How Creativity Sparks Next-Level Knowledge Management

Do you want to realize the potential of knowledge within your organization? Be aspirational in your knowledge management practices?

Many organizations don't recognize the full value of the knowledge within their firms — both the knowledge that's documented and, more importantly, the knowledge that's not documented. They treat knowledge as an afterthought, something that just happens.

Managing Documented Knowledge vs. Tacit Knowledge

Taking care of the documented knowledge, which is also called information, is relatively straightforward: create a document or some other artifact, put it in a repository, tag it with metadata to make it searchable, and give people access to it. Access is set according to the sensitivity level of the information within and the person’s need for that information. With information, there's a life cycle: it's checked periodically for updates and relevance, whether it's still being used, or not, and when it reaches the end of its time, it's archived or deleted, depending on what it is.

Managing tacit knowledge, the knowledge that's unable to be documented, is more difficult. Successfully managing this type of knowledge involves taking care of employees. Employees need tools to do their jobs, and time and space to reflect on problems and challenges. When you treat them well, they want to stay and contribute to the organization’s success rather than leave and take their knowledge and experience elsewhere. It boils down to creating a culture of trust, curiosity and continuous learning.

Related Article: The Revitalization of Knowledge Management

A Sustainable Approach to Knowledge Management

So how do you realize the potential within your organization? The first thing is to align with the organization's vision, to enable sustainability and be socially responsible. Sustainability relates not only to the products you produce, but also to the sustainability of your people and how you treat and engage them in your organization.

Knowledge is the lifeblood of your organization, so we will look at this question from a knowledge management perspective. Knowledge runs through all your processes and activities, and it’s what makes your organization successful or not. So, what is your vision for knowledge management? Is it sustainable and holistic? Are you looking at ways to support the knowledge in your organization through people and processes and not just technology? Is it sustainable from a human perspective? Are you looking at knowledge holistically from its creation through to its archiving or deletion? What do people need to create new knowledge and capture it, if it can be captured? Does the technology align with and support their processes, the language they use, and what they need to be creative and to problem-solve?

How Creativity Helps Us Explore Possibilities

Arts-based interventions challenge individuals to think through visual, auditory and dramatic means, using activities like drawing and painting, improvisation and music to engage different parts of our brains than we use when we're being analytical and process-oriented. Arts-based interventions engage the parts of the brain associated with emotions, memory and reasoning. This results in cognitive flexibility or neuro-plasticity. These are all good things when we're talking about problem-solving, sustainable leadership and decision-making.

Creativity is what differentiates us from AI and yet it's been educated out of us in the drive to be efficient and effective, analytical and rational. And yet to do our best work demands elements of creativity, flexibility, curiosity, continuous learning and problem-solving. This is especially true today, in a world that is volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous.

Creativity enables sustainable leadership behaviors and helps us see the big picture, recognize the interconnectedness of things, allows us to develop a sense of purpose and enlightened self-interest, as well as to consider others. Creativity helps us take a longer-term orientation, rather than what matters in the next 90 seconds. It enables our courage, integrity, curiosity, open-mindedness and helps us build relationships. A creative mindset allows us to appreciate both details and the bigger picture, all of which are critical to making our organizations sustainable from an environmental as well as a human perspective.

We can learn from artists how to tap into our creativity. They’re curious, iterative, passionate, resilient and aren’t afraid of failure. They iterate to see what does and doesn’t work and create a culture of flexibility, passion, freedom, purpose and variety; keeping us engaged, interested and curiously learning.

Getting Back in Touch With Our Creativity

We need to prepare people to be creative, to be problem solvers, to cope with the world and the pace of change, the chaos and confusion. Using art does that. And it makes our knowledge management practices productive in a whole new way.

Art can be used for many purposes, including as instruments for team building, communication, training, leadership development, problem-solving and innovation. The impact art has on a personal as well as leadership, cultural and team level makes it ideal to apply to the strategic processes of transformation.

When we're talking about aspirational KM, Arts-based Interventions (ABIs) fit in as an instrument for tactical activities like team building, innovation and for strategic processes of transformation. I encourage you to seek out your knowledge management team and engage them in this discussion, encourage them to take a holistic view of knowledge and the humans that create and use it.

Bringing art into our work routines can be as easy as using visualizations or creative ice breakers, such as scribble drawings, to get people out of their comfort zones. When we have time, activities like improv or painting can encourage greater transformation, curiosity, learning and resilience.

Making art based interventions a regular part of working can transform how knowledge flows within our organizations. They create a knowledge-sharing culture and help people be more innovative. On a personal level, ABIs can help improve people's wellness, mental health engagement and agency. On an organizational level, they improve effectiveness, efficiency, productivity and sustainability. Art provides the missing piece in knowledge management efforts, helping with problem-solving and the amplification of learning, which in turn allows knowledge to grow.

The use of art and other creativity-activating activities makes knowledge creation and application more holistic and balanced. Taking this approach gives any organization a competitive advantage over the organizations that are stuck in the past, in old models and ways of thinking.

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