Championing greater sharing

The final part of building a winning strategy to knowledge and innovation is about creating an environment where sharing happens naturally. When this begins to occur you are well on the way to winning the knowledge game.

The better leaders in business use a range of tactics, to help champion greater sharing. At a practical level it could include the following behaviours:

• Keep your requests nice and simple.

• Make it clear why sharing and exchange is important.

• Ask of others what you would be prepared to do yourself.

• Anticipate awkward situations in advance.

• Start with safe and easy matters, then move to more sensitive and challenging issues

• Always offer to help them in return.

• Thank people for their involvement whatever the outcome or contribution.

Developing this skill is vitally important given that, more likely than not, the person you wish to share with will have no formal reporting relationship with you. This is increasingly the case in modern business where people are working with many people in a complex web of relationships and reporting channels cross time and place. It is not uncommon for people to have four or five people to whom they report in any given day. In these situations we have to work extra hard to gain their commitment and trust before we can expect anything in return.

Here the primary goal is to encourage open sharing, irrespective of hierarchy, status or background, so that where people wish to share it is very difficult for them to miss out. Also there is a clear recognition that sharing can take time and effort. So a little administrative support then rewarding contributors and giving social credit can help sway the balance in your favour.

In saying this, we do need to see the difference between just chatting aimlessly and exploring what matters. People often say to me, ˜we do knowledge sharing we have meetings . From years of observation, such gatherings only go through the motions . They are full of tightly controlled agendas , assumptions that have not been discussed and never to be revealed viewpoints. The fact is that when you experience knowledge sharing at its best you can certainly feel the difference because it is full of excellent dialogue, commitment and a desire to take responsibility.

Again we need to champion the cause of winning the knowledge game by first being prepared to open hearts and minds. If our personal behaviour is at odds with what we expect of others, we can hardly expect others to assist. See it as your personal goal to be a role model of greater collaboration, networking and celebration of knowing. Coach people to take responsibility for what they are passionate about. Encourage people to discover and learn together. Be generous with your knowledge.