RE: What's in a name?

["Le Vie, DonaldX S" <donaldx -dot- s -dot- le -dot- vie -at- intel -dot- com>]

OK, Bryan "the toolman" Johnson...here are some ideas to get the process
started..

Here's what I don't like about knowledge "tools": It associates technical
communications professionals with products. If the organization wants to
grow beyond its product-centered role in the organization (which is often
viewed as a support role to development), you should focus on terms that
promote a competency-based role that transcends the limiting paradigm of the
product-centered role. A document-centered perspective of "knowledge" and
the product-centered perspective of our profession confine us to supporting
roles, and completely blinds development and upper management to the core
competencies that we have and they need in a knowledge economy.

I've paraphrased the basic idea of Corey Wick's article in the November
issue of Technical Communication here, but if you want to convey a
cutting-edge image, then you can't be using terms that affirm the "old"
paradigm of documents and products. Knowledge in organizations today is
being recognized  as more of a social construct--which means more attention
is being given to community, context, consensus, and discourse--and how it
is developed, distributed, and refined. 

If you want to be viewed as a knowledge organization, look to some of the
knowledge management books for some ideas. Here are some:

The Knowledge Evolution: Expanding Organizational Intelligence, by Verna
Allee
Empowerment in Organizations: How to Spark Exceptional Performance, by
Judith Vogt and Kenneth Murrell

Good luck, and hand me that 3/8 drive socket, will ya?

Donn Le Vie
Information Engineering
Network Communications Group
Intel


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