Creating and Using Knowledge in a Digital Economy: NRCan in the 21st Century

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Creating and Using Knowledge in a Digital
Economy NRCan in the 21st Century
Information Management Day September 7,
2001 Albert Simard

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Opening Thoughts
Since it is axiomatic that a firms greatest
asset is its knowledge, then the firm that fails
to generate new knowledge will probably cease to
exist. Thomas Davenport (1998)
In an economy where the only certainty is
uncertainty, the one sure source of lasting
competitive advantage is knowledge. Ikujiro
Nonaka (1998)
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Outline

• Knowledge economy
• Creating knowledge
• Managing knowledge
• Sharing knowledge
• Using knowledge

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Challenges at the dawn of the 21st Century
Information Society
GlobalConnectivity
KnowledgeEconomy
Extended Organizations
Merging Technologies
Career-Long Learning
Accelerating Change
EnvironmentalStewardship
Sustainable Development
FiniteResources
Source US National Science Foundation, 2001
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Knowledge-Based Economy

• Success based on what you know not what you own
• Value of goods based on knowledge content
• Creating and using knowledge is the key
• Internet runs two ways Canada must participate
• Organizations must change or become irrelevant

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Knowledge 101

• Data - What are the Facts?
• (observations and measurements)
• Information - What do they mean?
• (interpretation within a context)
• Knowledge - How does it work?
• (relations between things, cause effect)
• Wisdom - What should I do?
• (experience and judgment)

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Knowledge Organization
Preservation
Lost Knowledge
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Creating Knowledge
Process
Value
Organization
(mandate, resources, culture)
Content
(facts, meaning, understanding)
(computers, communication)
Technology
Data
Information
Knowledge
Application
Production Stage
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Creating Knowledge - Steps

• Search for existing knowledge
• Acquire content
• Manage databases
• Transform data into information
• Synthesize new knowledge
• Produce knowledge products
• Disseminate knowledge products
• Use knowledge to solve problems

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Creating Knowledge on the Web

• Descriptive - program descriptions
• Static - reports, publications
• Updated - inventories, statistics
• Dynamic - information systems
• Interactive - decision-support systems

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Creating Knowledge is not Enough

• Bell Labs lasers
• Xerox graphical user interface, object-oriented
  programming, laser printer, Ethernet
• IBM, DEC mainframe computers
• CERN World-Wide Web
• Encyclopaedia Britannica synthesizing knowledge

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Knowledge Management Perspectives
Escher - Relativity
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Knowledge Management

• Capacity building
• resources, infrastructure, content
• Organizational context
• governance, culture, learning
• Integration
• vertical, horizontal, external

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Discovery Search Engine
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NRCan Access to Knowledge Policy
High
Specific cost and restriction circumstances
Specific cost circumstances
Goal of proposed policy
Cost
Specific restriction circumstances
Desired general state
None
Access
Restricted
Unrestricted
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Integrating Content
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Knowledge Management Framework
Knowledge Management
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Sharing Knowledge
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Knowledge Flow Regulators

• Context - issues, social, economic, nature
• Institutional - organization, national,
  international
• Content - domain, provider, user
• Technology - computers, communication, networks
• Infrastructure - interoperability, metadata,
  systems

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Science Technology ClusterA Business Model
Supply (Providers)
Providers and users connect through an ST
Information Market
Demand (Users)
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The ST Provider Face
Government ST organizations
Provider Face
Non-Government organizations interested in ST
Businesses that share ST
Universities, colleges, institutes, schools
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The ST User Face
Businesses that need ST for innovation and growth
User Face
Scientists, managers, professionals, specialists
Policy advisors, decision makers, regulators
public, educators, youth, seniors, media,
communities
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All together now
Subjects
Expertise
About ST
Creating Knowledge
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ST Cluster Portal Context
Canada Site
Business Services
Individual Services
International Services
Sub-Portals
Other Related Clusters
Public Institutions
ENRFAH
ST Practitioners
Policy
Academe
Canadians
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Just consider
Jean-Yves Paquette,Young entrepreneur
Gloria Weisman,environmental policy analyst
Haig Acterian,Forester
Dorothy Jones,retired, gardener
Zachary (Zak) Walsh, 13,Mrs. Joness
grandson budding scientist
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Temperature Departures from Normal
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Analysis of Energy Project
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Canada - Land Cover
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Threatened Species
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Distribution of Black Spruce
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Plant Hardiness Zones of Canada
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Identifying an Insect
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To Summarize

• S T have been connected for about four
  decades.
• S T are beginning to make their knowledge more
  useful.
• Like an iceberg, Government On-Line represents
  only the visible tip of the total KM structure.
• The vision of creating and managing knowledge
  looks beyond Electronic Service Delivery by 2004.
• Two E-Clusters focus on creating as well as
  disseminating knowledge.
• Innovation projects are beginning to be funded
  (tactile maps, Digital Commons for Heritage,
  Ecosystems On-Line).

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Closing Thoughts

• Knowledge of the universe wouldsomehow
  bedefective were no practical results to
  follow.
• Cicero (106-43 BC)

Goods in any storehouse are useless until
somebody takes them out and puts them to the use
they were intended for. That applies to what man
stores in his brain too. Tomas Watson (1874-1956)
founder, IBM