'Knowledge is the life–blood of effective decision–making'

Trying to summarise my reflections about the learning points of RDM, and after have read some literature about the decision making process beyond the tools and techniques available to support it, I have reached the conclusion that indeed, knowledge is the keystone of any decision making process, never mind if the problem or situation we are addressing is simple or very complex.

We have seen how powerful and useful DM’s techniques such decision trees, AHP, SMART and so forth are and how they have been designed to include all the different aspects that any decision problem could have, you can adapt the tool according the situation and its particular characteristics. However from my point of view, those techniques are useless if we as decision makers we don’t feed them with the meaningful and reliable information, if the people involved in the process doesn’t have the enough knowledge to address the situation to logical interpret analyze the problem, identify the risks, uncertainties and determining their complexity to appropriate choose the tool and finally when the decision is made, commit to action to implement it.

So knoweldge is everywhere, and as our KBAM web page said, ...is the life-blood of effective decision-making’

: 01 May 2011 00:07 |  Tags: Rdm |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Good decison is not neccesarily good outcome

Robust decisions are based in good decision analysis, we cannot think that decision making as a process is the same that decision trees analysis or grid analysis or any other methodology; therefore we cannot compare the process with the tool or the technique.

The tools that are available to analyze the decision problems have been designed to help the decision maker to see and understand the big picture of the situation including any potential risk, the complexity of the situation as its dynamic, and not to base his/her decision in a basic judgment. (Matheson J.E 2005)

However I think that when we choose one of those tools to analyze the decision problems, in one way we are using our judgment about the tool, like for example, if the information that i have available of the problem, include probabilities so Decision trees would be a good tool to use, and so forth; and from that point of view maybe we are missing some important elements of other tools.

The point would be then,  that regardless a good or bad outcomes, we can  make good decisions, Using of course  tools and methodologies,  taking into consideration risks, uncertainty or any fact that impact the problem we are analyzing, also involving people who has the knowledge of the situation and finally but not less our own judgment.

: 21 Apr 2011 00:55 |  Tags: Rdm |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

The real challenge of KBAM is just starting

Module Week of KBAM is over and im very happy with the presentation results, we worked  hard, we tried to cover a lot, and even when at the end we had to cut off a lot of the research done for the final presentation, the outcome was great.

I think everyone have learnt a lot about not just of the therory of Facilities and Knowledge management but also about how to manage so many information in so little time. That was very good, how the groups could hadled with good pace the presentations and the questions asked.

Something interesting that i havent thought about it, just untill Paul mentioned, was have asked about  what approach the board was expecting from the consultant team, just that  single question, would change everything we did, and that is another key learning point, we cant expected to be told waht to do...but how to do it of course yes!

Now the challenge is other, is how to make it real, how we could as a consultants integrate the knowledge management to any of the assets chosen, from the theorical point of view doesnt look  more complicated that all our previous assignments but in practical seems so different;  because for people any different task not related directly to their jobs is an extratask...fact that lead me to think that we will need, ;eadership, empowerment, motivation and all the tools availables  to get that integration to the task....that is the key part, embed it to their daily life...well to our daily life.... we are the  first change agents.

: 08 Apr 2011 16:20 |  Tags: Kbam |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

What happens to knowledge when we outsource???

Facilities management has been defined as the integration of  those non - core processes that support the main activities of the organizations, some authors argue that the objective of the facilities manager is merely operative and others said that is strategic.

Well i think that is a critical part of the strategy of the organization, for the time being in where  we have tried to cover at maximum all the aspects involved in the theory, seems that even if the organizations are small, those  non core process are vital to make them run, and for that have to be included into the overall strategy of the company.

That’s why i found quite interesting the fact that because its nature of  'non adding value' processes directly to the  main activity of the organization , are the first activities to be thought in outsource, of course make sent, from the point of view of the benefits that the outsourcing processes can bring to the organizations, like focus on the core activities, avoid major investments or reduce costs

However when not just the canteen and housekeeping activities are those which are chosen to be outsourced and maybe Information systems or maintenance activities are included, i wonder what happen with the knowledge?

I mean Knowledge is already quite difficult to capture and manage into the main activities of the organisation itself, and we are learning how to make the most of it, but when we can’t manage the area, process or activity, how we can assure the knowledge is well transferred, how we can also protect the knowledge of those activities provide... even if are not a core -activities?.....

: 05 Apr 2011 12:44 |  Tags: Kbam |  Comments (4) |  Close comments |  Report a problem