Monday, June 12, 2017

Knowledge Management

KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
                                                                            
-Dr. N. H. DESHPANDE
                                                                  
When everything is changing fast and when we are surrounded by uncertainty, probably the only constant is Knowledge. The companies which can create consistently new knowledge are successful today. What we know, why we know and how we know matters these days. Human minds can alone produce and process knowledge.
Knowledge is a mixture of experience, beliefs, value systems, information and expertise; it is the core asset of every company. Knowledge is neither data nor information alone. Data represents facts and figures which are true and cannot be changed. Information comes from data organized in a meaningful manner. It may or may not be processed. Knowledge is the next step where information is clubbed with past experience and validated on its basis. The last step obviously is wisdom.


Knowledge can be tacit or explicit. Tacit knowledge is personal in nature. Tacit knowledge is subconsciously understood and applied, is difficult to articulate, developed from direct experiences and actions, and is generally shared. Contrary to that explicit knowledge is formal and systematic.

Knowledge is crucial for continued operation and development of organizations. Obviously it is expensive and comes with a price tag. Knowledge is interchangeable, sharable and expandable.

How to create and sustain knowledge in an organization is the million dollar question these days. One way is socialization, formal or informal wherein one individual shares his/her knowledge with another. It can be transferred by observation, imitation and by practicing. Thus other employees begin to internalize it.
Generally after attending an external training programme, we ask the participant to make presentation of his/her learning experience in front of his departmental colleagues. This is one good form of knowledge management. This serves three purposes-
  • Development of internal faculty within organization
  • Sharing can devise plan of action of what newly learnt/acquired knowledge can be implemented/practiced within department/organization.
  • Decisions regarding future deputation or otherwise by HR Department based on the transfer of knowledge that has taken place.

    Another form is when an individual combines discrete pieces of explicit knowledge into a new whole.

Typical problems associated with knowledge can be-
  1. Execution:
    If one spends time in locating appropriate knowledge base, then the speed of execution becomes slow.
  2. Lost Business Opportunities:
    Inability of marketing team to respond customer queries may lead to lost sales.
  3. Time to Market:
    If expertise is not available at opportune time, the entire new product development cycle may get delayed.
  4. Knowledge bottleneck:
    Shortage of a particular skill or expertise can jeopardize the entire operations in an organization.
  5. Retention Issues:
    Organizations often fail to retain knowledge acquired and lessons learned in the past. People just resign/retire and carry the entire knowledge bank with them outside company gates.
  6. Sub standard decisions:
    If knowledge application fails it leads to sub standard decisions taken by the policy makers. This primarily happens since the organization is not aware of what knowledge resources it has and how to capitalize on potential new initiatives.
KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
Organizational success is prima facie decided by the intellectual and system capabilities it owns rather than mere physical assets. How an organization manages its human intellect and converts it into products/services is fast becoming the success mantra.

The process of generating organizational wealth from optimum utilization of knowledge and intellectual assets of an organization is called as knowledge management.

There are five major area of Knowledge Management:
1. Knowledge Acquisition
2. Knowledge Utilization
3. Knowledge Enhancement
4. Knowledge Facilitation
5. Knowledge Implementation
Knowledge Acquisition: It is the starting point of any knowledge management assignment. How knowledge is acquired from various sources and its synthesis is primarily important here.

Knowledge Utilization: Mere acquisition of knowledge will be useless unless it is shared through various ways and means among employees at all levels periodically. What matters is Knowledge transfer.

Knowledge Enhancement: It involves gap analysis between desired and actual knowledge base of the employees. The current and potential knowledge requirements of the employees are systematically and scientifically evaluated with a view to upgrade them in a phased manner.

Knowledge Facilitation: Organizational climate, employee relations, transparency in communication all equally matter when it comes to building knowledge base. A lot depends on enabling processes that take care of the array of emotions and feelings, likes/dislikes, attitudes, sentiments etc; which the employee brings to workplace.

Knowledge Implementation: This is the visible component and comes into existence only when practiced. Alone technology cannot succeed in this process. How the knowledge possessed by employees becomes a part of products, systems, solutions and services is equally important. It has to add value to the end customer.

PHASES OF KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT

(1) Information Technology Based

Management information system using artificial intelligence, reengineering is fast growing and is IT assisted.

Augmentation and Automation ensure that resources are optimally utilized.
Various knowledge tools and technologies go beyond data and information. They facilitate organization of knowledge processes, codification and transfer.

(2) People Based

Philosophers, Psychologists and Management Practitioners emphasize upon acquisition /sharpening of various skills and improvement in human behavior through knowledge route.
They suggest continuous learning and managing of skills and behavior at both levels- individual as well as organizational.
Though knowledge bases are becoming effective support tools, human beings are still necessary for this process to take place. Human intervention is necessary for interpretation and application. Selecting and buying “KM" software, is not the crux of the problem, the issue is how to make it work for the organization sustainable.
Recognizing this, it is better to focus on human resources rather than technologies or processes.

EFFECTIVE KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT

Knowledge Management is complex and thus should not concentrate on just one aspect.  Effective management of knowledge requires hybrid solutions of people and technology.
Human beings are quite accomplished at certain knowledge skills. When we seek to understand knowledge, to interpret it in a broader context,
to combine it with other types of information, or to synthesize various unstructured forms of knowledge, human beings are recommended tools.
Computers and communications systems, on the other hand, are faster when it comes to highly structured knowledge.
Thus for effective Knowledge Management a combination of technology, employee involvement, the infrastructure and culture of an organization is essential.

Advantages of Knowledge Management

1. Supports innovation.
2.   Reduction in cost of new projects.
3.   Enhancement in employee productivity.
4.   Replication of best practices.
5.   Change acceptance and adaptability enhances.

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Friday, June 2, 2017

INDIA SKILLS REPORT-2017

FEW HIGHLIGHTS OF INDIA SKILLS REPORT-2017

(Coverage- 5, 60,000 students across 29 states& 7 Union Territories and 125+ Employers)

Objective of the report:
To create standard reporting guidelines on potential skill supply-demand gap, that can provide insights into the hiring trends of the market while understanding the needs of the job seekers and organizations.

Preamble:           With “ PeopleStrong” as Knowledge Partner , “AICTE” as Academic Partner and “ CII” as India Partner with support from “ Wheebox” ( Online Talent Assessment Company of India) has come up with this report.
Technical Education growth has been phenomenal in the recent past. Total No. of Engineering (UG) and Polytechnics approved by AICTE till the AY 2016-17 are 3285 & 3925 respectively with sanctioned intake of 1553360 and 1244778.
Making this talent pool employable is really a task. The India Skill Report 2017 brought up by CII, People strong, Wheebox, UNDP & AICTE is a step in strengthening the skill landscape through Quantitative and Qualitative assessment of the demand and supply sides of the labor market. It brings on surface, a no. of eye-opening facts which we all should understand thoroughly.
The report highlights the employability factor of the youth from across the country with different educational backgrounds and also highlights needs and expectations of the employers’ thereby facilitating better match.

Facts:    Despite large cross section of population being eligible to work, a no. of jobs simply remain unfilled in the absence of right candidate. India Skills Report 2017 is an effort that aims to take stock of the talent landscape of India-its challenges and impact on economy growth. It captures the skill levels of the supply side, the employability skill assessment test and needs of the demand side of the Talent Supply Chain as captured by India Hiring Intent Survey.  
The survey was carried out across 29 states and 7 Union Territories, 3000 educational campuses all over the country and about 5.6 lakh candidates were assessed on Parameters such as Knowledge, skill aptitude and behavioral components. Skill gaps that emerged out depicted an overall picture of how the students rank in terms of skills that would be imperative to gauge the employability in the coming years.
The other side approached close to 125 employers from 11 major sectors (Manufacturing, IT, ITES, BFSI etc.)

A Brief Snapshot :

The report indicates skill expectations from industry in general. It is interesting to see that domain expertise alone is playing a small role. Other attributes such as Learning ability, performance focus (result orientation), adaptability, interpersonal skills, integrity and values, communication, numerical and logical ability, cultural fitment occupy more space.


The employers have underlined following requirement of skills-

·         Learning Ability (12.78%)
·         Domain expertise (19.30%)
·         Integrity & Values (15.29%)
·         Communication (13.78%)
·         Numerical & logical ability (9.77%)
·         Cultural fitment (10.28%)
·         Adaptability (6%)
·         Result orientation (8.52%)
·         Interpersonal skills (3.76%)

The industry is also clear on its sourcing channels-

Source
Percent
Referrals
23.83%
Job Portals
21.6%
Consultants
20.35%
Social Media
13.76%
Campus
12.75%
Job Fairs
2.7%
Others
5.02%

The report also tries to bring couple of interesting facts. When it comes to capturing best performers in skills, the picture that emerges out is something like this-

English
Numerical Abilities
Critical Thinking
Computer Skills
W.B.
W.B.
Delhi
Rajasthan
Maharashtra
Delhi
W.B.
Delhi
Rajasthan
Maharashtra
Rajasthan
Maharashtra
Telangana
Bihar
Maharashtra
W.B.
U.P.
Haryana
Karnataka
Karnataka
Karnataka
U.P.
Kerala
U.P.
Haryana
A.P.
H.P.
A.P.
A.P.
Kerala
A.P.
T.N.
T.N.
H.P.
Haryana
Telangana
Gujarat
Rajasthan
M.P.
Gujarat

It is interesting to note that states like Maharashtra, Delhi, W.B. and A. P. are there in all the lists, three states (Maharashtra, W.B. and A.P.)have featured in top 10 states based on overall scores. These states therefore are attractive hiring destinations.


AGE WISE EMPLOYABILITY ANALYSIS

Age Group
States having most employable candidates
18-21
W.B. Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Karnataka, U.P. A.P., Haryana, Telangana, Gujarat,  T.N.
22-25
Delhi, U. P. Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Haryana, A.P. T.N. Kerala, W.B.
26-29
Delhi, W.B. Haryana, Bihar, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, U.P. A.P. T.N.

STATES WITH MAX. MALE & FEMALE EMPLOYABLE CANDIDATES
MALE                                                            FEMALE

W.B.                                                                 Rajasthan
Maharashtra                                                      A.P.
Haryana                                                            Karnataka
U.P.                                                                   Telangana
Karnataka                                                         Maharashtra
Gujarat                                                              W.B.
Rajasthan                                                          U.P.
Telangana                                                         Haryana
A.P.                                                                   T.N.
T.N.                                                                   Gujarat

The report further indicates expected salary ranges, which can direct the employers to those states for their hiring requirements-

Salary expected up to 2 L
Salary range 2- 2.6 L
Salary > 2 L
T.N.
U.P.
Maharashtra
A.P.
Gujarat
T.N.
Maharashtra
U.P.
A.P.
Karnataka
Maharashtra
T.N.
U.P.
A.P.
Rajasthan

               
Conclusion:        The Skills Report has created an interesting repository from Industry and Academia on one platform. Some facts that the report has highlighted are- No. of employable candidates has marginally improved over last year. Hiring sentiments are positive with approximate 10% increase in hiring from last year’s numbers. The report has a special segment on female skilling and job market participation which can be discussed separately in near future.

Dr. N. H. DESHPANDE
(SOURCE- INDIA SKILLS REPORT 2017)
Note:- For more details please refer the report.