Monday, 13 July

The best of times and the worst of times…
Program:
Peter Tobin (GIBS)
Using narratives to grow organizational capital.
This was a pleasant discussion (we participated) with appropriate examples of what a narrative (story) is, how to compile a narrative, how to use it to develop human capital (knowledge) and at the very end a Narrative implementation checklist was given – see handout of slides.
Marietjie Schutte (UP)
Back to planet earth with over a hundred slides on Knowledge management. I will read this again – it looks logical and systematic. If you have a good quality information system in place it can be used for your Knowledge Management initiative. Technology is used as a tool for KM. After an hour of putting Trust into perspective I am convinced knowledge transfer cannot take place without it. I am so thankful for the tea break and brandy cakes….
Judy Sandrock Fostering communities of practice Now I know – heard this buzzword on several occasions and did not comprehend what this is. Read her book: Art of managing knowledge - a practical guide. You need to form communities of practice in your organization in order to extract the tacid knowledge from employees – should be groups that form spontaneously with a leader who is passionate about a specific subject, a facilitator willing to learn about the subject and about 3 core members who also have an interest and passion for the subject. In smaller groups where TRUST is high sharing can take place – keep track (archive) the knowledge gathered for future use. Communities of practice have a shelf life and will dissolve once the common goal have been met.
Ann de Boer
HBDI
Nothing can prepare you for this session – not even the questionnaires we had to complete before the start of this academy….I cannot possibly sum up all of the learning that was done in 3 hours - in a fun and interactive way. We got to know ourselves and our colleagues much better and understand that it takes all sorts of personalities to get the job done. In our group of 20 are mostly green and red people. I am as emotional as they come (especially under duress) and need to work a lot on my blue! and less on my green personality – yellow is sufficiently present. Leaders should be well developed in all four sectors of the brain. This was as much fun as Pomoja.
Dinner speaker: Premilla Hamid gave an inspiring encounter of her rise to being General Manager: Public Affairs of Anglo American SA. You should always try your best and set the bar higher than expected and take all staff member along. Be yourself! You can do anything if you apply yourself to it – take the opportunities!