Re: Building a documentation knowledgebase

["Gene Kim-Eng" <techwr -at- genek -dot- com>]

Personally, I think there's been entirely too much emphasis in recent years
on promoting business initiatives by convincing people they should be willing
to join in because it will benefit them.  In some cases, management just
needs to wave its big stick and say, "Henceforth, thou shalt do this or else."
In the OP's case, this is what seems to have happened, and though it is
certainly possible to take issue with whether it's the right road to take from
a technical viewpoint, the fact that management is willing to start down *any*
road to a corporate kb is half the battle won...*if* management has and is
willing to use the clout to move the company forward.  So while I might have
been willing to make a different suggestion to management had I been asked
in the early stages, now that management has issued its directive, what I
would do is get on board the train, push that common template like it's the
best idea I've ever heard and start whispering in someone's ear my thoughts 
for the *next* step in the process.

Gene Kim-Eng


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mark Baker" <listsub -at- analecta -dot- com>

> I think this is an oversimplification. Certainly adopting a common template
> is simpler than working with a knowledge base. But people's willingness to
> adopt a new process is not based primarily on how easy or difficult it is to
> do, but on whether they see a real benefits either to themselves or to
> people that they care about (which may be the company, the customers, or
> their colleagues in the next department). If people do think a knowledge
> base will benefit them, they may be willing to use it, despite the
> difficulties, and if the don't think that the common template will benefit
> them, then they probably won't be willing to use it, even if it is easy to
> do so.
> 
> Understand, I'm not saying that people will feel that a knowledge base will
> benefit them. They may or they may not. Ditto on the common template. I'm
> simply pointing out that motive is more important than difficulty in judging
> people's likelihood of accepting change.



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