Funny how I cannot think 'Jazz' now without thinking of Stuart Henshall, who (in his Unbound Spiral weblog) is fond of talking about jazz -- "jazz communities," "jazz blogging," "jazz in the blogosphere," "'actionable' jazz," "group jazz," "jazz quadrants" -- you get the picture.
Jazz is a wonderful forum for 'co-creation' - reminding me of Charles Mingus' 'Free Jazz' and the spontaneous 'co-creation' he inspired in the music, methods, and musicians that he was famous for bringing together.
And so this morning, as I was catching up on my knowledge 'news' reading, imagine my glee at finding the following title within my 'knowledge management' search -- Play Management Symphonies Like Jazz.
In this article, for The Financial Express, Mrityunjay B Athreya reviews --The Future of Competition by C K Prahalad and Venkat Ramaswamy, and the authors' [referred to in the following excerpt of this article as 'PR'] interpretation of the concept of 'co-creation.' [Strong emphasis throughout the citation below is mine...]
As an aside -- Mrityunjay B Athreya also makes wide usage of the term 'consumer' [twenty-nine mentions actually] and I cannot help but feel my friend Jerry Michalski cringing and gritting his teeth! [click on Jerry's name above and read his one year old but still most excellent post on the utilization of the word 'consumer.']
PR claim that company, competitor, partner, collaborator, investor, consumer are all equal. The market is not a target to be attacked, but a forum to be involved in.
What kind of core competences are required for success in co-creation? They also change, understandably. Product management has to learn to also benefit from others' competences. Top managements have to create the environment for information, resource reallocation, experimentation and quick response.
Arthur Koestler's model in the Act of Creation showed that insights arise in intersecting matrices of knowledge and experience. While information can be streamlined into a system, emerging knowledge is inherent in individuals and their experiences.
During my involvement with Siemens AG, as mentor for Asia Pacific during 1996-1999, the company invested 500 million marks in creating an internal knowledge management landscape. It is common experience that it is easier to install the hardware and software, but harder to get people to use the intranet-based system. There is need for a culture of generosity in entering and sharing one's accumulating, experiential knowledge, and the humility to access other people's knowledge, in the interest of problem-solving and value creation.
Co-creation brings the added opportunity, and complexity of widening KM to involve the consumers. PR identify seven layers of such a Knowledge Environment. In the context of co-creation, the concept of strategy also undergoes change. It can no longer be unilaterally set by the top management. The initial model of strategy, from Harvard Business School (HBS), enunciated by Edmund Learned and others was a four-step process of funnelling through opportunities, resources, aspirations, and social responsibility...
K-Collector Topics: Hardware Humility Knowledge Management Music Productivity Thinking Weblogs Harvard