to shift the focus to more knowledge management, which will open up the language we use in organisations. Lessons learned is only one particular element that can be used to share and use project knowledge. …Your feedback would be most welcome.
2) Section: 9.1.1.4 Organizational Process Assets needs to also include ‘Lessons learned from previous projects’
Today feedback was received from PMI.
No. 1 was rejected as ”Recommendation is prescriptive rather than descriptive”…I am ok with this for the present moment. We need to continue working on finding a way to change PMBOK to reflect better Lessons Learned practice. Will leave this for my PhD challenge.
No. 2 was Accepted With Modification…We agree with your basic recommendation. We have modified the sentence and believe that the following re-write addresses your comment: “…Lessons learned on organizational structures that have worked in previous projects; and…”. Happy with the outcome..one lessons learned improvement.
Until next time…
Regards, Stephen
PM voices (PMI)…comments on ‘Build a Business Case for Lessons Learned’
A good discussion on PM lessons learned (PM Voices). From my perspective we Project Managers seem to do well in identification and capturing of lessons learned. I would agree that it works better when the lessons identified are part of the weekly PM process. Where we fail to get traction is with the dissemination and application of lessons learned. If you’re interested in some follow on research in this domain, please have a look at my research blog. http://www.pmlessonslearned.info/ I will be presenting some of my findings at PMOz 2012. Regards, Stephen
A good PM Lessons Learned article by Stephen Jenner (APM Oct 2011)
I recently read ‘Still failing for the same boringly repetitive reasons?‘ by Stephen Jenner in the APM voice of project management (October 2011). Again it struck a cord with the research work I am doing on PM lessons learned. I met Stephen during a tour in Australia in 2010., and he shared with me his thoughts on benefits and lessons learned. The Gateway reports have been a valuable source of reading research material. The following quotes from the APM article really say it all with the problem we have in not learning from our lessons.
‘…knowing-doing gap, ..in many areas of management that good practice is known, but is rarely applied’ ‘The solution isn’t acquiring more knowledge – its learning and applying what already exists…’
Stephen goes on to talk about a major cause is ’the difficulty of identifying lessons to learn’. My research to date would say that we do okay with identifying, however we don’t do well in disseminating / applying our lessons learned, so this is an interesting point he makes. Stephen does talk about ‘ineffective management practices’ in that 80% of UK government departments don’t use Gateway 5 (Benefits Evaluation) and that there is widespread failure in post-implementation reviews. These stats align closely with the Australian experiences to date. The final cause Stephen talks about is the ‘Individual psychology’, where he describes that we suffer from a number of cognitive biases (the strongest is over-confidence). My research to date very much covers the social and cultural cognitive behaviours, so it is good to confirm with Stephens notes.
In closing Stephen describes a ‘solution for ‘A strategy for learning
Action1. Accept that learning doesn’t happend by accident
Action 2. Expect learning and monitor it
Action 3. Seek disconfirming evidence
Action 4. Robust post-implementation review
Action 5. Don’t wait for the post implementation review’
Always great to read articles aligned with ones research topic.
Cheers, Stephen D
Do we learn from risks?
I recently posted on a Risk Management LinkedIn group a question “Do we learned from risks?”
Is it possible to ‘integrate’ risk management and knowledge management (ie lessons learned) in a project management environment?
Please share your experiences…
I received a number of good responses that will all help with understanding the KM, RM and PM variables associated with learning from risks.
….extract from the group post 29April2012:
To Justin, Jacquetta, Garth, Rick, Peter, Quinton and ir Peter, very much appreciate you for all sharing and making comments.
@Garth, I like the comments on cultural/systemic risk
@ Rick, I like the anti-mistake solution 
@Quinton, I agree that Knowledge Management (KM) is much more than Lessons Learned which is why I get frustrated in the PM circles of PMBoK and PRINCE2 etc looks like we have a common interest in the role of KM in project Risk Management (RM)…
One thing I am struggling with is that both KM systems and RM systems don’t seem to be well integrated and yet they both play an important role in capturing/managing uncertainty and project success. My experience shoes that KM systems contain a lot of risk related information that one does not find in RM systems.
I am currently researching PM Lessons Learned (http://www.pmlessonslearned.info) and this alignment with risk management is a key variable of interest for me.
If anyone else has some learning’s to share, please comment or contact/connect with me privately.
Regards, Stephen