THE LIBRARIAN’S ROLE IN KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
This brochure is a synopsis of the poster. For complete details please contact the author.
Examples of how librarians can assist their team in a KM project:
IT is often an integral part of a knowledge-driven plan. But KM is first and foremost about people. Librarians, who have a strong service focus, are qualified at helping their team members understand that workers’ needs come before technological bells and whistles.
If the team is working with information software then the librarians, who evaluate these types of tools as part of their regular duties, are well suited to act as team liaison to the organization's IM or computer department.
Librarians deal with information transfer on a daily basis and can play a pivotal role in facilitating the team’s conceptualization of a knowledge transfer environment.
LIBRARIANS AS KNOWLEDGE MANAGERS HOW TO BE A KEY PLAYER ON PROJECT TEAMS
Don’t fall into the trap of trying to categorize everything … My information can be your knowledge. Your knowledge can be my information. ─ M.C. Rumizen KM TERMS Data are discrete bits of self-contained facts. Information is data that has been arranged and has contextual meaning. Knowledge is information put into action. Knowledge Management is an organized method by which the intellectual capital of an organization is created, captured, and shared. Explicit Knowledge can be spoken, recorded, and transmitted. Tacit Knowledge includes “knowhow,” judgment, experience, and insight.
Susan M. Frey, MS, MLS 700 Orthopaedic Drive Warsaw, IN 46581-0988 Phone (574) 372-7712 Fax (574) 267-3605
[email protected]
2003
No portion of this brochure may be reproduced without permission from the author.
Poster presented at the Midwest Chapter of the Medical Library Association Annual Meeting Indianapolis, Indiana September 22, 2003
ABSTRACT
THE PROBLEM
What do librarians do when their users cry, “We are wasting time and money tracking and re-tracking the same information!” At DePuy Orthopaedics we teamed up with colleagues from other departments to devise a knowledgebased solution to the problem. Over the years individual departments tried to handle their information needs by themselves, many without the benefit of IT or a standardized methodology. This created information isolation within each department. To remedy the situation the Clinical Research Department approached the DePuy librarians and asked if we would be willing to work with them in finding a solution to this problem. This was an opportunity for the librarians to contribute in the development of a key knowledge management project by collaborating with colleagues from other departments to devise a plan for locating the data and making it available to all employees on a web-based platform. Effective knowledge management builds not only on those with informational, behavioral, and technological expertise but also on people with valuable, often undocumented institutional knowledge. Because of this, interdepartmental teamwork is worthwhile in developing and maintaining knowledge systems. This poster describes the Product Article Database Project to date and reviews aspects of what was learned of the librarian’s role in the processing, preservation, and distillation of knowledge.
In the Spring of 2002 the Statistical Director of the Clinical Research Department approached the librarians to ask if we could help devise a strategy for handling the tracking of documents describing clinical trials of DePuy orthopedic products. This information consisted of white papers, journal articles, and conference papers. Since these documents were stored in the file cabinets, binders, and folders of a variety of individuals and teams throughout the company, there was no central resource to consult. Often new employees approached seasoned colleagues to identify and locate the information. Even then, it was unclear if the colleague consulted had collected all the relevant papers or whether anyone had recorded how the information is being used. Critical intelligence was being overlooked because the gathering and dissemination of these papers was being performed on an ad hoc basis. Because of this, employees were asking themselves these types of questions: I have a Medline search performed by one of the librarians on our Sigma knee product line. Did last year’s team look through these references? This white paper is just what we need for our project. I wonder if our overseas offices are using this paper in any way? What documents were consulted on the AML hip project 5 years ago? Did someone make a list of useful/not useful references?
THE SOLUTION
It was evident that a searchable database of full text scholarly articles, white papers, and conference paper abstracts including notes on how the information is being used would serve the needs of the entire company. By collecting the information and mounting it on the library Intranet it would be possible to bring it to the desktops of employees worldwide. This instrument is named the Product Article Database. The way the system works, as based on the demonstration of the pilot, is that a user from any DePuy worldwide location connects to the library Intranet that runs on a server located in Warsaw, Indiana. The user initiates a search in the library’s online catalog to access records that are a part of the Product Article Database. The system pulls up a record that contains the bibliographic reference to a white paper, conference paper, or peer-reviewed journal article. Experiential information on how DePuy employees use this document and additional background notes are included in the record. (These notes are tacit knowledge transformed into explicit knowledge.) The user can also link to the full text document along with the bibliographic record and background notes and download the files into her or his desktop, laptop, or handheld. The pilot was approved in January of 2003 and the team is now working on completing the project and in discussing future plans.
